Brian O'Higgins

“ But maybe the men, or most o' them, were like Denis M'Cann—God be good to him!—an' took the tay because they couldn't stand the other thing any longer."
"Is it Denis o' the Hill that died last year?" said Joe Clinton, his voice trembling with eagerness, and before Bartle Nolan could give us a warning sign four or five of us had blurted out:
"What about Denis, Ned?"
"The very man," said Ned, in reply to Joe's question, and apparently paying no attention to us. "It wasn't any wonder poor Denis took to the tay after all the heart-scald he got from the stirabout—not a wonder in the world." ”

“ His best humour is coarse or smutty, his heartiest laughter is jarring and hurtful, his outlook on life is very different to that of the genial blacksmith of Balnagore. God speed the day when the smutty wit of the Sasanach shall be heard no longer in our land, when the laughter of the open-hearted, clean-minded Gael shall ring from end to end of Eirinn, lighting every mind, lifting up every heart, and softening for all who have suffered the memory of those sadder days that they have known. ”

“ Why, the town over there, the biggest fair day ever it seen, or the finest day of a races 'd be no more to Dublin any day in the week than a tin whistle 'd be to the double-barrelled bugle of a brass band! You'd think that every man, woman an' child in Dublin took a pledge every mornin' to make somebody bothered before night with the fair dint o' noise, or die in the attempt. ”

“ I don't know what Christmas is comin' to at all."
"I wonder who thought o' the first plum puddin'," said Joe Clinton, as he looked meditatively into the big turf fire that Ned kept burning in a huge open grate for our special benefit. "Whoever he was, he didn't think he'd sicken so many people before the end o' the world. Some o' the things they call plum puddin's are a holy terror. An' the fun of it is that they never put as much as the skin of a plum in one o' them." ”

“ There never beat a warmer, kinder heart than that which throbbed beneath Ned M'Grane's torn and soot-stained coat.
Joe Clinton was telling us one evening about a narrow escape he and Tom Brangan and a couple more of the boys had the night before in Rowan's demesne when they went to set their rabbit-snares, and very nearly fell into the hands of the police from Castletown, who had been told by the old Major to keep a look-out for poachers. ”

“ At this juncture the tooth began to ache again worse than ever, and Larry squirmed in his seat with pain.
"I was tellin' Mr. Boylan to-day," said old Kitty Malone to Ned, "that every blacksmith has a charm for the toothache, an' I was wantin' him to go up to you an' see, but he said maybe you haven't it at all. Have you it, Mr. M'Grane?"
"Well, I must be an amadán out an' out not to think of it before now," said Ned. "To be sure I have it. Every blacksmith in the world has it, but it's no use to him outside his own forge. ”

“ When are you goin' to pay me?'
"The poor jobber was shakin' an' shiverin' like a man in a fit. He was afraid, I think, that the neighbours 'd back up Jimmy, an' give him a taste o' their sticks if he failed to pay.
"'Oh, sir!' says he, 'don't be too hard on me. Sure I haven't the price of one haggard let alone all the haggards in Ireland. There's all I have in the world—fifty pound—an' you can have it an' welcome for your two pigs.'
"'Well,' says Jimmy, 'as it's Christmas times an' I'm a soft-hearted man, I'll let you off easier than you deserve. ”

“ I'm afraid a ram 'd be middlin' tough eatin' though—even for a sojer. Will you stay there till I go home for my camera, an' I'll take your photograph an' show it to Julia? Ah! can't you let the poor old ram go; sure he can't give evidence against the notorious sheep-stealer, Jimmy Malone. Let him go, an' come over here, an' I'll give you the hares. You won't? Well, I'll have to be sayin' good mornin', Mister M'Keon, an' I hope you'll enjoy the game-keepin' if you get it. If I see your friends, the peelers, I'll send them to your assistance. ”

