The Ned M'Keown Stories: Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of; William Carleton, Volume ThreeCarleton, William
General
The Ned M'Keown Stories: Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of; William Carleton, Volume Three
Carleton, William
Ireland -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
“The squire very kindly lent sheets for them both to be laid out in,
and mould candle-sticks to hould the lights; and, God he knows, 'twas
a grievous sight to see the father and mother both stretched beside one
another in their poor place, and their little orphans about them; the
gorsoons,--them that had sense enough to know their loss,--breaking
their hearts, the craythurs, and so hoarse, that they weren't able to
cry or spake. But, indeed, it was worse to see the two young things
going over, and wanting to get acrass to waken their daddy and mammy,
poor desolit childher!
“When the corpses were washed and dressed, they looked uncommonly well,
consitherin'. Larry, indeed, didn't bear death so well as Sally; but
you couldn't meet a purtier corpse than she was in a day's travelling.
I say, when they were washed and dressed, their friends and neighbors
knelt down around them, and offered up a Pather and Ave a-piece, for
the good of their sowls: when this was done, they all raised the keena,
stooping over them at a half bend, clapping their hands, and praising
them, as far as they could say anything good of them; and indeed, the
craythurs, they were never any one's enemy but their own, so that nobody
could say an ill word of either of them. Bad luck to it for potteen-work
every day it rises! only for it, that couple's poor orphans wouldn't be
left without father or mother as they were; nor poor Hurrish go the gray
gate he did, if he had his father living, may be; but having nobody
to bridle him in, he took to horse riding for the squire, and then to
staling them for himself. He was hanged afterwards, along with Peter
Doraghy Crolly, that shot Ned Wilson's uncle of the Black Hills.
“After the first keening, the friends and neighbors took their sates
about the corpse. In a short time, whiskey, pipes, snuff, and tobacco
came, and every one about the place got a glass and a fresh pipe. Tom,
when he held his glass in his hand, looking at his dead brother, filled
up to the eyes, and couldn't for some time get out a word; at last,
when he was able to spake--'Poor Larry,' says he, 'you're lying there low
before me, and many a happy day we spint with one another. When we were
childher,' said he, turning to the rest, 'we were never asunder; he was
oulder nor me by two years, and can I ever forget the leathering he gave
Dick Rafferty long ago, for hitting me with the rotten egg--although
Dick was a great dale bigger than either of us. God knows, although you
didn't thrive in life, either of you, as you might and could have done,
there wasn't a more neighborly or friendly couple in the parish they
lived in; and now, God help them both, and their poor orphans over them!
Larry, acushla, your health, and Sally, yours; and may God Almighty have
marcy on both your sowls.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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