Visions and Beliefs in the West of Ireland, First Series

by Unknown

This I can tell you and be certain of, and I remember well that the man in the third house to this died after being sick a long time. And the wife died after, and she was to be buried in the same place, and when they came to the husband's coffin they opened it, and there was nothing in it at all, neither brooms nor anything else.

There's a boy, I know him well, that was up at that forth above the house one day, and a blast of wind came and blew the hat off him. And when he saw it going off in the air he cried out, "Do whatever is pleasing to you, but give me back my cap!" And in the moment it was settled back again on to his head.

Old Deruane goes on:

There are many can do cures, because they have something walking with them, what one may call a ghost from among the Sheogue. A few cures I can do myself, and this is how I got them. I told you that I was for five quarters in Manchester, and where I lodged were two old women in the house, from the farthest end of Mayo, for they were running from Mayo at the time because of the hunger. And I knew that they were likely to have a cure, for St. Patrick blessed the places he was not in more than the places he was in, and with the cure he left and the fallen angels, there are many in Mayo can do them.

Now it's the custom in England never to clean the table but once in the week and that on a Saturday night. And on that night all is set out clean, and all the crutches of bread and bits of meat and the like are gathered together in a tin can, and thrown out in the street, and women that have no other way of living come round then with a bag that would hold two stone, and they pick up all that's thrown out in the street, and live on it for a week. And often I didn't eat the half of what was before me, and I wouldn't throw it out, but I'd bring it to the two old women that were in the house, so they grew very fond of me.

Well, when the time came that I thought to draw towards home, I brought them one day to a public-house and made a drop of punch for them, and then I picked the cure out of them, for I was wise in those days.

Those that get a touch I could save from being brought away, but I couldn't bring back a man that's away, for it's only those that have been living among them for a while that can do that. There was a neighbour's child was sick, and I got word of it, and I went to the house, for the woman there had showed me kindness. And I went in to the cradle and I lifted the quilt off the child's face and you could see by it, and I knew the sign, that there was some of their work there. And I said, "You are not likely to have the child long with you, Ma'am." And she said, "Indeed I know I won't have him long." So I said nothing but I went out, and whatever I did, and whatever I got there, I brought it again and gave it to the child, and he began to get better. And the next day I brought the same thing again, and gave it the child, and I looked at it and I said to the mother, "He'll live to comb his hair grey." And from that time he got better, and now there's no stronger child in the island, and he the youngest in the house.

After that the husband got sick, and the woman said to me one day, "If there's anything you can do to cure him, have pity on me and on my children, and I'll give you what you'll wish." But I said, "I'll do what I can for you, but I'll take nothing from you except maybe a grain of tea or a glass of porter, for I wouldn't take money for this, and I refused £2 one time for a cure I did." So I went and I brought back the cure, and I mixed it with flour and made it into three little pills that it couldn't be lost, and gave them to him, and from that time he got well.

There's a woman lived down the road there, and one day I went in to the house, when she was after coming from Galway town, and I asked charity of her. And it was in the month of August when the bream fishing was going on, and she said, "There's no one need be in want now, with fresh fish in the sea and potatoes in the gardens"; and gave me nothing. But when I was out the door she said, "Well, come back here." And I said, "If you were to offer me all you brought from Galway, I wouldn't take it from you now."