Fairy Legends And Traditions Of The South Of Ireland - free ebook by Thomas Crofton Croker

FAIRY LEGENDS AND TRADITIONS OF THE SOUTH OF IRELAND.

BY T. CROFTON CROCKER. A New Edition. WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS, AFTER DESIGNS OF THE AUTHOR AND OTHERS. “Come l’araba Fenice Che ci sia, ognun lo dice; Dove sia, nessun lo sa.”— Metastasio. Philadelphia: LEA AND BLANCHARD. 1844....

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PREFACE.

The erudite Lessing styles a preface “the history of a book.” Now, though there can be no necessity for a preface in that sense of the word to the reprint of a work of mere whim, which has been nearly ten years before the public, yet a few words are requisite to prevent the present condensed and revised edition from being considered an abridgment. However compact may be the mode of printing adopted, the act of compressing into one volume the three in which the “Fairy Legends” originally appeared

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TO THE DOWAGER LADY CHATTERTON.

CASTLE MAHON. The Wood Engravings after Designs by Mr. Brooke, R. H. A. , Mr. M c Clise , and the Author. Irish FAIRY LEGENDS. “Look there! look there, mammy!” FAIRY LEGENDS. THE SHEFRO. ————————“Fairy Elves Whose midnight revels, by a forest side Or fountain some belated peasant sees, Or dreams he sees, while over-head the Moon Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth Wheels her pale course.”— Milton. LEGENDS OF THE SHEFRO....

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THE LEGEND OF KNOCKSHEOGOWNA. I.

In Tipperary is one of the most singularly shaped hills in the world. It has got a peak at the top like a conical nightcap thrown carelessly over your head as you awake in the morning. On the very point is built a sort of lodge, where in the summer the lady who built it and her friends used to go on parties of pleasure; but that was long after the days of the fairies, and it is, I believe, now deserted. But before lodge was built, or acre sown, there was close to the head of this hill a large pa

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THE LEGEND OF KNOCKFIERNA.[2] II.

It is a very good thing not to be any way in dread of the fairies, for without doubt they have then less power over a person; but to make too free with them, or to disbelieve in them altogether, is as foolish a thing as man, woman, or child can do. It has been truly said, that “good manners are no burden,” and that “civility costs nothing;” but there are some people fool-hardy enough to disregard doing a civil thing, which, whatever they may think, can never harm themselves or any one else, and

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THE LEGEND OF KNOCKGRAFTON. III.

There was once a poor man who lived in the fertile glen of Aherlow, at the foot of the gloomy Galtee mountains, and he had a great hump on his back: he looked just as if his body had been rolled up and placed upon his shoulders; and his head was pressed down with the weight so much, that his chin, when he was sitting, used to rest upon his knees for support. The country people were rather shy of meeting him in any lonesome place, for though, poor creature, he was as harmless and as inoffensive a

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THE PRIEST’S SUPPER. IV.

It is said by those who ought to understand such things, that the good people, or the fairies, are some of the angels who were turned out of heaven, and who landed on their feet in this world, while the rest of their companions, who had more sin to sink them, went down further to a worse place. Be this as it may, there was a merry troop of the fairies, dancing and playing all manner of wild pranks on a bright moonlight evening towards the end of September. The scene of their merriment was not fa

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THE BREWERY OF EGG-SHELLS. V.

It may be considered impertinent, were I to explain what is meant by a changeling; both Shakspeare and Spenser have already done so, and who is there unacquainted with the Midsummer Night’s Dream [6] and the Fairy Queen? [7] Now Mrs. Sullivan fancied that her youngest child had been changed by “fairies’ theft,” to use Spenser’s words, and certainly appearances warranted such a conclusion; for in one night her healthy, blue-eyed boy had become shrivelled up into almost nothing, and never ceased s

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LEGEND OF BOTTLE HILL. VI.

