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015 - The Kildare Pooka - How Thomas Connolly met the Banshee · Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry

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Speaker 1: Section fourteen of Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry.
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Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Douglas W. Taylor Squim
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Speaker 1: Washington on Facebook at Papa Doug Actor. Fairy and Folk
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Speaker 1: Tales of the Irish Peasantry, edited and selected by W. B. Yates.
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Speaker 1: Section fourteen The Kildare Poker by Patrick Kennedy. Mister h R.
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Speaker 1: When he was alive used to live a good deal
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Speaker 1: in Dublin, and he was once a great while out
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Speaker 1: of the country on account of the ninety eight business.
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Speaker 1: But the servants kept on in the big house that
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Speaker 1: are off all the same as if the family was
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Speaker 1: at home. Well, they used to be front and out
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Speaker 1: of their lives. After goin to their beds, with the
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Speaker 1: bangin of the kitchen door, and the clatterin of fire irons,
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Speaker 1: and the pots and plates and dishes one evenin' they
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Speaker 1: sat up ever so long, keeping one another in heart,
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Speaker 1: with telling stories about ghosts and fetches, and that when
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Speaker 1: what would you have of it? The little scullery boy
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Speaker 1: that used to be sleepin over the horses, and could
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Speaker 1: not get room at the fire, crept into the hot hearth,
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Speaker 1: and when he got tired listening to the stories, sor
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Speaker 1: I fear him, But he fell dead asleeph well and good.
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Speaker 1: After they were all gone and the kitchen fire raked up,
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Speaker 1: he was walk with the noise of the kitchen door
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Speaker 1: opening and the tramplin of an ass on the kitchen floor.
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Speaker 1: He peeped out an what should he see but a
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Speaker 1: big ass sure enough, sittin on his carabaningoin a yawning
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Speaker 1: before the fire. After little he looked about him and
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Speaker 1: began scratching his ears. If he was quite tired, and
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Speaker 1: says he, I may as well begin first as last.
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Speaker 1: The poor boy's teeth began to chatter in his head,
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Speaker 1: for says he, now he's goin to eat me. But
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Speaker 1: the fellow with the long ears and tail on him
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Speaker 1: had something else to do. He stirred the fire, and
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Speaker 1: then he brought in a pail of water from the
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Speaker 1: pump and filled a big pot that he put on
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Speaker 1: the fire before he went out. He then put in
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Speaker 1: his hand foot I mean, into the hot hearth, and
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Speaker 1: pulled out the little boy, he let her roar out
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Speaker 1: of him with the fright, but the pok only looked
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Speaker 1: at him and thrust out his lord lip to show
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Speaker 1: how little he valued him, And then he pitched him
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Speaker 1: into his pew again. Well, he then lay down before
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Speaker 1: the fire till he heard the bile comin on the water.
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Speaker 1: And maybe there wasn't a plate or a dish or
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Speaker 1: a spoon on the dresser that he didn't fetch an
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Speaker 1: put into the pot and wash and dry the holl
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Speaker 1: by of them, as well as air a kitchen maid
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Speaker 1: from that to Dublin town. He then put all of
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Speaker 1: them up on their places on the shelves, and if
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Speaker 1: he didn't give a good sweep into the kitchen, leave
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Speaker 1: it till again then he comes and sets fum at
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Speaker 1: the boy let down one of his ears and cocked
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Speaker 1: up the other and gave a grin. The poor fella
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Speaker 1: strove to roar out, but not a degodd come out
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Speaker 1: of his throat. The last thing the pook had done
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Speaker 1: was to rake up the fire and walk out, given
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Speaker 1: such a slap of the door that the boy thought
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Speaker 1: the house couldn't help tumbling down. Well, to be sure,
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Speaker 1: if there wasn't a hollaballoon. Next morning, when the poor
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Speaker 1: fellow told his story, they could talk of nothing else
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Speaker 1: the whole day. One said one thing, another said another.
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Speaker 1: But a fat, lazy schollary girl said the wittiest thing
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Speaker 1: of all. Musha says she. If the Poka does be
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Speaker 1: cleaning up everything that way when we are asleep, what
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Speaker 1: should we be slaving ourselves far doing his work? Sugar
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Speaker 1: Deen says another dence, the wisest words he ever said.
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Speaker 1: Co it's meself, won't contradict you, so said, so done.
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Speaker 1: Not a bit of a play to dish a drop
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Speaker 1: of water that evening, and not a bassin was laid
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Speaker 1: on the floor, and everyone went to bed soon after sundown.
