Herminie Templeton Kavanagh

“ With a quick clasp of her hands and a frightened little gasp, Bridgeen stopped short and looked timidly around. Well might she hesitate! Just a few yards beyond the tree, shadowy, dark, and dumb, crouched the low green mound which was famed through all the countryside as the leprechaun's fairy fort.
There was not a man in the barony, let alone a child, foolhardy enough to venture to this spot after dark; and yet here was Bridgeen standing alone in that very place, with the sun fast disappearing behind the mountains. ”

“ The dismal ould mountain glowered toward his Riverence, its dark look saying, plain as spoken words:
“How dare ye come here; how dare ye?”
“I wondher,” says Father Cassidy to himself, looking up at the black hill, “if the Good People are fallen angels, as some do be saying.
“Why were they banished from heaven? It must have been a great sin entirely they committed, at any rate, for at the same time they were banished the power to make a prayer was taken from them. That’s why to say a pious word to a fairy is like trowing scalding wather on him. ”

“ Seeing that not a hair changed for all his work, Barney wrapped Maureen’s shawl about the King and started for home, saying: “Hould your whist! It’s a child I must have to be baptised this day. It’ll be hard to manage, but I have a plan! You came as a child, and you’ll be thrated as such—and look, if you don’t quit kicking me in the stomach, I’ll strangle you!”
As you know, to say pious words to one of the Good People is worse than cutting him with a knife, to show him pious pictures is like burning him, but to baptise a fairy is the most turrible punishment in the whole worruld. ”

“ There on the left wall, grand an’ noble, shone the pictures of Bridget’s people. Of all the well-dressed, handsome, proud-appearing persons in the whole worruld, the O’Hagans an’ the O’Shaughnessys would compare with the best. This was a hard enough crack, though a crushinger knock was to come. Ferninst them on the right wall glowered the O’Gills and the O’Gradys, and of all the ragged, sheep-stealing, hangdog-looking villains one ever saw in jail or out of jail, it was Darby’s kindred. ”

“ That minute the King climbed down from the window splitting with laughter. “Darby,” he says, slapping his knees, “Father Cassidy is floundhering about in the bog outside. He’s not hurt, but he’s mighty cowld and uncomfortable. Do you go and make him promise not to read any prayers this night, then bring him in. Tell him that if he don’t promise, by the piper that played before Moses, he may stay reading his prayers in the bog till morning, for he can’t get out unless some of my people go in and help him!” ”

“ First, you must know that the Good People can never put their charm on anyone who is willing to come with them. That’s whay you came safe. Then, agin, they can’t work harm in the daylight, and after cock-crow any mortal eye can see them plain; nor can they harm anyone who has a sprig of holly, nor pass over a leaf or twig of holly, because that’s Christmas bloom. Well, there’s a certain evil word for a charm that opens the side of the mountain, and I will try to find it out for you. ”

“ Bridgeen faltered, “I know she's in Heaven as Father Cassidy says, and that it's cruel and wicked to wish her back to life again; but I know, too, that even if she is happy with the angels she still must miss little Paudeen the baby sometimes—and, Misther Leprechaun, the one wish I have is that you'll let me see my mother for a minute, just for a minute, won't you?” ”

“ Howsumever, ’twas not the pelting rain, nor the lashing wind, nor yet the pitchy darkness that bothered the heart out of him as he wint splashin’ an’ stumbling along the road. A thought of something more raylentless than the storm, more mystarious than the night’s blackness put pounds of lead into the lad’s unwilling brogues; for somewhere in the shrouding darkness that covered McCarthy’s house the banshee was waiting this minute, purhaps, ready to jump out at him as soon as he came near her. ”

“ We’ll make you as comfortable as we can; and so you won’t worry about Bridget and the childher, I’ll have a goold sovereign left with them every day of their lives. But I wish we had comeither on you," he says, with a sigh, “for it’s aisy to see you’re great company. Now, come up to my place and have a noggin of punch for friendship’s sake,” says he.
That’s how Darby O’Gill began his six months’ stay with the Good People. Not a thing was left undone to make Darby contented and happy. A civiller people than the Good People he never met. ”