It was in the good days, when the little people, most impudently called fairies, were more frequently seen than they are in these unbelieving times, that a farmer, named Mick Purcell, rented a few acres of barren ground in the neighbourhood of the once celebrated preceptory of Mourne, situated about three miles from Mallow, and thirteen from “the beautiful city called Cork.” Mick had a wife and family: they all did what they could, and that was but little, for the poor man had no child grown up

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THE CONFESSIONS OF TOM BOURKE. VII.

Tom Bourke lives in a low long farm-house, resembling in outward appearance a large barn, placed at the bottom of the hill, just where the new road strikes off from the old one, leading from the town of Kilworth to that of Lismore. He is of a class of persons who are a sort of black swans in Ireland; he is a wealthy farmer. Tom’s father had, in the good old times, when a hundred pounds were no inconsiderable treasure, either to lend or spend, accommodated his landlord with that sum at interest;

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FAIRIES OR NO FAIRIES. VIII.

John Mulligan was as fine an old fellow as ever threw a Carlow spur into the sides of a horse. He was, besides, as jolly a boon companion over a jug of punch as you would meet from Carnsore Point to Bloody Farland. And a good horse he used to ride; and a stiffer jug of punch than his was not in nineteen baronies. May be he stuck more to it than he ought to have done—but that is nothing whatever to the story I am going to tell. John believed devoutly in fairies; and an angry man was he if you dou

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THE HAUNTED CELLAR. IX.

There are few people who have not heard of the Mac Carthies—one of the real old Irish families, with the true Milesian blood running in their veins, as thick as buttermilk. Many were the clans of this family in the south; as the Mac Carthy-more—and the Mac Carthy-reagh—and the Mac Carthy of Muskerry; and all of them were noted for their hospitality to strangers, gentle and simple. But not one of that name, or of any other, exceeded Justin Mac Carthy, of Ballinacarthy, at putting plenty to eat an

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MASTER AND MAN. X.

Billy Mac Daniel was once as likely a young man as ever shook his brogue at a patron, emptied a quart, or handled a shillelagh: fearing for nothing but the want of drink; caring for nothing but who should pay for it; and thinking of nothing but how to make fun over it: drunk or sober, a word and a blow was ever the way with Billy Mac Daniel; and a mighty easy way it is of either getting into or ending a dispute. More is the pity, that through the means of his drinking, and fearing and caring for

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THE LITTLE SHOE. XI.

“Now tell me, Molly,” said Mr. Coote to Molly Cogan, as he met her on the road one day, close to one of the old gateways of Kilmallock, [14] “did you ever hear of the Cluricaune?” “Is it the Cluricaune? why, then, sure I did, often and often; many’s the time I heard my father, rest his soul! tell about ’em.” “But did you ever see one, Molly, yourself?” “Och! no, I never see one in my life; but my grandfather, that’s my father’s father, you know, he see one, one time, and caught him too.” “Caught

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THE BANSHEE. XII.

The Reverend Charles Bunworth was rector of Buttevant, in the county of Cork, about the middle of the last century. He was a man of unaffected piety, and of sound learning; pure in heart, and benevolent in intention. By the rich he was respected, and by the poor beloved; nor did a difference of creed prevent their looking up to “ the minister ” (so was Mr. Bunworth called by them) in matters of difficulty and in seasons of distress, confident of receiving from him the advice and assistance that

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LEGENDS OF THE BANSHEE. XIII.

The family of Mac Carthy have for some generations possessed a small estate in the county of Tipperary. They are the descendants of a race, once numerous and powerful in the south of Ireland; and though it is probable that the property they at present hold is no part of the large possessions of their ancestors, yet the district in which they live is so connected with the name of Mac Carthy by those associations which are never forgotten in Ireland, that they have preserved with all ranks a sort

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THE SPIRIT HORSE. XIV.