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Speaker 1: Next mornin everything was as fine as fine in the kitchen,
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Speaker 1: and the Lord Mayor might eat his dinner off the flags.
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Speaker 1: It was greatte to the lazy servants, you may depend.
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Speaker 1: And everything went on well till a foolhardy gag of
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Speaker 1: a boy said he would stay up one night and
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Speaker 1: have a chat with the Polka. He was a little
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Speaker 1: daunted when the door was thrown open and the ass
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Speaker 1: marched up to the fire. And then sir says he
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Speaker 1: at last picking up courage. If it isn't taken a liberty,
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Speaker 1: might I ask who you are and why you are
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Speaker 1: so kind as to do half of the day's work
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Speaker 1: for the girls every night? No liberty you at all,
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Speaker 1: says Dubukah. Says he, I'll tell you, and welcome. I
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Speaker 1: was a servant in the time of Squire Ar's father,
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Speaker 1: and was the laziest rog that ever was clogged and
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Speaker 1: fed and done nothing for it when my time came
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Speaker 1: for the other world. This is a punishment was laid
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Speaker 1: on me to come here and do all this labor
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Speaker 1: every night and then go out in the cold. It
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Speaker 1: isn't so bad in the fine weather, But if you
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Speaker 1: only knew what it is to stand with your head
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Speaker 1: between your legs, face and the storm from midnight to
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Speaker 1: sunrise on a blake winter night. And could we do
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Speaker 1: anything for your comfort me, poor fellow, says the boy Moosha.
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Speaker 1: I don't know, says the Poka, but I think a
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Speaker 1: good quilted phriez court would help to keep the life
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Speaker 1: in me them long nights. Why then, in Troth we'd
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Speaker 1: be the ungratefulest of people if we didn't feel for you.
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Speaker 1: To make a long story short. The next night, but
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Speaker 1: two the boy was there again, and if he didn't
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Speaker 1: delight the poor pooka holding up a fine warm court
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Speaker 1: before him. It's no matter between the poka and the man.
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Speaker 1: His legs was got into the fore arms of it,
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Speaker 1: and it was buttoned down the breast and the belly,
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Speaker 1: and he was so pleased. He walked up to the
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Speaker 1: glass to see how he looked. Well, says he. It's
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Speaker 1: a long lane that has no turnin' I am much
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Speaker 1: obliged to you and your fellow servants. You have made
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Speaker 1: me happy at last. Good night to you. So he
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Speaker 1: was walking out, but the other cried, ah, sure you're
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Speaker 1: going too soon. What about the Washington sweeping' Ah you
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Speaker 1: may tell the girls that they must now get their turn.
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Speaker 1: My punishment was to last till I was thought where
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Speaker 1: they of a reward for the way I'd done me duty.
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Speaker 1: You'll see me no more, and no more they did,
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Speaker 1: and right sorry they were for having been in such
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Speaker 1: a hurry to reward the ungrateful pooka. End of the
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Speaker 1: Kildare Puka, The solitary fairies, the Benshee, the Benshee from
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Speaker 1: ban Ban a woman and she shay A fairy is
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Speaker 1: an attendant fairy that follows the old families, and none
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Speaker 1: but them and waiales before a death. Many have seen
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Speaker 1: her as she goes, wailing and clapping her hands the
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Speaker 1: keen Keen. The funeral cry of the peasantry is said
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Speaker 1: to be an imitation of her cry. When more than
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Speaker 1: one banshee is present and they wail and sing in chorus,
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Speaker 1: it is for the death of some holy or great one.
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Speaker 1: An omen that sometimes accompanies the banshee is the coach
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Speaker 1: a bower calch a bower, an immense black coach mounted
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Speaker 1: by a coffin and drawn by headless horses driven by
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Speaker 1: a dulahan. It will go rumbling to your door, and
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Speaker 1: if you open it, according to Croker, a basin of
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Speaker 1: blood will be thrown in your face. These headless phantoms
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Speaker 1: are found elsewhere than in Ireland. In eighteen o seven,
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Speaker 1: two of the sentry stationed outside Saint James's Park died
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Speaker 1: of fright. A headless woman, the upper part of her
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Speaker 1: body naked, used to pass at midnight and scale the railings.
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Speaker 1: After a time, the sentries were stationed no longer at
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Speaker 1: the Haunted spot in Norway. The heads of corpses were
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Speaker 1: cut off to make their ghosts feeble. Thus came into
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Speaker 1: existence the Doula Hans perhaps, unless indeed they are descended
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Speaker 1: from that Irish giant who swam across the channel with
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Speaker 1: his head in his teeth. D end of the solitary Fairies.
