Visions and Beliefs in the West of Ireland, Second Series
General
Visions and Beliefs in the West of Ireland, Second Series
Atlantic Coast (Ireland) -- Social life and customs; Folklore -- Ireland; Ireland -- Social life and customs
Monday is a good day for pulling herbs, or Tuesday, not Sunday. A
Sunday cure is no cure. The _cosac_ (lichen) is good for the heart,
there was Mineog in Gort, one time his heart was wore to a silk
thread, and it cured him. The _slanugad_ (rib-grass) is very good,
and it will take away lumps. You must go down when it's growing on
the scraws, and pull it with three pulls, and mind would the wind
change when you are pulling it or your head will be gone. Warm it on
the tongs when you bring it and put it on the lump. The _lus-mor_
(mullein) is the only one that's good to bring back children that are
away. But what's better than that is to save what's in the craw of a
cock you'll kill on St. Martin's Eve and put it by and dry it, and
give it to the child that's away.
There's something in green flax I know, for my mother often told me
about one night she was spinning flax, before she was married and she
was up late. And a man of the faeries came in. She had no right to
be sitting up so late, they don't like that. And he told her to go
to bed, for he wanted to kill her, and he couldn't touch her while
she was handling the flax. And every time he'd tell her to go to bed,
she'd give him some answer, and she'd go on pulling a thread of the
flax, or mending a broken one, for she was wise, and she knew that at
the crowing of the cock he'd have to go. So at last the cock crowed,
and he was gone, and she was safe then, for the cock is blessed.
_Mrs. Ward:_
As to the _lus-mor_, whatever way the wind is blowing when you begin to
cut it, if it changes while you're cutting it, you'll lose your mind.
And if you're paid for cutting it, you can do it when you like, but if
not _they_ mightn't like it. I knew a woman was cutting it one time,
and a voice, an enchanted voice, called out, "Don't cut that if you're
not paid, or you'll be sorry." But if you put a bit of this with every
other herb you drink, you'll live for ever. My grandmother used to put
a bit with everything she took, and she lived to be over a hundred.
_An Old Man on the Beach:_
I wouldn't give into those things, but I'll tell you what happened
to a son of my own. He was as fine and as stout a boy as ever you
saw, and one day he was out with me, and a letter came and told of
the death of some one's child that was in America, and all the island
gathered to hear it read. And all the people were pressing to each
other there. And when we were coming home, he had a bit of a kippeen
in his hand, and getting over a wall he fell, and some way the
kippeen went in at his throat, where it had a sharp point and hurt
the palate of his mouth, and he got paralysed from the waist up.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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