Read Online Irish Fairy and Folk Tales by Edited and with an Introduction by William Butler Yeats - Free Book Online

greatly—a newly-dug grave right before him. Hemoved over to it, and looked down, and there at the bottom he saw a black coffin. He clambered down into the hole and lifted the lid, and found that (as he thought it would be) the coffin was empty. He had hardly mounted up out of the hole, and was standing on the brink, when the corpse, which had clung to him for more than eight hours, suddenly relaxed its hold of his neck, and loosened its shins from round his hips, and sank down with a
plop
into the open coffin.
    Teig fell down on his two knees at the brink of the grave, and gave thanks to God. He made no delay then, but pressed down the coffin lid in its place, and threw in the clay over it with his two hands; and when the grave was filled up, he stamped and leaped on it with his feet, until it was firm and hard, and then he left the place.
    The sun was fast rising as he finished his work, and the first thing he did was to return to the road, and look out for a house to rest himself in. He found an inn at last, and lay down upon a bed there, and slept till night. Then he rose up and ate a little, and fell asleep again till morning. When he awoke in the morning he hired a horse and rode home. He was more than twenty-six miles from home where he was, and he had come all that way with the dead body on his back in one night.
    All the people at his own home thought that he must have left the country, and they rejoiced greatly when they saw him come back. Everyone began asking him where he had been, but he would not tell anyone except his father.
    He was a changed man from that day. He never drank too much; he never lost his money over cards; and especially he would not take the world and be out late by himself of a dark night.
    He was not a fortnight at home until he married Mary, the girl he had been in love with; and it’s at their wedding thesport was, and it’s he was the happy man from that day forward, and it’s all I wish that we may be as happy as he was.
    G LOSSARY. —
Rann
, a stanza;
kailee
(
céilidhe
), a visit in the evening;
wirra
(
a mhuire
), “Oh, Mary!” an exclamation like the French
dame; rib
, a single hair (in Irish,
ribe
); a lock (
glac
), a bundle or wisp, or a little share of anything;
kippeen
(
cipin
), a rod or twig; boreen (
bóithrin
), a lane;
bodach
, a clown;
soorawn
(
suarán
), vertigo.
Avic
(
a Mhic
) = my son, or rather, Oh, son. Mic is the vocative of Mac.

PADDY CORCORAN’S WIFE
W ILLIAM C ARLETON
    Paddy Corcoran’s wife was for several years afflicted with a kind of complaint which nobody could properly understand. She was sick, and she was not sick; she was well, and she was not well; she was as ladies wish to be who love their lords, and she was not as such ladies wish to be. In fact, nobody could tell what the matter with her was. She had a gnawing at the heart which came heavily upon her husband; for, with the help of God, a keener appetite than the same gnawing amounted to could not be met with of a summer’s day. The poor woman was delicate beyond belief, and had no appetite at all, so she hadn’t, barring a little relish for a mutton-chop, or a “staik,” or a bit o’ mait, anyway; for sure, God help her! she hadn’t the laist inclination for the dhry pratie, or the dhrop o’ sour buttermilk along wid it, especially as she was so poorly; and, indeed, for a woman in her condition—for, sick as she was, poor Paddy always was made to believe her in
that
condition—but God’s will be done! she didn’t care. A pratie an’ a grain o’ salt was a welcome to her—glory be to his name!—as the best roast an’ boiled that ever was dressed; andwhy not? There was one comfort: she wouldn’t be long wid him—long troublin’ him; it matthered little what she got; but sure she knew herself, that from the gnawin’ at her heart, she could never do good widout the little bit o’ mait now and then; an’, sure, if her own husband begridged it to her, who else had she a