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Speaker 1: How Thomas Connolly met the Banshee. J Todd Hunter ad
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Speaker 1: the Banchee, Sir, Well, Sir, as I was striving to
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Speaker 1: tell you I was going home from work one day
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Speaker 1: from mister Cassidy's that I told you of in the
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Speaker 1: dusk of the evening, I had more nor a mile.
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Speaker 1: I it was nearer too mile to thrack to where
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Speaker 1: I was a lodging with a dacent weddy woman I
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Speaker 1: knew Biddy McGuire be name, so as to be near
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Speaker 1: me work. It was the first week in November, and
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Speaker 1: a lonesome road I had to travel, and dark enough
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Speaker 1: with trees above it. And about half ways there was
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Speaker 1: a bit of a bridge I had to cross over
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Speaker 1: one of them little streams that runs into the daughter.
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Speaker 1: I walked on in the middle of the road, and
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Speaker 1: there was no towpath at that time, mister Harry nor
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Speaker 1: for many a long day after that, But as I
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Speaker 1: was saying, I walked along till I come nigh upon
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Speaker 1: the bridge where the road was a bit open, And
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Speaker 1: there right enuf I seen the hog's back of the
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Speaker 1: old fashioned bridge that used to be there till it
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Speaker 1: was pulled down, and a white mist steaming up out
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Speaker 1: of the water all around it. Well, now, mister Harry,
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Speaker 1: often as I'd passed by the place before that night,
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Speaker 1: it seemed strange to me, and like a place you
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Speaker 1: might see in a dream. And as it come up
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Speaker 1: to it, I began to feel a cold wind blown
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Speaker 1: through the hollow. O me heart, Musha Thomas, says I
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Speaker 1: to myself. Is it yourself that's in it? Says I?
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Speaker 1: Or if it is, what's the matterwigietal at Al says I.
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Speaker 1: So I put a bold face on it, and I
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Speaker 1: made a struggle to set one leg afore the other,
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Speaker 1: until I came to the roise of the bridge, and there,
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Speaker 1: God be good to us. In a candle of the wall,
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Speaker 1: I seen an old woman, as I thought, sitting on
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Speaker 1: her hunkers all crouched together, and her head bowed down
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Speaker 1: seemingly in the greatest affliction. Well, sir, I pitied the
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Speaker 1: old creature and thought I wasn't worth a threatenin for
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Speaker 1: the mortal fright I was in. I up and says
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Speaker 1: to her, it's a cold lodging for ye, ma'am, well
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Speaker 1: the sorrow howporth? She says to that nor took no
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Speaker 1: more notice of me than if I hadn't let a
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Speaker 1: word out of me, but kept a rocking herself to
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Speaker 1: and fro, as if her heart was breakin. So I
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Speaker 1: says to her again, eh, is there anything the matter
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Speaker 1: with gee? I made for to touch her on the shoulder,
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Speaker 1: only something stopped me, For as I looked closer at her,
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Speaker 1: I saw she was no more an old woman, or
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Speaker 1: was she an old cat? The first thing I took
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Speaker 1: notice to, mister Harry was her hair that was streeling
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Speaker 1: down over her shoulders, and a good yard on the
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Speaker 1: ground in each side of her. Oh be the hoky farmer,
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Speaker 1: But that was the hair. The likes of it. I
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Speaker 1: never seen non mortal woman young or old before, nor since.
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Speaker 1: It grew as strong out of her as out of air.