The history of Morty Sullivan ought to be a warning to all young men to stay at home, and to live decently and soberly if they can, and not to go roving about the world. Morty, when he had just turned of fourteen, ran away from his father and mother, who were a mighty respectable old couple, and many and many a tear they shed on his account. It is said they both died heart-broken for his loss: all they ever learned about him was that he went on board of a ship bound to America. Thirty years afte

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DANIEL O’ROURKE. XV.

People may have heard of the renowned adventures of Daniel O’Rourke, but how few are there who know that the cause of all his perils, above and below, was neither more nor less than his having slept under the walls of the Phooka’s tower! I knew the man well; he lived at the bottom of Hungry Hill, just at the right hand side of the road as you go towards Bantry. An old man was he at the time that he told me the story, with gray hair, and a red nose; and it was on the 25th of June, 1813, that I he

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THE CROOKENED BACK. XVI.

Peggy Barrett was once tall, well shaped, and comely. She was in her youth remarkable for two qualities, not often found together, of being the most thrifty housewife, and the best dancer in her native village of Ballyhooley. But she is now upwards of sixty years old; and during the last ten years of her life, she has never been able to stand upright. Her back is bent nearly to a level; yet she has the freest use of all her limbs that can be enjoyed in such a posture; her health is good, and her

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FIOR USGA. XVII.

A little way beyond the Gallows Green of Cork, and just outside the town, there is a great lough of water, where people in the winter go and skate for the sake of diversion; but the sport above the water is nothing to what is under it, for at the very bottom of this lough there are buildings and gardens, far more beautiful than any now to be seen, and how they came there was in this manner. Long before Saxon foot pressed Irish ground, there was a great king called Core, whose palace stood where

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THE LEGEND OF LOUGH GUR. XIX.

Larry Cotter had a farm on one side of Lough Gur, [17] and was thriving in it, for he was an industrious proper sort of man, who would have lived quietly and soberly to the end of his days, but for the misfortune that came upon him, and you shall hear how that was. He had as nice a bit of meadow-land, down by the water-side, as ever a man would wish for; but its growth was spoiled entirely on him, and no one could tell how. One year after the other it was all ruined just in the same way: the bou

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THE ENCHANTED LAKE. XX.

In the west of Ireland there was a lake, and no doubt it is there still, in which many young men had been at various times drowned. What made the circumstance remarkable was, that the bodies of the drowned persons were never found. People naturally wondered at this: and at length the lake came to have a bad repute. Many dreadful stories were told about that lake; some would affirm, that on a dark night its waters appeared like fire—others would speak of horrid forms which were seen to glide over

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THE LEGEND OF O’DONOGHUE. XXI.

In an age so distant that the precise period is unknown, a chieftain named O’Donoghue ruled over the country which surrounds the romantic Lough Lean, now called the lake of Killarney. Wisdom, beneficence, and justice, distinguished his reign, and the prosperity and happiness of his subjects were their natural results. He is said to have been as renowned for his warlike exploits as for his pacific virtues; and as a proof that his domestic administration was not the less rigorous because it was mi

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THE LADY OF GOLLERUS. XXII.

On the shore of Smerwick harbour, one fine summer’s morning, just at day-break, stood Dick Fitzgerald “shoghing the dudeen,” which may be translated, smoking his pipe. The sun was gradually rising behind the lofty Brandon, the dark sea was getting green in the light, and the mists, clearing away out of the valleys, went rolling and curling like the smoke from the corner of Dick’s mouth. “’Tis just the pattern of a pretty morning,” said Dick, taking the pipe from between his lips, and looking tow

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FLORY CANTILLON’S FUNERAL. XXIII.

The ancient burial-place of the Cantillon family was on an island in Ballyheigh Bay. This island was situated at no great distance from the shore, and at a remote period was overflowed in one of the encroachments which the Atlantic has made on that part of the coast of Kerry. The fishermen declare they have often seen the ruined walls of an old chapel beneath them in the water, as they sailed over the clear green sea, of a sunny afternoon. [19] However this may be, it is well known that the Cant

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THE WONDERFUL TUNE. XXV.

