TALES OF MY CHILDHOOD,
BY JOHN KEEGAN.
No. I.—THE BOCCOUGH RUADH.
A TRADITION OF POOR-MAN’S BRIDGE.
“When ghosts, as cottage maids believe,
Their pebbled beds permitted leave,
And goblins haunt, from fire or fen,
Or mine or flood, the walks of men.”——Collins.
One evening last winter—a holiday evening too—when the western wind was sweeping on wild pinions from the grey hills of Tipperary, athwart the rich and level plains of the Queen’s County, when the blast roared down in the chimney, and the huge rain-drops pattered saucily against the four tiny panes which constituted the little kitchen window, I was sitting in the cottage of a neighbouring peasant, amid a small but happy group of village rustics, and enjoying with them that enlivening mirth and sinless delight which I have never found any where but at the fireside of an Irish peasant. The earthen floor was well scrubbed over; the “brullaws ov furnithure” were arranged with more than usual tidiness, and even the crockery on the well-scoured dresser reflected the ruddy glare of the red fire with redoubled brilliancy, and glittered and glistened as merrily as if they felt conscious of the calm and tranquillity of that happy scene. And happy indeed was that scene, and happy was that time, and happier still the hearts of the laughing rustics by whom I was on that occasion surrounded, and amongst whom I have spent the lightest and happiest hours of my existence.
It was, as I said, a wild night, but even the violence of the weather abroad gave an additional relish to the enjoyments within. The blast whistled fiercely in the bawn and in the haggard, but the huge fire blazed brightly on the hearth-stone. The rain fell in torrents; but, as one of the company chucklingly remarked, “the wrong side ov the house was out,” and I myself mentally exclaimed with Tam o’ Shanter,
“The storm without may roar and rustle,
We do not mind the storm a whustle.”