ow hair, washing and ever washing, and wringing out clothing that was stained crimson red, and she crying and keening all the time. 'Little Hound,' said Cathbad, 'Do you see what it is tha

Blake, when he "burst out into singing of the things he saw in Heaven, and made the rafters ring." And a few years ago the woman of a thatched house at the foot of Echtge told me "There were great wonders done in the old times; and when my father that worked in the garden there above was dying, there came of a sudden three flashes of light into the room, the brightest light that ever was seen in the world; and there was an old man in the room, one Ruane, and I leaned back on him for I had like to faint. And people coming the road saw the light, and up at Mick Inerney's house they all called out that our house was in flames. And when they came and heard of the three flashes of light coming into the room and about the bed they all said it was the angels that were his friends that had come to meet him." When Raftery died, the blind poet who wandered through our townlands a hundred years ago, some say there were flames about the house all through

g

g

ld by St

e road, for they had come to see her, but she said there was no fear of her, and she

shadow of my wife on the road before me, and it was as white as d

Cur

g the road, and she is a girl would not be afraid to walk the whole world with herself. And it was l

r she knew her cousin would do her no harm. And after a while he was gone, and when she got near home and saw the lights she

Si

inging his cart to Kinvara. And I heard it again a few nights ago, but I heard of no death since then. What is the Banshee

I would stand barefooted in the snow listening to t

e that I saw my daughter that was in America dead, and stretched and a table laid out with the corpse. She came home after,

the door of the house I looked down and saw a little woman, very broad and broad faced-about the bigness of the seat of that table-and a cloak about her. I called out to

nd I suppose, father or mother, it follows the generations. I heard it another time and my daughter from America coming into the house that night. It was the most m

Clo

t. Anyway, there's no question you could ask him he couldn't answer. And what he says of the Banshee is, that it's Rachel mourning still for every innocent of the earth

. S

has seen her there and heard her wailing, wailing, and she with a red petticoat put about her head. There

inning

graveyard beyond at Ryanrush, so we ran like foals to see who was being buried, and I was the first, and leaped up on the wall. And there she was and

side

a crying-the grandest cry ever you heard-and I said "Glynn's after dying and they're crying him." And

s the Banshee we

down, outside Aughanish, there the Banshee does always be

pears and cries for a month before any one dies. A great many are t

And when the old Captain died, the crows all left the

emara

ne, and we would be having afternoon tea. He told me one time I would soon be at a burying, and it would be a baby's burying, and I l

He

ing by the fire, and I heard a noise like the blow of a flail on the door outside. And I went to see what it was, but there was

ill

a flock of stares (starlings) came about his

d that if she heard you singing loud she'

emara

on Christmas night-it struck six again, and afterwards I heard that my sister in America had die

Hun

he hall-door, and then she saw a great number of foxes lying on the steps and barking and running about. And the next morning there was a meet at some distant covert-it had been

Han

the fair of Loughrea. And as he started home he sent word to my grandfather "Come to the corner of the old castle and yo

I saw her running along the path before me. But when I got

Lin

was alone in the house with the dog. And what do you think but he started up and went out to the h

nd in the morning it was standing wide open. And as I knew by the

er lying in Kilmacduagh. "You should never separate," says I, "in death a couple t

air you might get a blast of holy wind you

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y were out of this world. And one of those boys was out at sea all day, the day before he was drowned. And when he came in to Galway in the evening, some boy said to him "I saw you today standing up on the high

near A

n that field beside us the sound of washing cloth

the forth one night, and not long

ran

out laying spillets since daybreak with two other men." And he said, "But I did see him, and I could have spoke with him." And the next day-St. Bridget's Day-there was confessions in the little chapel below and I was in it, and Shamus Meagher, and it was he that was kneeling

Pi

ght they were all killed, and they went out and they were quiet then. But they went on to the next house where they heard a lowing, and all th

Man i

she had a little girl sick. And one day she went out behind the house and t

t I heard a noise outside, as if of hammering. And I went out and I thought it came from anothe

s the last night you'll have to watch the chil

g down to the sea, and a little storm came, and took my hat off and broug

d Mid

ughter and that she was dead and put in the coffin. And I heard

near L

kely it is some that lived in the house are wanting it for themselves at that time. And there is a house near the Darcys' where as soon as the potatoes are strained from the pot, they must

air, and she has a beetle with her and she takes it and beetles clothes in the ri

Ki

s if held over her face. They all looked up and saw it, and they were all afraid and went back but myself. Then I heard a cry that did not seem to come from her but from a good way off, and then it seemed

e home a few days after and took to the bed and died. It is

. K

s good for us wait where we are, for they have brought the corp out and are crying him." So we waited a while and no one came, and so we went on to the house, and we had two hours to wait before they brought out the corp fo

oct

wouldn't have had much wrong with him, but his brother had died of phthisis, and when he got a cold he made sure he would die too, and he took to the bed. And every day his mother would go in and cry for an hour over him, and then he'd cry and then the father would cry, and he'd say "Oh, how can I leave my father and my mother! Who will there be to mind them when I'm gone?" One time he was getting

ld Ar

of us there, and when it came to just before midnight, I heard a great silence fall, and I looked from one to another to see the silence. And then there came a knock at the window, just as the clock was striking twelve. And Connor's

tside but would come shrinking and howling into the house. Yes indeed, I believe the faeries are in all countries, all over the world; but the banshee is only in Ireland, though sometim