Douglas Hyde

“ What good have we now out of our journey to Rome and to France? Never mind yet, you clown, but you’ll pay us another time for this. Believe us, you’ll repent it.”
“He’ll have no good to get out of the young girl,” said the little man that was talking to him in the palace before that, and as he said the word he moved over to her and struck her a slap on the side of the head. “Now, says he, “she’ll be without talk any more; now, Guleesh, what good will she be to you when she’ll be dumb? It’s time for us to go—but you’ll remember us, Guleesh!” ”

“ The daughter of the King of France is to be married to-night, the handsomest woman that the sun ever saw, and we must do our best to bring her with us, if we’re only able to carry her off; and you must come with us that we may be able to put the young girl up behind you on the horse, when we’ll be bringing her away, for it’s not lawful for us to put her sitting behind ourselves. But you’re flesh and blood, and she can take a good grip of you, so that she won’t fall off the horse! Are you satisfied, Guleesh, and will you do what we’re telling you? ”

“ The night was calm as is a lake when there is not a breath of wind to move a wave on it, and there was no sound to be heard but the hum of the insects that would go by from time to time, or the hoarse, sudden scream of the wild geese as they passed from lake to lake, half a mile up in the air over his head; or the sharp whistle of the golden and green plovers, rising and lying, lying and rising, as they do on a calm night. ”

“ There were more there playing tricks, and more making fun and laughing, for such a feast as there was that day had not been in France for twenty years, because the old king had no children alive but only the one daughter, and she was to be married to the son of another king that night. Three days the feast was going on, and the third night she was to be married, and that was the night that Guleesh and the fairies came, hoping, if they could, to carry off with them the king’s young daughter. ”

“ The priest did all he could to keep her with them for another while, but without effect, and Guleesh spoke every sweet word that came into his head, trying to get the victory over her, and to coax her and make her stay as she was, but it was no good for him. She determined that she would go, and no man alive would make her change her intention. ”

“ IrishThere was once a boy in the County Mayo, and Guleesh was his name, and there was the finest lis, or rath, in Ireland a little way off from the gable of the house where he lived, and he was often in the habit of seating himself on the fine grass bank that was running round it. One night he stood and half leaned against the gable of the house looking up into the sky, and watching the beautiful white moon over his head. After him to be standing that way for a couple of hours, he said to himself: “My bitter grief that I am not gone away out of this place altogether. ”

“ Perhaps I might see or hear something that would be useful to me, and might bring back her talk again to Mary”—that was the name himself and the priest called the king’s daughter, for neither of them knew her right name. He told his intention to the priest, and the priest gave him his blessing.
Guleesh accordingly went to the old rath when the night was darkening, and he stood with his elbow leaning on a grey old flag, waiting till the middle of the night should come. The moon rose slowly, and it was like a knob of fire behind him ”

“ And with that they rose up into the air, and out with them at one roolya-boolya the way they came; and they left poor Guleesh standing where they found him, and the two eyes going out of his head, looking after them and wondering.
He did not stand long till he turned back, and he thinking in his own mind on all he saw and heard, and wondering whether there was really a herb at his own door that would bring back the talk to the king’s daughter. “It can’t be,” says he to himself, “that they would tell it to me if there was any virtue in it ”