“ The little lads knew well ’twas too dark for the clergyman to read from his book any banishing prayers, and barring having too much fun, the divil a thing they had to fear!
’Twas fresh anger that came to Father Cassidy afther the first rush of surprise and wondher. He thried now to get at the Good People, to lay his hands on thim. A dozen charges at the bank his Riverence made, and as many times a score of the Little People flew up to meet him and sthruck the poor baste over the soft nose with their wands till the horse was welted back. ”

“ The place of honour on the right wall was given to Darby’s fourth cousin, Phelem McFadden, an’ he was painted with a pair of handcuffs on him. Wullum O’Gill had a squint in his right eye, and his thin legs bowed like hoops on a barrel.
If you have ever at night been groping your way through a dark room, and got a sudden, hard bump on the forehead from the edge of the door, you can undherstand the feelings of the knowledgeable man. ”

“ And then, with faces close, the two talked earnestly about many important things—how willingly Bridgeen must obey her father; how carefull she must be to keep the stirabout from burning in the morning; but, above all, how watchful she must be to keep her brother Jamesy away from the fire. The colleen promised faithfully not to forget. And so they talked on lovingly, happily together.
At last the mother said: “It is the children's bedtime, and you must be my own brave daughter and go to them. Keep well in your mind what I have said; be cheerful and contented, for we are not separated. ”

“ Darby’d say. “If you’re going along the lonely boreen at night and you hear, from some fairy fort, a sound of fiddles, or of piping, or of sweet woices singing, or of little feet patthering in the dance, don’t turn your head, but say your prayers an’ hould on your way. The pleasures the Good People’ll share with you have a sore sorrow hid in them, an’ the gifts they’ll offer are only made to break hearts with.” ”

“ The throuble he’s thrying to bring on others is the throuble I’ll throuble him with. If he comes dacint, he’ll go dacint; if he comes bothering, he’ll go bothered,” says he.
Faith, thin, your Honour, the King spoke no less than the truth, for at that very minute Terror, as foine a horse as ever followed hounds, was galloping down the starlit road to Darby’s house, and over Terror’s mane bent as foine a horseman as ever took a six-bar gate—Father Cassidy. ”

“ Ten jumps to the second and a hundred feet to the jump. Rosie’s tail standing straight up in the air, firm as an iron bar, and Darby floating straight out behind; a thousand furious fairies flying a short distance after, filling the air with wild commands and threatenings. ”

“ He passed through the village and had almost reached the Ballymore crossroads when he spied just ahead of him a slim, bare-footed little girl, trudging wearily along and carrying in her clasped arms a pair of brogues almost as heavy as herself.
“It's Bridgeen Daley,” he muttered. “The kind Lord look down on that houseful of motherless children.” Father Cassidy reined in his horse beside her. “Is that you, Bridgeen?” he called. “Come here, asthore. Oh, I see, ye've been to Neddy Hagan's to get yer father's brogues mended. ”

“ Their ould white horse bobbed up and down through the sticky morning fog, Darby and Maureen shivering on the front sate. The Ruler of the Fairies, Maureen’s shawl folded about him, was lying cuddled below in the sthraw. When they saw anyone coming, the fairy-chief would climb into Maureen’s lap, and she’d hould him as though he were a baby. ”

“ With that they marched our bould Darby, a prisoner, down the long passage, which every second grew wider and lighter and fuller of little people.
Sometimes, though, he met with human beings like himself, only the black charm was on them, they having been stolen at some time by the Good People. He saw lost people there from every parish in Ireland, both commoners and gentry. ”

“ Howsumever, in the home of the Good People—which, as you know, is the hollow heart of the great mountain Sleive-na-mon—Anthony Sullivan’s goat lives and prospers to this day, a pet and a hayro among the fairies. ”

“ Darby’s dancing was such that purty soon those around stood still to admire.
There’s a saying come down in our family through generations which I still hould to be true, that the better the music the aisier the step. Sure never did mortal men dance to so fine a chune and never so supple a dancer did such a chune meet up with. ”