The state of the poor souls cooped up in the lobster-pots, gave Jack a great deal of trouble, and how to release them cost him a great deal of thought. He at first had a mind to speak to the priest about the matter; but what could the priest do, and what did Coo care for the priest? Besides, Coo was a good sort of an old fellow, and did not think he was doing any harm. Jack had a regard for him too, and it also might not be much to his own credit if it were known that he used to go dine with the Merrows under the sea. On the whole, he thought his best plan would be to ask Coo to dinner, and to make him drunk, if he was able, and then to take the hat and go down and turn up the pots. It was first of all necessary, however, to get Biddy out of the way; for Jack was prudent enough, as she was a woman, to wish to keep the thing secret from her.
Accordingly, Jack grew mighty pious all of a sudden, and said to Biddy, that he thought it would be for the good of both their souls if she was to go and take her rounds at Saint John's Well, near Ennis. Biddy thought so too, and accordingly off she set one fine morning at day dawn, giving Jack a strict charge to have an eye to the place. The coast being clear, away then went Jack to the rock to give the appointed signal to Coomara, which was, throwing a big stone into the water; Jack threw, and up sprang Coo. "Good morrow, Jack," said he; "what do you want with me?" "Jist nothin' at all to spake about, sir," replied Jack; "only to come and take pot-luck wid me, now that Biddy's out of the way; if I might make so free as to ax you, an' shure it's myself that's afther doin' so." "It's quite agreeable, Jack, I assure you; what's your hour?" "Any time that's most convenient to yoursilf, sir: say one o'clock, that you may go home, if you wish it, wid the daylight." "I'll be with you," said Coo, "never fear me."
Jack went home and dressed a noble fish dinner, and got out plenty of his best foreign spirits, enough for that matter to make twenty men drunk. Just to the minute came Coo, with his cocked hat under his arm. Dinner was ready; they sat down, and ate and drank manfully. Jack thinking of the poor souls below in the pots, plied old Coo well with brandy, and encouraged him to sing, hoping to put him under the table, but poor Jack forgot that he had not the sea over his own head now to keep it cool. The brandy got into it and did his business for him, and Coo reeled off home, leaving his entertainer as dumb as a haddock on a Good Friday.
Jack never woke till the next morning, and then he was in a sad way. "'Tis no use at all for me thinkin' to make that ould Rapperee dhrunk," said Jack; "an' how in this world can I help the poor sowls out o' the lobster pots." After ruminating nearly the whole day, a thought struck him. "I have it," said he, slapping his thigh; "I'll be bail Coo nivir saw a dhrop o' raal potyeen as ould as he is, an' that's the thing to settle him! Och! thin isn't it well that Biddy won't be home these two days yit; I can have another twist at him." Jack asked Coo again, and Coo laughed at him for having no better head; telling him, he'd never come up to his grandfather. "Well, but thry me agin," said Jack, "and I'll be bail to dhrink you dhrunk and sober, and dhrunk agin."—"Any thing in my power," said Coo, "to oblige you."
All this dinner, Jack took care to have his own liquor watered, and to give the strongest brandy he had to Coo. At last, says he, "Pray, sir, did you ivir dhrink any potyeen? any raal mountain-jew?"—"No," says Coo; "what's that, and where does it come from?"—"Oh! that's a sacret," said Jack, "but it's the right stuff; nivir believe me agin if it isn't fifty times better nor brandy or rum either. Biddy's brother jist sint me a prisent of a little dhrop, in exchange for some brandy, and as you're an ould frind o' the family, I kep it to thrate you wid."—"Well, let's see what sort of thing it is," said Coo.
The potyeen was the right sort. It was first-rate, and had the real smack on it. Coo was delighted with it; he drank and he sang, and he laughed and he danced, till he fell on the floor fas' asleep. Then Jack, who had taken good care to keep himself sober, snapt up the cocked hat, ran off to the rock, leaped in, and soon arrived at Coo's habitation.
All was as still as a churchyard at midnight—not a Merrow young or old, was there. In he went and turned up the pots, but nothing did he see, only he heard, he thought, a sort of a little whistle or chirp as he raised each of them. At this he was surprised, till he recollected what the priest had often said, that nobody living could see the soul, no more than they could see the wind or the air. Having now done all he could do for them he set the pots as they were before, and sent a blessing after the poor souls to speed them on their journey wherever they were going. He now began to think of returning; he put on the hat (as was right,) the wrong way; but when he got out, he found the water so high over his head that he had no hopes of ever getting up into it now that he had not old Coomara to give him a lift. He walked about looking for a ladder, but not one could he find, and not a rock was there in sight. At last he saw a spot where the sea hung rather lower than anywhere else, so he resolved to try there. Just as he came to it, a big cod happened to put down his tail. Jack made a jump and caught hold of it, and the cod, all in amazement, gave a bounce and pulled Jack up. The minute the hat touched the water, pop away Jack was whisked; and up he shot like a cork, dragging the poor cod, that he forgot to let go, up with him tail foremost. He got to the rock in no time, and without a moment's delay hurried home rejoicing in the good deed he had done. But, meanwhile, there was fine work at home; for our friend Jack had hardly left the house on his soul-freeing expedition, when back came Biddy from her soul-saving one to the well. When she entered the house and saw the things lying thrie-na heelah on the table before her—"Here's a purty job," said she, "that blackguard of mine—what ill-luck I had ivir to marry him—he's picked up some vagabone or other, while I was prayin' for the good of his sowl; and they've bin dhrinkin' up all the potyeen that my own brother gev' him, and all the sperits, to be shure, that he was to have sould to his honour." Then hearing an outlandish kind of grunt, she looked down and saw Coomara lying under the table. "The blessed Vargin help an' save me," shouted she, "if he hasn't made a rael baste of himself. Well, well, well to be shure, I often hard till of a man makin' a baste of himself wid dhrink, but I niver saw it afore! Oh hone, oh hone,—Jack, honey, what 'ill I do wid you, or what 'ill I do widout you? How can any dacint woman ivir think of livin' wid a baste?"
With such like lamentations, Biddy rushed out of the house, and was going, she knew not where, when she heard the well known voice of Jack, singing a merry tune. Glad enough was Biddy to find him safe and sound, and not turned into a thing that was like neither fish nor flesh. Jack was obliged to tell her all; and Biddy, though she had half a mind to be angry with him for not telling her before, owned that he had done a great service to the poor souls. Back they both went most lovingly to the house, and Jack wakened up Coomara; and perceiving the old fellow to be rather dull, he bid him not be cast down, for 'twas many a good man's case; said it all came of his not being used to the potyeen, and recommended him, by way of cure, to swallow a hair of the dog that bit him. Coo, however, seemed to think he had had quite enough: he got up, quite out of sorts, and without having the good manners to say one word in the way of civility, he sneaked off to cool himself by a jaunt through the salt water.
Coomara never missed the souls. He and Jack continued the best friends in the world; and no one, perhaps, ever equalled Jack at freeing souls from purgatory; for he contrived fifty excuses for getting into the house below the sea, unknown to the old fellow; and then turned up the pots, and let out the souls. It vexed him, to be sure, that he could never see them; but as he knew the thing to be impossible, he was obliged to be satisfied. Their intercourse continued for several years. However, one morning, on Jack's throwing in a stone, as usual, he got no answer. He flung another, and another; still there was no reply. He went away, and returned the next morning; but it was to no purpose. As he was without the hat, he could not go down to see what had become of old Coo; but his belief was, that the old man, or the old fish, or whatever he was, had either died, or had removed away from that part of the country.[603]