“ She was a lucky sheep for us anyway."
"Sheep an' goats must be good to poachers always," said Ned M'Grane, as he let the hammer rest on the anvil, and cast the horse-shoe on which he had been working into the trough, "for 'twas Tim Brogan's old white goat that nearly thumped the life out o' the Scotch game-keeper that was in Archdale's, an' he runnin' after young Joe Magee long ago, an' 'twas a ram that saved Jimmy the Thrick when the Sojer M'Keon came at him an' he after killin' the two hares above on the Mullagh. The sheep an' goats must have a grâdh for the poachers, I'm thinkin'." ”

“ There wasn't a hare or a rabbit in the country safe from him, an' neither gamekeeper nor peeler could ever lay hands on him. He was within an ace o' bein' caught as often as he has fingers an' toes on his body, an' every time, by hook or by crook, he'd dodge the peelers an' get away from them, an' every gamekeeper in the country 'd swear to you at the time that if there ever was a divil in Ireland that divil was Jimmy Malone. A hundred times they set traps for him an' failed to catch him. ”

“ He could run as fast as a hare himself, an' he had more tricks an' dodges an' plans in his head than any hare that ever lay in a form. Sure one day an' the huntsmen an' the beagles in full cry after a hare below in Hoey's Bottom, didn't he watch beside a little gap in the wall that he knew she'd go through, and had a sack opened, with the mouth of it round the hole, an' when the poor hare came along at full speed thro' the gap, where did she go only right into the sack, an' Jimmy had her at home in his own house before the huntsmen knew that the hounds were after losin' the trail. ”

“ Well, one May fair—the biggest fair that ever was in Castletown, the old people 'll tell you—Charley an' Maire had a fine lump of a calf to sell that they reared themselves from he was calved, an' they brought him out brave an' early in the mornin' to get rid of him, if they could come across a buyer. They weren't long in the fair, anyway, when who comes up to them but Mickey Flanagan—God rest him!—Jack the Jobber's father, an' begins to make the bargain with Maire. ”

“ THE LAWYER FOR THE DEFENCE Adapted from the Irish of "An Seabhac" in "An Baile Seo 'Gainn-ne."
One St. Patrick's Night the Gaels were gathered together in their own special corner of Heaven (Ned McGrane told us on a certain evening in the Forge) , and were having a glorious time of it. They were there in tens of thousands—Fionn and the Fianna, Brian Boru, the O'Neills and O'Donnells and O'Sullivans and MacCarthys, and every other O and Mac who ever looked upon Ireland as the one and only small nationality that claimed his heart and hand. ”

“ Make us pay rates for every time we say our prayers?—the pack o' robbers. I wish I had some o' their heads under this!" And then there would be a crashing blow on the anvil that shook the forge and awakened memories of the Blacksmith of Limerick who crushed the heads of the Williamites with his sledge, long ago. On such occasions we never attempted to engage Ned in conversation until his work for the day was finished, and the pipe and tobacco were called into requisition. ”

“ You might as well be eatin' roasted beech-leaves as some o' the bacon you'd get in shops. The divil another bit of it'll come into our house, if we were never to pay the rent."
"If you saw Peadar Byrne," said Bartle Gormley, from a corner, "when Father Martin was talkin' about the killin' o' the pigs, an' the savin' o' the money. He could only catch an odd word, an' he had the bothered ear cocked in a way that I never saw it at the readin' o' the Gospel."
"Maybe," said Ned, with a comical look, "maybe he thought there was pigs goin' for nothin', an' that he'd miss one if he didn't listen." ”

“ It's forty year ago an' more since it happened, Joe, an' indeed it wasn't the woman was to blame at all, but the crankiest, contrariest, crossest old codger of a man that ever sat on a stool, and that was Dickey Moran that lived there below in the hollow, where Jimmy Kearney is livin' now. An' if every woman conducted her fight for a vote as cleverly as Peggy Moran conducted hers for peace an' quietness there 'd be a lot more respect an' support for them than there is. But what 'd be the use of advisin' a woman? ”