Maurice Connor was the king, and that’s no small word, of all the pipers in Munster. He could play jig and planxty without end, and Ollistrum’s March, and the Eagle’s Whistle, and the Hen’s Concert, and odd tunes of every sort and kind. But he knew one, far more surprising than the rest, which had in it the power to set every thing dead or alive dancing. In what way he learned it is beyond my knowledge, for he was mighty cautious about telling how he came by so wonderful a tune. At the very firs

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THE GOOD WOMAN. XXVI.

In a pleasant and not unpicturesque valley of the White Knight’s country, at the foot of the Galtee mountains, lived Larry Dodd and his wife Nancy. They rented a cabin and a few acres of land, which they cultivated with great care, and its crops rewarded their industry. They were independent and respected by their neighbours; they loved each other in a marriageable sort of way, and few couples had altogether more the appearance of comfort about them. Larry was a hard working, and, occasionally,

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HANLON’S MILL. XXVII.

One fine summer’s evening Michael Noonan went over to Jack Brien’s, the shoemaker, at Ballyduff, for the pair of brogues which Jack was mending for him. It was a pretty walk the way he took, but very lonesome; all along by the river-side, down under the oak-wood, till he came to Hanlon’s mill, that used to be, but that had gone to ruin many a long year ago. Melancholy enough the walls of that same mill looked; the great old wheel, black with age, all covered over with moss and ferns, and the bus

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THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN. XXIX.

“God speed you, and a safe journey this night to you, Charley,” ejaculated the master of the little sheebeen house at Ballyhooley after his old friend and good customer, Charley Culnane, who at length had turned his face homewards, with the prospect of as dreary a ride and as dark a night as ever fell upon the Blackwater, along the banks of which he was about to journey. Charley Culnane knew the country well, and, moreover, was as bold a rider as any Mallow-boy that ever rattled a four-year-old

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DIARMID BAWN, THE PIPER XXX.

One stormy night Patrick Burke was seated in the chimney corner smoking his pipe quite contentedly after his hard day’s work; his two little boys were roasting potatoes in the ashes, while his rosy daughter held a splinter [26] to her mother, who, seated on a siesteen, [27] was mending a rent in Patrick’s old coat; and Judy, the maid, was singing merrily to the sound of her wheel, that kept up a beautiful humming noise, just like the sweet drone of a bagpipe. Indeed they all seemed quite content

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TEIGUE OF THE LEE. XXXI.

“I can’t stop in the house—I won’t stop in it for all the money that is buried in the old castle of Carrigrohan. If ever there was such a thing in the world!—to be abused to my face night and day, and nobody to the fore doing it! and then, if I’m angry, to be laughed at with a great roaring ho, ho, ho! I won’t stay in the house after to-night, if there was not another place in the country to put my head under.” This angry soliloquy was pronounced in the hall of the old manor-house of Carrigrohan

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NED SHEEHY’S EXCUSE. XXXII.

Ned Sheehy was servant-man to Richard Gumbleton, Esquire, of Mountbally, Gumbletonmore, in the north of the county of Cork; and a better servant than Ned was not to be found in that honest county, from Cape Clear to the Kilworth Mountains; for nobody—no, not his worst enemy—could say a word against him, only that he was rather given to drinking, idling, lying, and loitering, especially the last; for send Ned of a five-minute message at nine o’clock in the morning, and you were a lucky man if you

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THE LUCKY GUEST. XXXIII.

The kitchen of some country houses in Ireland presents in no ways a bad modern translation of the ancient feudal hall. Traces of clanship still linger round its hearth in the numerous dependants on “the master’s” bounty. Nurses, foster-brothers, and other hangers-on, are there as matter of right, while the strolling piper, full of mirth and music, the benighted traveller, even the passing beggar, are received with a hearty welcome, and each contributes planxty, song, or superstitious tale, towar

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DREAMING TIM JARVIS. XXXIV.

