Part I: Household Stories

Preface

Though the subject of this volume seems light and frivolous enough, it might be preceded, and accompanied, and concluded by grave and tiresome dissertations ; and if our hopes were limited to its peru...

Household Stories

In this class is properly comprised those fictions which, with some variations, are told at the domestic gatherings of Celts, Teutons, and Slavonians, and are more distinguished by a succession of wil...

Jack And His Comrades

Once there was a poor widow, and often there was, and she had one son. A very scarce summer came, and they didn't know how they'd live till the new potatoes would be fit for eating. So Jack said to hi...

Jack And His Comrades. Part 2

Wasn't that a fine haul we made at the Lord of Dunlavin's ! says one ugly-looking thief with his mouth full, and it's little wre'd get only for the honest porter : here's his purty health ! T...

Jack And His Comrades. Part 3

So all were welcomed to their hearts' content, and the ass, and the dog, and the cock got the best posts in the farmyard, and the cat took possession of the kitchen. The lord took Jack in hand, dresse...

The Bad Stepmother

Once there was a king, and he had two fine children, a girl and a boy; but he married again after their mother died, and a very wicked woman she was that he put over them. One day when he was out hunt...

The Bad Stepmother. Continued

At last there was a letter delivered to the king; and this was wrote by the wicked stepmother herself, as if it was from the young queen to one of the officers, asking him to get a furlough, and come ...

Adventures Of Gilla Na Chreck An Gour

Long ago, a poor widow woman lived down near the iron forge, by Enniscorthy, and she was so poor, she had no clothes to put on her son ; so she used to fix him in the ash-hole, near the fire, and pile...

Adventures Of Gilla Na Chreck An Gour. Continued

1 Jemmy and the editor of these stories had witnessed the rittka-fadha, with the vizarded, goat-bearded clown, and his wife (Tom Blanche the tailor), and May-boys and May-girls at Castle Boro, and had...

Jack The Master And Jack The Servant

There was once a poor couple, and they had three sons, and the youngesfs name was Jack. One harvest day, the eldest fellow threw down his hook, and says he, What's the use to be slaving this way? I'...

Jack The Master And Jack The Servant. Continued

So they came to the gate. What do you want ? says the guard. I want to get the princess for my wife. Do you see them heads? Yes; what of that? Yours will be along with them before you're a ...

I'll Be Wiser The Next Time

Jack was twenty years old before he done any good for his family. So at last his mother said it was high time for him to begin to be of some use. So the next market day she sent him to Bunclody (Newto...

The Three Crowns

There was once a king, some place or other, and he had three daughters. The two eldest were very proud and uncharitable, but the youngest was as good as they were bad. Well, three princes came to cour...

The Three Crowns. Part 2

Next day, he went out after breakfast, and she sent the prince to the castle where the eldest sister was. The same thing happened there; but when the giant was snoring, the princess wakened up the pri...

The Three Crowns. Part 3

Well, they weren't long powdhering away, when a sthronshuch (idler) of a tailor came in; and when the smith asked him what news he had, he got the handle of the bellows and began to blow, to let out a...

The Corpse Watchers

There was once a poor woman that had three daughters, and one day the eldest said, Mother, bake my cake and kill my cock, till I go seek my fortune. So she did, and when all was ready, says her mot...

The Brown Bear Of Norway

There was once a king in Ireland, and he had three daughters, and very nice princesses they were. And one day that their father and themselves were walking in the lawn, the king began to joke on them,...

The Brown Bear Of Norway. Part 2

Now she began to reflect how she never felt her husband leaving her of a morning, and how she never found him neglecting to give her a sweet drink out of a gold cup just as she was going to bed. So...

The Brown Bear Of Norway. Part 3

At last she pitied his case, and removed the charm, and the horns dropped down on the ground, and he would have killed her on the spot, only he was as weak as water, and his fellow-servants came in, a...

The Goban Saor

It is a long time since the Goban Saor was alive. Maybe it was him that built the Castle of Ferns; part of the walls are thick enough to be built by any goban, or gow, that ever splintered wood, or ha...

The Three Advices Which The King With The Red Soles Gave To His Son

When the chief of the Botina Dearriga was on his death-bed he gave his son three counsels, and said misfortune would attend him if he did not follow them. The first was never to bring home a beast fro...

Part II: Legends Of The Good People

Legends Of The "Good People"

All our superstitions, and a great part of our legendary lore, have descended to us from our pagan ancestors. Aphrodite and Artemis selected lovers from among mortals;-Melusina, Viviana, Morgana, and ...

The Fairy Child

There was a sailor that lived up in Grange when he was at home; and one time, when he was away seven or eight months, his wife was brought to bed of a fine boy. She expected her husband home soon, and...

The Changeling And His Bagpipes

A certain youth whom we shall here distinguish by the name of Rickard the Rake, amply earned his title by the time he lost in fair-tents, in dance-houses, in following hunts, and other unprofitable oc...

The Tobinstown Sheeoge

In the pleasant valley of the Duffrey, sheltered from the north-west winds by the huge pile of Mount Leinster, lie two villages separated by a turf bog. The western cluster is called Kennystown, and t...

The Belated Priest

A very lonesome road connect.- the village of Ballin-daggin, in the Duffrey, with the townland of Mangan, on the Bantry side of the brawling Urrin, and outside these intermediate stations it leads to ...

The Palace In The Rath

Every one from Bunclody to Enniscorthy knows the rath1 between Tombrick and Munfin. Well, there was a poor, honest, quiet little creature, that lived just at the pass of Glanamoin, between the hill of...