“ Well, one summer there came home a fellow that was after bein' a sojer out in India or somewhere—his name was Jack M'Keon, but no one called him anythin' only the Sojer M'Keon—an' o' course none o' the young fellows about 'd be seen in his company an' he after takin' John Bull's shillin' an' fightin' against them that never done him or his country any harm, so who did he get in with only Tony Smith that was gamekeeper in Rowan's at the time, an' it seems Tony promised to get him a job as a sort of under-gamekeeper after a while, because he used to do anythin' Tony 'd ask him to do ”

“ It was a fine bait, that innocent remark of Bartle's, and we waited with drawn breath to see what its result would be on Ned.
"Well," said the latter, as he teased the tobacco between his fingers, while a far-away look that was hopeful came over his face and into his eyes, "there was many a reason, Bartle. The praties began to get bad, an' bad seasons left the meal for the stirabout sour an' heavy an' ugly, an' then people goin' to Dublin an' places like that began to get notions, an' the women began to think they weren't able for the strong food an' that tay would put more heart in them. ”

“ Doctor Dempsey knew be the look o' the lad that he'd never be a doctor as long as there was a bill on a crow, but he was hard up for money at the time, an' didn't he take Johnnie; an' old Jimmy went home as proud as a peacock an' he boastin' an' blowin' out of him to everybody that the next doctor for the district 'd be no other than 'Doctor John Finnegan.' He used to drive over on the car every mornin' to Doctor Dempsey's an' call for him again in the evenin', an' he havin' him dressed up like a young lord or somethin'. ”

“ Gettin' a likin' for mutton, is that it, Mister Malone? They'll hardly give you any mutton in jail, though, unless Julia an' myself sends you a bit o' what we'll have at the weddin'. No girl 'd like to marry a sheep-stealer; would she, Mister Malone?'
"Jimmy was ragin', but he knew that if it came to a fight with M'Keon the Sojer 'd beat him, because he was a powerful big man, an' along with that if the peelers came an' they squabblin', M'Keon 'd accuse him o' sheep-stealin' an' poachin' an' he'd be done for. ”

“ Some people get impatient an' make some complaint or other, an' then, instead of the charm workin', the pain o' the toothache gets worse than ever, an' sometimes they die that very night. Do you promise, Larry?"
"I promise, Ned, that no matter how severe or how long the workin' o' the charm is I'll not make the least complaint, because I'd suffer anythin' to ease the pain o' this infernal tooth. Sure it'll never annoy me again, Ned?" ”

“ A bargain is a bargain. Am I right or wrong?' says he to Bartle Nolan's father an' a few more o' the neighbours that were listenin' to the whole thing.
"There wasn't a man among them could deny that he was after buyin' the two pigs, an' they told Jimmy that he might as well give in at once, that the bargain was made, an' that the law 'd be again him if he brought the jobber into court. ”

“ It's the quarest place you ever seen in your life, Denis, an' if you're wise you'll never see it. I can't make out why people are always trippin' over other runnin' up to Dublin an' half o' them 'd be better off at home if they 'd only work hard an' keep sober an' let other people's business alone. ”

“ The Sojer gave him a string of army curses an' up he jumps again an' after Jimmy—the boyo was within a few perch o' the wood an' he runnin' for the bare life an' never lookin' behind him—but the dickens a far Mister M'Keon went till the ram was up with him an' had him stretched on the grass the same as before, an' he cursin' for all he was worth. ”

“ Oh, I can tell you, 'shut your eyes and open your mouth' would not be much use to a man in Dublin.
"They don't walk at all up there—it 'd hurt their corns an' wear out their boots; but they're always runnin' after trams, an' then payin' money to be let sit in them to draw their breath. I didn't know what they were at the first time I seen them doin' it. I was walkin' down from me cousin's house to the chapel one mornin', an' not payin' much heed to anythin', when a fella darted out of a gate an' nearly knocked me down with the bump he gave into me. ”