“‘Why,’ replied Katty, ‘it’s my big pudden that’s bewitched, an’ it’s out hot pursuin’—here she stopped, not wishin’ to mention her brother’s name—‘someone or other that surely put pishrogues (a fairy spell) an it.’
“This was enough; Jack, now seein’ he had assistance, found his courage comin’ back to him; so says he to Katty, ‘Go home,’ says he, ‘an’ lose no time in makin’ another pudden as good, an’ here’s Paddy Scanlan’s wife Bridget says she’ll let you boil it on her fire, as you’ll want our own to dress for dinner; and Paddy himself will lend me a pitchfork, for pursuin’ to the morsel of that same pudden will escape, till I let the wind out of it, now that I’ve the neighbours to back an’ support me,’ says Jack.
“This was agreed to, an’ Katty went back to prepare a fresh pudden, while Jack an’ half the townland pursued the other wid spades, graips, pitchforks, scythes, flails, and all possible description of instruments. On the pudden went, however, at the rate of about six Irish miles an hour, an’ sich a chase was never seen. Catholics, Prodestants, and Prosbytarians were all afther it, armed, as I said, an’ bad end to the thing but its own activity could save it. Here it made a hop, there a prod was made at it, but off it went, and someone, as eager to get a slice at it on the other side, got the prod instead of the pudden. Big Frank Farrell, the miller, of Ballyboulteen, got a prod backwards that brought a hullabulloo out of him that you might hear at the other end of the parish. One got a slice of the scythe, another a whack of a flail, a third a rap of the spade, that made him look nine ways at wanst.
“‘Where is it goin’?’ asked one. ‘My life for you, it’s on its way to meeting. Three cheers for it, if it turns to Carntaul!’ ‘Prod the sowl out of it if it’s a Prodestan,’ shouted the others; ‘if it turns to the left, slice it into pancakes. We’ll have no Prodestan’ puddens here.’
“Begad, by this time the people were on the point of begginnin’ to have a regular fight about it, when, very fortunately, it took a short turn down a little by-lane that led towards the Methodist praychin’-house, an’ in an instant all parties were in an uproar against it as a Methodist pudden. ‘It’s a Wesleyan,’ shouted several voices; ‘an’ by this an’ by that, into a Methodist chapel it won’t put a foot to-day, or we’ll lose a fall. Let the wind out of it. Come, boys, where’s your pitchforks?’
“The divil pursuin’ to the one of them, however, ever could touch the pudden, and jist when they thought they had it up against the gravel of the Methodist chapel, begad, it gave them the slip, and hops over to the left, clane into the river, and sails away before their eyes as light as an egg-shell.
“Now, it so happened that a little below this place the demesne wall of Colonel Bragshaw was built up to the very edge of the river on each side of its banks; and so, findin’ there was a stop put to their pursuit of it, they went home again, every man, woman, and child of them, puzzled to think what the pudden was at all, what it meant, or where it was goin’. Had Jack Rafferty an’ his wife been willin’ to let out the opinion they held about Harry Connolly bewitchin’ it, there is no doubt of it but poor Harry might be badly trated by the crowd, when their blood was up. They had sense enough, howaniver, to keep that to themselves, for Harry, bein’ an ould bachelor, was a kind friend to the Raffertys. So, of coorse, there was all kinds of talk about it—some guessin’ this, an’ some guessin’ that—one party sayin’ the pudden was of their side, and another denyin’ it, an’ insisting it belonged to them, an’ so on.
“In the meantime, Katty Rafferty for ‘fraid the dinner might come short, went home and made another pudden much about the same size as the one that had escaped, an’ bringing it over to their next neighbour, Paddy Scanlan’s, it was put into a pot, and placed on the fire to boil, hopin’ that it might be done in time, espishilly as they were to have the ministher, who loved a warm slice of a good pudden as well as e’er a gentleman in Europe.
“Anyhow, the day passed; Moll and Gusty were made man an’ wife, an’ no two could be more lovin’. Their friends that had been asked to the weddin’ were saunterin’ about in the pleasant little groups till dinner-time, chattin’ an’ laughin’; but, above all things, sthrivin’ to account for the figaries of the pudden; for, to tell the truth, its adventures had now gone through the whole parish.