Thomas Crofton Croker

“ Oh then, Dunmore Castle, it is you that are the gloomy-looking tower on a gloomy day, with the gloomy hills behind you; when one has gloomy thoughts on their heart, and sees you like a ghost rising out of the smoke made by the kelp-burners on the strand, there is, the Lord save us! as fearful a look about you as about the Blue Man’s Lake at midnight. Well then, any how,” said Connor, after a pause, “is it not a blessed night, though surely the moon looks mighty pale in the face? ”

“ Mick hesitated.
“Well then, good by, I can stay no longer: once more, take it, and be rich; refuse it, and beg for your life, and see your children in poverty, and your wife dying for want: that will happen to you, Mick Purcell!” said the little man with a malicious grin, which made him look ten times more ugly than ever.
“May be ’tis true,” said Mick, still hesitating: he did not know what to do—he could hardly help believing the old man, and at length in a fit of desperation he seized the bottle—“Take the cow,” said he, “and if you are telling a lie, the curse of the poor will be on you.” ”

“ When the harvest nights came on, and the moon shone bright and brilliant over the hill, and the cattle were lying down hushed and quiet, and the herdsman, wrapt in his mantle, was musing with his heart gladdened by the glorious company of the stars twinkling above him, she would come and dance before him,—now in one shape—now in another,—but all ugly and frightful to behold. One time she would be a great horse, with the wings of an eagle, and a tail like a dragon, hissing loud and spitting fire. ”

“ The tune we feel glad in;—
This castle you’re had in,
That your life we may sadden;—
Here’s two humps for Jack Madden!”
And twenty of the strongest fairies brought Lusmore’s hump, and put it down upon poor Jack’s back, over his own, where it became fixed as firmly, as if it was nailed on with twelvepenny nails, by the best carpenter that ever drove one. Out of their castle they then kicked him; and in the morning, when Jack Madden’s mother and her gossip came to look after their little man, they found him half dead, lying at the foot of the moat, with the other hump upon his back. ”

“ Never was such an ullabulloo in this world, before or since; ’twas as if heaven and earth were coming together; and all out of Maurice Connor’s wonderful tune!
In the height of all these doings, what should there be dancing among the outlandish set of fishes but a beautiful young woman—as beautiful as the dawn of day! She had a cocked hat upon her head; from under it her long green hair—just the colour of the sea—fell down behind, without hindrance to her dancing. ”

“ If it resembled any thing earthly, it seemed the cry of a female, struck by a sudden and mortal blow, and giving out her life in one long deep pang of expiring agony. ‘Heaven defend us!’ exclaimed my mother. ‘Go you over the hedge, Leary, and save that woman, if she is not yet dead, while we run back to the hut we just passed, and alarm the village near it.’ ‘Woman!’ said Leary, beating the horse violently, while his voice trembled—‘that’s no woman: the sooner we get on, ma’am, the better;’ and he continued his efforts to quicken the horse’s pace. We saw nothing. The moon was hid. ”

“ Jumping into the pit, he took a little sup from the bottle to keep his heart up—he then took a big one—and then, with desperate wrench, he wrenched up the stone. All at once, up rushed a blast of wind, wild and fierce, and down fell Tim—down, down and down he went—until he thumped upon what seemed to be, for all the world, like a floor of sharp pins, which made him bellow out in earnest. Then he heard a whisk and a hurra, and instantly voices beyond number cried out—
“Welcome, Tim Jarvis, dear! ”

“ Manus, well becomes him, never told mankind or womankind, but swore to himself, by all the books that were ever shut or open, that, any how, he would go to the bottom of the big hole. What did he care for the Payshtha-more that was lying there to keep guard on the gold and silver of the old ancient family that was buried there in the wars, packed up in the brewing-pan? Sure he was as good an O’Rourke as the best of them, taking care to forget that his grandmother’s father was a cow-boy to the earl O’Donnel. ”

“ The bargain was struck, and Larry went to the hill-top, when the moon began to peep over the brow. He had been regaled at the farmer’s house, and was bold with the extract of barley-corn. So he took his seat on a big stone under a hollow of the hill, with his back to the wind, and pulled out his pipes. He had not played long when the voice of the fairies was heard upon the blast, like a slow stream of music. Presently they burst out into a loud laugh, and Larry could plainly hear one say, “What! another man upon the fairies’ ring? ”

“ 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 to the dominion of the eagle, who soars majestically over them. ”

