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Irish Fairy Tales By: Jack B. [Illustrator] Yeats |
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Edited With an Introduction by W. B. YEATS Author of 'The Wanderings of Oisin,' Etc. Illustrated by Jack B. Yeats [Illustration: "PLAYING AWAY ON THE PIPES AS MERRILY AS IF NOTHING HAD
HAPPENED." ( Page 48.)] London
T. Fisher Unwin
1892
WHERE MY BOOKS GO. All the words that I gather,
And all the words that I write,
Must spread out their wings untiring,
And never rest in their flight,
Till they come where your sad, sad heart is,
And sing to you in the night,
Beyond where the waters are moving,
Storm darkened or starry bright. W. B. YEATS. LONDON, January 1892 .
CONTENTS PAGE INTRODUCTION 1 LAND AND WATER FAIRIES THE FAIRIES' DANCING PLACE 13 THE RIVAL KEMPERS 17 THE YOUNG PIPER 32 A FAIRY ENCHANTMENT 49 TEIGUE OF THE LEE 53 THE FAIRY GREYHOUND 69 THE LADY OF GOLLERUS 77
EVIL SPIRITS THE DEVIL'S MILL 95 FERGUS O'MARA AND THE AIR DEMONS 112 THE MAN WHO NEVER KNEW FEAR 123
CATS SEANCHAN THE BARD AND THE KING OF THE CATS 141 OWNEY AND OWNEY NA PEAK 151
KINGS AND WARRIORS THE KNIGHTING OF CUCULAIN 185 THE LITTLE WEAVER OF DULEEK GATE 195
APPENDIX CLASSIFICATION OF IRISH FAIRIES 223 AUTHORITIES ON IRISH FOLKLORE 234
INTRODUCTION AN IRISH STORY TELLER
I am often doubted when I say that the Irish peasantry still believe
in fairies. People think I am merely trying to bring back a little of
the old dead beautiful world of romance into this century of great
engines and spinning jinnies. Surely the hum of wheels and clatter of
printing presses, to let alone the lecturers with their black coats
and tumblers of water, have driven away the goblin kingdom and made
silent the feet of the little dancers. Old Biddy Hart at any rate does not think so. Our bran new opinions
have never been heard of under her brown thatched roof tufted with
yellow stone crop. It is not so long since I sat by the turf fire
eating her griddle cake in her cottage on the slope of Benbulben and
asking after her friends, the fairies, who inhabit the green
thorn covered hill up there behind her house. How firmly she believed
in them! How greatly she feared offending them! For a long time she
would give me no answer but 'I always mind my own affairs and they
always mind theirs.' A little talk about my great grandfather who
lived all his life in the valley below, and a few words to remind her
how I myself was often under her roof when but seven or eight years
old loosened her tongue, however. It would be less dangerous at any
rate to talk to me of the fairies than it would be to tell some
'Towrow' of them, as she contemptuously called English tourists, for I
had lived under the shadow of their own hillsides. She did not
forget, however, to remind me to say after we had finished, 'God bless
them, Thursday' (that being the day), and so ward off their
displeasure, in case they were angry at our notice, for they love to
live and dance unknown of men. Once started, she talked on freely enough, her face glowing in the
firelight as she bent over the griddle or stirred the turf, and told
how such a one was stolen away from near Coloney village and made to
live seven years among 'the gentry,' as she calls the fairies for
politeness' sake, and how when she came home she had no toes, for she
had danced them off; and how such another was taken from the
neighbouring village of Grange and compelled to nurse the child of the
queen of the fairies a few months before I came... Continue reading book >>
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