“So much the worse,” I replied; “that holy name should never be profaned in such a manner, and I am sorry any person would be so wicked or so foolish as to encourage you in your tricks. I neither like you nor your proceedings, and the sooner you go about your business the better.”
He started to his feet in a passion, blew out the candle, seized the plate, and attempted to throw the contents into the fireplace; but my wife, who did not wish her hearth to be wet, took it from him and laid it past. He fumed and stormed, said I let him take a great deal of trouble on my account, and insisted on proceeding; but I was determined, and, being considerably chafed and annoyed by the transaction, I again ordered him off, and left him.
In a few moments I heard the noise of a violent altercation and scuffle, and I was loudly called on. I hastened to the scene of contention, and found my wife holding Orohoo by the neck, and preventing his departure. “What’s all this?” I exclaimed. “This fellow,” said she, “when he was going, took a live coal out of the grate, and told me to take care of my children.” This he stiffly denied, until confronted by the servant, and I threatened to give him up to the police as an impostor, when he quailed, and acknowledged that he had said so, but that he meant no harm by it. “And sure,” said he, “there’s no harm in bidding you mind them; for if your cow was hurt, so may your children. You’re not treating me well,” he continued; “I came at the bidding of a friend to do you a good turn, and asked nothing for it, and now you’re putting me out; you’ll be glad to see me yet, though. But take my advice: never throw out your Sunday’s ashes until Tuesday morning, and always sweep your floor in from the door to the hearth.” And away he went.
My heart now beat easy, for I thought we had fairly got rid of the fairy man; but I was to be still further mystified and bewildered. On examining the plate over which he had performed his incantations, we found the contents to be thick, yellow, and slimy, with a red sediment like globules of blood at the bottom. This seemed extraordinary, as I certainly watched him closely, and did not see him put any thing into the plate but milk, water, and salt.
The month now drew near a close, and our bread was still butterless. This often caused the morsel to stick in the throat of my poor dear partner, who felt none of the scruples of conscience with which I was affected, and firmly believed, her cow was bewitched. “Here we are day after day losing, our substance, and might have it only for your squeamishness in not letting the fairy man finish his job.” Thus she would argue, and hesitated not to call me a fool, nay, a downright ass; and indeed my neighbours were much of the same opinion: one of them, a respectable farmer’s wife, was particularly pertinacious. “My Robin,” said she one evening, as they were harping on the old string, “my Robin was down in Sligo, and he heard that if you got the coulter of a plough, and made it red-hot in the fire, while you were churning the butter would come back; or if you chose to churn on Sunday morning before the lark sings, you will surely get it.” “Tempt me no more with your spells or Sabbath-breaking; I will have none of them,” said I, impatiently; “I will never barter my peace of mind for a pound of butter, if I should never eat a morsel.”
But, in truth, my peace of mind was gone, for the continual urging and yammering I was subjected to made me heartily sick, and I inwardly resolved to sell the cow the first opportunity, and so end the matter.
On May eve, in the afternoon, I had occasion to leave home for a short time, and on my return was rather surprised to find all the windows closed and the door locked against me. I knocked and called for admittance, but received no answer; and hearing the noise of churning going on within, “fast and furious,” the truth flashed across my mind; and lamenting my wife’s credulity, I retired to the garden to await the result. In a short time she came running out like one demented, clapping her hands and screaming, “Oh! we’ve got the butter, we’ve got the butter!” and on going in I found a coulter phizzing and sparkling at a white heat in the fire, an ass’s shoe (which had been found a few days previously) under the churn, my worthy neighbour aforesaid standing over it, panting and blowing from the exertions she had made on my behoof, and wiping the dew-drops from her really comely countenance, and in the churn, floating like lumps of gold in a sea of silver, as fine a churning of butter as ever we were blessed with.
Well, I own I was staggered, and being triumphantly asked, “Now, is there no witchcraft or virtue in a red-hot coulter?” I could scarcely muster up courage to utter “No.” In vain I protested the butter came back because “Brownie” got back to her pasture, in consequence of the change in her feeding, from dry fodder to the mellow and genial produce of spring, as the loss at first was owing to the transition from grass to hay. ’Twas to no purpose to argue thus: all else were positive it was otherwise; but whether the virtue was in Orohoo’s incantations, the efficacy of the red-hot coulter, the influence of the ass’s shoe, or the tremendous pommelling the milk was subjected to on the occasion, no one could exactly say.
A few days after, I conversed on the subject with an intelligent person, a herd in charge of an extensive stock farm. After hearing my story to an end, he indulged in a hearty laugh at my expense. “Faith,” said he, “I took you for a sensible man, and did not suppose you would credit such folly.” “I’d as soon believe my mother was a bishop,” said I, “as put any faith in it some time ago. But how can I get over the chain of circumstantial evidence?—not a link of it wanting. First, ‘the Hawk’ coming with her seven-and-sixpenny geese, then the gipsies and the piper, and losing my butter just then.” “’Tis very easy,” said he, “to account for it. In the first place, you took your cow from grass and fed her on hay.” “Yes, but she had plenty of winter cabbage, and we gave her boiled potatoes.” “Just the thing; cabbage is good for plenty of milk, but not for butter. I’ll engage you gave her the potatoes warm.” “Yes.” “And she got a scour?” “Indeed she did, and her hair fell off.” “So I thought. And afterwards she got in good condition?” “Yes.” “Oh! ay, she put her butter on her ribs. Did you kill a pig at Christmas?” “I did.” “Where did you put your bacon in press?” “Why, under the shelf in the dairy.” “Now the murder is out! Never as long as you live put meat, either fresh or salt, near your milk-vessels; if you do, you will surely spoil your milk and lose your butter.” “This may account for my loss, but what have you to say to its coming back?” “Why, what’s to hinder it, when your bacon is in the chimney and your cow at grass?” “But the red blobs in the plate, and Orohoo fighting the devil for me, what do you say to that?” Here he gave way to such a violent fit of laughter that I really thought he would burst the waistband of his doe-skins. “Orohoo! ha! ha!—Orohoo! ha! ha! ha!—the greatest villain that ever breathed. He came to me one time that I had a cow sick, and said she was fairy-smitten, and that he would cure her. He began with his tricks with the milk and water, just the same as he did with you; but I watched him closer; and when I saw the smoke rising out of the plate, I got him by the neck, shook a little bottle of vitriol out of the cuff of his coat, and took a paper of red earthy powder out of his waistcoat pocket.” I looked aghast and confounded. Was I, then, the dupe of the fairy man? The thought was humiliating, and I even wished that I had remained in ignorance, but on reflection had reason to congratulate myself that it was only a temporary lapse, and that I was right in my original opinion, that, except the witchery of a pair of blue languishers, or the fairy spell of a silver-tongued syren, there is now no evil of the kind to be apprehended.
A.