“ As this was spoken the coffin was borne from the beach by a retiring wave, and the company of sea people prepared to follow it; but at the moment one chanced to discover Connor Crowe, as fixed with wonder and as motionless with fear as the stone on which he sat.
“The time is come,” cried the unearthly being, “the time is come: a human eye looks on the forms of ocean, a human ear has heard their voices; farewell to the Cantillons; the sons of the sea are no longer doomed to bury the dust of the earth!” ”

“ Charley pulled up hard. “Ay,” said he, “you may beat me by the head, because it always goes so much before you; but if the bet was neck-and-neck, and that’s the go between the old mare and Desdemona, I’d win it hollow!”
It appeared as if the stranger was well aware of what was passing in Charley’s mind, for he suddenly broke out quite loquacious.
“Charley Culnane,” says he, “you have a stout soul in you, and are every inch of you a good rider. ”

“ Where, but in the very pit in the field that was Jer Driscoll’s, and his wife Norah above with a big stick ready to beat “her dreaming blackguard.” Tim roared out to the woman to leave the life in him, and put his hands in his pockets to show her the gold; but he pulled out nothing only a handful of small stones mixed with yellow furze blossoms. The bush was under him, and the great flag-stone that he had wrenched up, as he thought, was lying, as if it was never stirred, by his side: the whisky bottle was drained to the last drop; and the pit was just as his spade had made it. ”

“ The door of the well being left open, the water, which had been so long confined, rejoiced at obtaining its liberty, rushed forth incessantly, every moment rising higher and higher, and was in the hall of the entertainment sooner than the young prince himself, so that when he attempted to speak to the king he was up to his neck in water. At length the water rose to such a height, that it filled the entire of the green valley in which the king’s palace stood, and so the present lough of Cork was formed. ”

“ Tom,” cried Jack, “stop, man, stop! what are you doing? The fairies—the good people, I mean—hate to be meddled with. You will be pinched or blinded; or your horse will cast its shoe; or—look! a wilful man will have his way. Oh! oh! he is almost at the oak—God help him! for he is past the help of man.”
By this time Tom was under the tree, and burst out laughing. “Jack,” said he, “keep your prayers to yourself. Your fairies are not bad at all. I believe they will make tolerably good catsup.” ”

“ This didn’t do at all; so I dismounted, and guided myself along the stream, directed by the noise of the water, as cautious as if I was treading upon eggs, holding poor Modderaroo by the bridle, who shook, the poor brute, all over in a tremble, like my old grandmother, rest her soul any how! in the ague. Well, sir, the heart was sinking in me, and I was giving myself up, when, as good luck would have it, I saw a light. ”

“ Mick drove his cow something faster, but the little man kept up with him. Mick didn’t know how he walked, for he was almost afraid to look at him, and to cross himself, for fear the old man would be angry. Yet he thought his fellow-traveller did not seem to walk like other men, nor to put one foot before the other, but to glide over the rough road, and rough enough it was, like a shadow, without noise and without effort. ”

“ Come along: you’re warm, I’m sure, colonel Pratt, so come in and cool yourself; Teigue is going to have a swim!” The voice seemed as descending amongst the trailing ivy and brushwood which clothes this picturesque cliff nearly from top to bottom, yet it was impossible that any human being could have found footing. “Now, colonel, have you courage to take the leap?—Ho, ho, ho! what a pretty soldier you are. Good-bye—I’ll see you again in ten minutes above, at the house—look at your watch, colonel:—there’s a dive for you!” ”

“ Every thing was as silent as a churchyard, only now and then one could hear far off a dog barking, or a cow lowing after being milked. There wasn’t a creature to be seen on the road or in the fields. I wondered at this first, but then I remembered it was May-eve, and that many a thing, both good and bad, would be wandering about that night, and that I ought to shun danger as well as others. So I walked on as quick as I could, and soon came to the end of the demesne wall, where the trees rise high and thick at each side of the road, and almost meet at the top. ”

“ But I am afraid that the motives which lead Tom Bourke to pay more court to the dead than the living are precisely those which lead to the opposite conduct in the generality of mankind—a hope of future benefit and a fear of future evil. For the good people, who are a race as powerful as they are capricious, have their favourites among those who inhabit the world; often show their affection, by easing the objects of it from the load of this burdensome life; and frequently reward or punish the living, according to the degree of reverence paid to the obsequies and the memory of the elected dead. ”

