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LEARGAIDH STREAM.
‘Ina Rosses. , ,
Of the wild country between Dnntgleo (ancient Clochan-liath) and
Gaeth-Doir, which goes by the general name of The Rosses (the “ penin-
sulas"). Stephen Gwynn writes :- ‘ i
" From Ard-a'-raith or Gleanntaidhe a choiceof routes is open. The
easiest way upon the whole is to hug the coast and make for Dun-gleo,
about sixteen Irish miles to the north of Gleauntaidhe. And a wild road
you will have to travel over the treeless mountain side, seeing. if you meet
with such a. day as I did, nothing but a shifting panorama of brown. crests
and grey mists, with here and there a dim glimpse of the Atlantic, till you
reach the neighbourhood of Dun-gleo itself and its cluster of neighbouring
lakes. Now, there are sundry good motives for taking- this hue. First,
Dun-gleo is a. good iishing centre : its lakes abound with brown and
white trout, though for some reason the salmon seldom come into them.
Secondly, the whole coast oil‘ the Rosses-which is a general name for the
district between Dun-gleo and Gaeth-Doir-is scattered in a curious way
with a multiplicity of islands, big and little. ranging from Ara downwards,
and in line weather must be exceedingly picturesque."
The Claideach and the Gaeth-Barra are rivers of the Rosses country,
which is a "noted fairy one." There is a "little jutty of rocks" some
where between the points where they empty into the sea; and they say if
anyone falls asleep on it " there is danger of his waking silly, the Good-
People having carried off his soul.". And many a. sprightly dance they
have on the grey sands in celebration of their conquests. As our poet
.Yea.ts sings :-
"Where the wave of moonlight glasses
The dim grey sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
They foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances.
Mingling hands and mingling glances
’ Till the moon has taken Eight."
And, as William Allingham tells us, the King of the Good-People (who is
now "so old and grey, he's nigh lost his wits“) often passes here on his
progresses north 2-
"With a bridge of white mist
Columcille he crosses,
On his stately journeys
From Sliabh-na-liag to Rosses;
Or going up with music
On cold starry nights,
'l‘o,su with the ?1ueen
01’ t e gay Nor ern Lights."
Fnxv--ruoims.
We are all, no doubt, familiar with the appearance of our fairy-
thorns. William Allingham, the hard of Beul-ath..eSeanaigh, has drawn
them in general lines 2-
" By the craggy hill-side,
Thro' the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn-trees
For pleasure here and there.
Is any man so ' g
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In‘hls bed at night 1''‘
And Sir Samuel Ferguson paints the ideal :-
"The Hawthorn stands between the ashes tall and slim,
Like matron with her twin grand-daughters at her knee:
The rowan berries cluster o'er her low head grey and dim
In ruddy kisses sweet to see."
Often in the summer-time, about sunset, when the Fairies are in
lively mood, they sing and dance round the thorns. And although it is
the privilege only of the favoured few to see them, every mortal with ears
can hear the sweet music they make. It seems to come from out the
gnarled, dusky branches of the trees-at first loud and clear-defined, then
fainting, fainting gradually away, till the silence of the summer evening
" drinks away their voices in eclioless repose." ’
Funyscnunnss.
Very often when you pass a lonely fort on a dark night you will be
astonished to see a light shining from it; the Fairies are then at some
. work of their own, and you will do well to pass on and not disturb them.
From the frequency of this apparition it has come to pass that many forts
are called L-Vw-irgroinnzall, i.:., the "fort of the candles." We must
not suppose that these fearful lights are always the creation of the
peasaut's imagination ; no doubt they have been in man instances
actually seen, and we must attribute them to that curious henornenon,'
ignis fatuus, or Will-o’-the-wisp. But the people will not sten to this,
gr tlliey know well that all such apparitions are the work of the Good-
eop e.
WARDEN-RINGS.
Those little green spots on the swells of mountains and the breasts of
bogs and the marges of streams which are such a delightful feature of our
Island's scenery-nighlmn an rinnrz-sidhe, " rings of fairy dancing." the
peasants call them-are supposed to marl: the trysting-places of the Good-
Folk. Here they gather 0' nights--
"When the moon is up,
And the stars are out,
And the honey-dew is falling"-
to deliberate and dispute and feast and dance. 'Tis their ring-a-rosy
skipping does the trick, and the magic light of the old moon laughing
down on them and their frolics :- '
"On my hills the moonbeams la
From Carra.ig<:ross to Beola-geaiyin .
By every rill, in every glen
Merry elves, their morris pacing
o aerial minstrelsie,
Emerald rings on brown heath tracing,
"Trip it deft and merrilie.
. The country-people will not suffer their cattle to stray over these
rings for fear they might be fairy’-stricken for their tres And for this
rnson are they called " warden-rings," as everything ey enclose ‘Is safe
from vulgar annoyance and desecration. ,
C]iAj’nA’An bpoicezxb 50 mAl]t5]16Ab.
0’er the mg to Peggy.
I got this tune from Pminseas mac Snibhne. It is well known in the parish of Cill-mac-nEnaln.
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