“Is it the Cluricaune? why, then, sure I did, often and often; many’s the time I heard my father, rest his soul! tell about ’em.”
“But did you ever see one, Molly, yourself?”
“Och! no, I never see one in my life; but my grandfather, that’s my father’s father, you know, he see one, one time, and caught him too.”
“Caught him! Oh! Molly, tell me how?”
“Why, then, I’ll tell you. My grandfather, you see, was out there above in the bog, drawing home turf, and the poor old mare was tired after her day’s work, and the old man went out to the stable to look after her, and to see if she was eating her hay; and when he came to the stable door there, my dear, he heard something hammering, hammering, hammering, just for all the world like a shoemaker making a shoe, and whistling all the time the prettiest tune he ever heard in his whole life before. Well, my grandfather, he thought it was the Cluricaune, and he said to himself, says he, ‘I’ll catch you, if I can, and then, I’ll have money enough always.’ So he opened the door very quietly, and didn’t make a bit of noise in the world that ever was heard; and looked all about, but the never a bit of the little man he could see anywhere, but he heard him hammering and whistling, and so he looked and looked, till at last he see the little fellow; and where was he, do you think, but in the girth under the mare; and there he was with his little bit of an apron on him, and hammer in his hand, and a little red nightcap on his head, and he making a shoe; and he was so busy with his work, and he was hammering and whistling so loud, that he never minded my grandfather till he caught him fast in his hand. ‘Faith I have you now,’ says he, ‘and I’ll never let you go till I get your purse—that’s what I won’t; so give it here to me at once, now.’—‘Stop, stop,’ says the Cluricaune, ‘stop, stop,’ says he, ’till I get it for you.’ So my grandfather, like a fool, you see, opened his hand a little, and the little fellow jumped away laughing, and he never saw him any more, and the never the bit of the purse did he get, only the Cluricaune left his little shoe that he was making; and my grandfather was mad enough angry with himself for letting him go; but he had the shoe all his life, and my own mother told me she often see it, and had it in her hand, and ’twas the prettiest little shoe she ever saw.”
“And did you see it yourself, Molly?”
“Oh! no, my dear, it was lost long afore I was born; but my mother told me about it often and often enough.”
The main point of distinction between the Cluricaune and the Shefro, arises from the sottish and solitary habits of the former, who are rarely found in troops or communities.
The Cluricaune of the county of Cork, the Luricaune of Kerry, and the Lurigadaune of Tipperary, appear to be the same as the Leprechan or Leprochaune of Leinster, and the Logherry-man of Ulster; and these words are probably all provincialisms of the Irish for a pigmy.
It is possible, and is in some measure borne out by the text of one of the preceding stories [IX.], that the word luacharman is merely an Anglo-Irish induction, compounded of (a rush,) and the English word, man.—A rushy man,—that may be, a man of the height of a rush, or a being who dwelt among rushes, that is, unfrequented or boggy places.
The following dialogue is said to have taken place in an Irish court of justice, upon the witness having used the word Leprochaune:—
Court.—Pray what is a leprochaune? the law knows no such character or designation.
Witness.—My lord, it is a little counsellor man in the fairies, or an attorney that robs them all, and he always carries a purse that is full of money, and if you see him and keep your eyes on him, and that you never turn them aside, he cannot get away, and if you catch him he gives you the purse to let him go, and then you’re as rich as a Jew.
Court.—Did you ever know of any one that caught a Leprochaune? I wish I could catch one.
Witness.—Yes, my lord, there was one—
Court.—That will do.
With respect to “money matters,” there appears to be a strong resemblance between the ancient Roman Incubus and the Irish Cluricaune.—“Sed quomodo dicunt, ego nihil scio, sed audivi, quomodo incuboni pileum rapuisset et thesaurum invenit,” are the words of Petronius.—See, for farther arguments in support of identity of the two spirits, the Brothers Grimm’s Essay on the Nature of the Elves, prefixed to their translation of this work, under the head of “Ancient Testimonies.”
“Old German and Northern poems contain numerous accounts of the skill of the dwarfs in curious smith’s-work.”—“The Irish Cluricaune is heard hammering; he is particularly fond of making shoes, but these were in ancient times made of metal (in the old Northern language a shoemaker is called a shoe-smith;) and, singularly enough, the wights in a German tradition manifest the same propensity; for, whatever work the shoemaker has been able to cut out in the day, they finish with incredible quickness during the night.”
The Brothers Grimm.