Timothy Jarvis was a decent, honest, quiet, hard-working man, as every body knows that knows Balledehob. Now Balledehob is a small place, about forty miles west of Cork. It is situated on the summit of a hill, and yet it is in a deep valley; for on all sides there are lofty mountains that rise one above another in barren grandeur, and seem to look down with scorn upon the little busy village which they surround with their idle and unproductive magnificence. Man and beast have alike deserted them

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RENT-DAY. XXXV.

“Oh ullagone, ullagone! this is a wide world, but what will we do in it, or where will we go?” muttered Bill Doody, as he sat on a rock by the Lake of Killarney. “What will we do? to-morrow’s rent-day, and Tim the Driver swears if we don’t pay up our rent, he’ll cant every ha’perth we have; and then, sure enough, there’s Judy and myself, and the poor little grawls , [33] will be turned out to starve on the high road, for the never a halfpenny of rent have I!—Oh hone, that ever I should live to s

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LINN-NA-PAYSHTHA. XXXVI.

Travellers go to Leinster to see Dublin and the Dargle; to Ulster, to see the Giant’s Causeway, and, perhaps, to do penance at Lough Dearg; to Munster, to see Killarney, the beautiful city of Cork, and half a dozen other fine things; but who ever thinks of the fourth province?—who ever thinks of going— The Ulster-man’s ancient denunciation “to hell or to Connaught,” has possibly led to the supposition that this is a sort of infernal place above ground—a kind of terrestrial Pandemonium—in short,

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THE LEGEND OF CAIRN THIERNA. XXXVII.

From the town of Fermoy, famous for the excellence of its bottled ale, you may plainly see the mountain of Cairn Thierna. It is crowned with a great heap of stones, which, as the country people remark, never came there without “a crooked thought and a cross job.” Strange it is, that any work of the good old times should be considered one of labour; for round towers then sprung up like mushrooms in one night, and people played marbles with pieces of rock, that can now no more be moved than the hi

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THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. XXXVIII.

A few miles west of Limerick stands the once formidable castle of Carrigogunnel. Its riven tower and broken archway remain in mournful evidence of the sieges sustained by that city. Time, however, the great soother of all things, has destroyed the painful effect which the view of recent violence produces on the mind. The ivy creeps around the riven tower, concealing its injuries, and upholding it by a tough swathing of stalks. The archway is again united by the long-armed brier which grows acros

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CLOUGH NA CUDDY. XXXIX.

Above all the islands in the lakes of Killarney give me Innisfallen—“sweet Innisfallen,” as the melodious Moore calls it. It is, in truth, a fairy isle, although I have no fairy story to tell you about it; and if I had, these are such unbelieving times, and people of late have grown so skeptical, that they only smile at my stories, and doubt them. However, none will doubt that a monastery once stood upon Innisfallen island, for its ruins may still be seen; neither, that within its walls dwelt ce

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THE GIANT’S STAIRS. XL.

On the road between Passage and Cork there is an old mansion called Ronayne’s Court. It may be easily known from the stack of chimneys and the gable ends, which are to be seen, look at it which way you will. Here it was that Maurice Ronayne and his wife Margaret Gould kept house, as may be learned to this day from the great old chimney-piece, on which is carved their arms. They were a mighty worthy couple, and had but one son, who was called Philip, after no less a person than the king of Spain.

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APPENDIX.

LETTER FROM SIR WALTER SCOTT TO THE AUTHOR OF THE IRISH FAIRY LEGENDS. Sir, I have been obliged by the courtesy which sent me your very interesting work on Irish superstitions, and no less by the amusement which it has afforded me, both from the interest of the stories, and the lively manner in which they are told. You are to consider this, Sir, as a high compliment from one, who holds him on the subject of elves, ghosts, visions, &amp;c. nearly as strong as William Churne of Staffordshire—

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