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Speaker 1: A young slip of a girl, you could see, But
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Speaker 1: the color of it was a mystery to describe. The
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Speaker 1: first squint I got of it, I thought it was
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Speaker 1: silvery gray, like an old crone's. But when I got
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Speaker 1: up beside her, I saw, by the glance of the
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Speaker 1: sky it was a sort of an escariate color, and
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Speaker 1: a shine out of it, like flow silk. It ran
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Speaker 1: over her shoulders and the tool shapely arms. She was
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Speaker 1: laying her head on for all the world, like Mary
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Speaker 1: Magdalen's in a pitcher. And then I perceived that the
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Speaker 1: gray cloak and the green ground underneath it was made
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Speaker 1: of no earthly material I ever laid eyes on. Now
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Speaker 1: I needn't tell ye, sir, that I seen all this
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Speaker 1: in the twinkle of a bed post, long as I
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Speaker 1: take to make the narration of it, so I may
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Speaker 1: to step back from her, and the lord bit tunis
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Speaker 1: an arm, says I out loud, and would dead. I
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Speaker 1: blessed myself, well, mister Harry. The word wasn't out of
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Speaker 1: my mouth before she turned her face on me, Ah,
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Speaker 1: mister Harry. But twas that was the awfullest apparition ever
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Speaker 1: I seen the face of her as she looked up
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Speaker 1: at me. God forgive me for saying it, But it
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Speaker 1: was more like the face of the axy Homo beyond
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Speaker 1: in the Marlborough Street chapel, nor like any face I
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Speaker 1: could mention as pails a corpse in the most of
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Speaker 1: freckles on it, like the freckles of a turkey's egg,
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Speaker 1: and the two eyes sown in with red thread from
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Speaker 1: the terrible power of crying he had to do. And
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Speaker 1: such a pair of eyes as the world, mister Harry,
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Speaker 1: as blue as to forget me nots, and as cold
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Speaker 1: as the moon in a bog hole of a frosty night,
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Speaker 1: and a dead alive look in him that sent a
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Speaker 1: cold shiver through the mara, and me bones be the martal.
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Speaker 1: You could have run a take up full of cold
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Speaker 1: perspiration out of the hair, and me had that minute
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Speaker 1: so ye could well. I thought the life would leave
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Speaker 1: me entirely. When she reads up from her hunkers till
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Speaker 1: be dead, she looked mostly as tall as Nelson's pillar,
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Speaker 1: and with the two eyes gazing back at me, and
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Speaker 1: her two arms stretch out before her, and I he
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Speaker 1: out of her that riz day, hear of me scalp
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Speaker 1: till it was stiff as dog's bristles in a new
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Speaker 1: hearth broom away. She glides glides round the angle of
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Speaker 1: the bridge and down with her into the stream that
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Speaker 1: ran underneath it. Twas then I began to suspect what
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Speaker 1: she was. We sh just Thomas, says I. To meself,
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Speaker 1: says I, and I made a great struggle to get
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Speaker 1: me two legs into a trot in spite of the
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Speaker 1: spave in a fright the pair of the Morion, And
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Speaker 1: how I brought myself home that same night, the Lord
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Speaker 1: in Heaven only knows, for I never could tell. But
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Speaker 1: I must have tumbled again the door and shot in
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Speaker 1: head foremost into the middle of the floor, where I
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Speaker 1: lay in dead swoon for mostly an hour. And the
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Speaker 1: first I knew was miss McGuire standing over me with
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Speaker 1: a jorum of punch. She was pouring down me throat
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Speaker 1: to bring back the life into me, and we hid
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Speaker 1: in a pool of cold water. She dashed over me
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Speaker 1: in her first fright. Ah, mister Connolly, say she. What
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Speaker 1: is ye shayhee to put the scare on a lone
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Speaker 1: woman like that? Says she? Am I in this world
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Speaker 1: of the next, says I, Musha, where else would you be?
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Speaker 1: Only here in me kitchen, says she. Oh glory be
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Speaker 1: to God, says I. But I thought I was in
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Speaker 1: purgatory at the last not to mention an uglier place,
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Speaker 1: says I. Only it's too cold I find myself, and
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Speaker 1: not too odd, says I faith and maybe you are
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Speaker 1: more than half ways there only for me, says she.
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Speaker 1: But what's come to ye, Talatal? Is it your fetch
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Speaker 1: ye seen? Mister Connolly ah noble clish says I? Never
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Speaker 1: mind what I seen, says I, so be degrees, I
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Speaker 1: ag and to come too a little. And that's the
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Speaker 1: way I'm at the banshee, mister Harry. But how did
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Speaker 1: you know it really was the banshee? After all? Tom
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Speaker 1: us there Gar, Sir, I knew the apparition of her
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Speaker 1: well enough, but was confirmed by the circumstance that occurred
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Speaker 1: the same time there was a mister O'nail's was come
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Speaker 1: on a visit, you must know, to a place in
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Speaker 1: the neighborhood, one of the old O'Nails of the County Tyrone,
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Speaker 1: a real old Irish family, and the banshee was heard
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Speaker 1: keening around the house that same night, be more than
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Speaker 1: one that was in it. And sure enough, mister Aarry,
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Speaker 1: he was found dead in his bed the next morning.
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Speaker 1: So if it wasn't the banshee I seen that time,
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Speaker 1: I'd like to know what else it could have been,
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Speaker 1: and of how Thomas Connolly met the Banshee. End of
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Speaker 1: Section fourteen.