“ Maurice had not the power to say a word more, for the strange lady with the green hair, seeing the wave just upon them, covered him up with herself in a thing like a cloak with a big hood to it, and the wave curling over twice as high as their heads, burst upon the strand, with a rush and a roar that might be heard as far as Cape Clear.
That day twelvemonth the piece of burned wood came ashore in Trafraska. It was a queer thing for Maurice to think of sending all the way from the bottom of the sea. A gown or a pair of shoes would have been something like a present for his poor mother ”

“ But to make a long story short, Ned Sheehy was a good butler, and a right good one too, and as for a groom, let him alone with a horse: he could dress it, or ride it, or shoe it, or physic it, or do any thing with it but make it speak—he was a second whisperer!—there was not his match in the barony, or the next one neither. A pack of hounds he could manage well, ay, and ride after them with the boldest man in the land. ”

“ The cropped-eared head of the gigantic horse moved steadily forward, always keeping from six to eight yards in advance. The horseman, unaided by whip or spur, and disdaining the use of stirrups, which dangled uselessly from the saddle, followed at a trot by Charley’s side, his hideous head now lost behind the lappet of his coat, now starting forth in all its horror, as the motion of the horse caused his arm to move to and fro. ”

“ But Larry was not so deceived; for when she came up, he, dropping his pipes, leaped upon her back.
Now from the top of Knocksheogowna, as you look westward to the broad Atlantic, you will see the Shannon, queen of rivers; “spreading like a sea,” and running on in gentle course to mingle with the ocean through the fair city of Limerick. It on this night shone under the moon, and looked beautiful from the distant hill. Fifty boats were gliding up and down on the sweet current, and the song of the fishermen rose gaily from the shore. ”

“ How does he know about the spoons?—if he tells it, I’m a ruined man!—there was no living soul could tell it to him but Tim Barrett, and he’s far enough off in the wilds of Botany Bay now, so how could he know it—I can’t tell for the world! But what’s that I see there at the corner of the wall?—’tis not a man!—oh, what a fool I am! ’tis only the old stump of a tree!—But this is a shocking place—I’ll never stop in it, for I’ll leave the house to-morrow; the very look of it is enough to frighten any one. ”

“ I never made but one in all my life, which was, to drink nothing at all for a year and a day, and ’tis myself repinted of it for the clean twelvemonth after. But if your honour would only listen to reason: I’ll just take in the poor baste, and if your honour don’t pardon me this one time may I never see another day’s luck or grace.”
“I know you, Ned,” said Mr. Gumbleton. “Whatever your luck has been, you never had any grace to lose: but I don’t intend discussing the matter with you. Take in the mare, sir.” ”

“ And who knows but ’tis grandmother I may be to a hake or a cod—Lord help and pity me, but ’tis a mighty unnatural thing!—and may be ’tis boiling and eating my own grandchild I’ll be, with a bit of salt butter, and I not knowing it!—Oh Maurice, Maurice, if there’s any love or nature left in you, come back to your own ould mother, who reared you like a decent Christian! ”

“ There was within hearing a man who was considered to be a poor, crazy, half-witted fellow, but he was as harmless as a child, and used to go wandering up and down through the country from one place to another. When he heard of so great a reward, Paddeen, for that was his name, spoke out, and said, that if Roderick Keating would give him encouragement equal to what he had offered to others, he was ready to venture after the ring into the lake; and Paddeen, all the while he spoke, looked as covetous after the sport as the money. ”

“ But Tim heeded not this speech: heaps of gold were around him, and he filled and filled away as hard as he could, his coat and his waistcoat and his breeches pockets; and he thought himself very clever, moreover, because he stuffed some of the guineas into his brogues. When the little people perceived this, they cried out—“Go home, Tim Jarvis, go home, and think yourself a lucky man.”
“I hope, gentlemen,” said he, “we won’t part for good and all; but may be ye’ll ask me to see you again, and to give you a fair and square account of what I’ve done with your money.” ”

“ The odious exciseman, with his portentous book in one hand, his unrelenting pen held in the other, or stuck beneath his hat-band, and the ink-bottle (‘black emblem of the informer’) dangling from his waist-coat-button—went not then from ale-house to ale-house, denouncing all those patriotic dealers in spirit, who preferred selling whisky, which had nothing to do with English laws (but to elude them,) to retailing that poisonous liquor, which derived its name from the British “parliament,” that compelled its circulation among a reluctant people. ”