The Breton Version Of The Palace In The Rath

In the Breton mythology the Irish fairies are replaced by the korils (night dancers), who assemble on the heaths and execute rondes till daybreak. Any inattentive mortal crossing their territory is se...

The Fairy Nurse

There was once a little farmer and his wife living near Coolgarrow. They had three children, and my story happened while the youngest was on the breast. The wife was a good wife enough, but her mind w...

The Recovered Bride

There was a marriage in the townland of Curragraigue. After the usual festivities, and when the guests were left to themselves, and were drinking to the prosperity of the bride and bridegroom, they we...

Faction-Fight Among The Fairies

I was sitting on the brow of that hill, the other day, and it was so calm you could hear the buzzing of a fly's wing. I was half asleep with the heat and with having nothing to do, when I was arouse...

Jemmy Doyle In The Fairy Palace

My father was once coming down Scollagh Gap on a dark night, and all at once he saw, right before him, the lights coming from ever so many windows of a castle, and heard the shouts and laughing of peo...

The Fairy Cure

We have related the adventures of a woman in the Duffrey, who had been called on at a late hour to assist the lady of a fairy chief in a trying situation. The person about whom we are going to speak w...

The Sea Fairies

Moruadhy or Moruach, is the name given to the mermaids that haunt the shallow waters near our coasts. The word is composed of Mur, sea, and Oich, maid. The mermen do not seem on the whole to be an att...

The Black Cattle Of Durzy Island

Several centuries since, a family residing on Durzy Island, off Bantry Bay, found a beautiful little coal-black bull and cow on a verdant spot near the beach. The cow furnished sufficient butter and m...

The Silkie Wife

Those in Shetland and Orkney Islands who know no better, are persuaded that the seals, or silkies, as they call them, can doff their coverings at times, and disport themselves as men and women. A fish...

The Pooka Of Murroe

The unfortunate hero of this narrative was returning home one night along an avenue which lay between a hedge and a wood, the trees of which stood so close that the boughs interlaced. He was not natur...

The Kildare Pooka

Mr. H___-R___-, when he was alive, used to live a good deal in Dublin, and he was once a great while out of the country on account of the Ninety-eight business. But the servants kept on in the ...

The Kildare Lurikeen

A young girl that lived in sight of Castle Carberry, near Edenderry, was going for a pitcher of water to the neighbouring well one summer morning, when who should she see sitting in a sheltery nook un...

The Adventures Of The " Son Of Bad Counsel."

The tale, of which the following is an abridgment, was composed in mixed prose and verse by Brian Dhu O'Reilly,1 who was living in Cavan about the year 1725. The original title is Eachtra mliic na Mio...

The Adventures Of The " Son Of Bad Counsel.". Part 2

Fair was the daughter of the Gruagach, but she was to be won with risk of life; and a shivering seized on the limbs of the young man, and his teeth chattered. The master seemed to know that trouble ha...

The Adventures Of The " Son Of Bad Counsel.". Part 3

In the cellar they found the son of ill-luck as well as of ill-counsel, seated on a cullender that was covering a vat of strongly-working new beer. These were the high-rimmed mound and the sea. The ro...

Part III: Witchcraft, Sorcery, Ghosts And Fetches

Witchcraft, Sorcery, Ghosts, And Fetches

It is probable that the first tradition is to be met outside the Pale, and even as far as Connemara, but the writer has heard or read it nowhere since he learned it in his youth from Mrs. K., our alre...

The Prophet Before His Time

About a hundred years ago lived Mr. Diarmuidh K., a strong gentleman-farmer of this family. His place was not far from Slieve Bui* (Yellow Hill). He was much addicted to the study of astrology, and th...

The Bewitched Churn

Near the townland mentioned there lived an old woman in bad repute with her neighbours. She was seen, one May eve, skimming a well that lay in a neighbouring farm ; and when that was done, she went in...

The Ghosts And The Game Of Football

There was once a poor widow woman's son that was going to look for service, and one winter's evening he came to a strong farmer's house, and this house was very near an old castle. God save all here...

The Cat Of The Carman's Stage

A carman was leaving Bunclody one morning for Dublin, when what should he see but a neighbour's cat galloping along the side of the road, and crying out every moment, Tell Moll Browne, Tom Dunne is d...

Cauth Morrisy Looking For Service

Well, neighbours, when I was a thuckeen (young girl) about fifteen years of age, and it was time to be doing something for myself, I set off one fine day in spring along the yalla high-road ; and if a...

Black Stairs On Fire

On the top of the hill of Cnoc-na-Crd (Gallows Hill) in Bantry, just in full view of the White Mountain, Cahir Rua's Den, and Black Stairs, there lived a poor widow, with a grandchild, about fifteen y...

The Witches' Excursion

Shemus Rua (Red James) was awakened from his sleep one night by noises in his kitchen. Stealing to the door, he saw half-a-dozen old women, sitting round the fire, jesting, and laughing, his own old h...

The Crock Found In The Rath

If any of our English readers are unfortunately ignorant of the social position of tailors in the remote districts of this country, let them hereby learn that Brian Neill, the unlucky hero of this nar...

The Enchantment Of Gearhoidh I Area

In old times in Ireland there was a great man of the Fitzgeralds. The name on him was Gerald, but the Irish, that always had a great liking for the family, called him Gearoidh Jarla (Earl Gerald). He ...

Illan Eachtach And The Lianan

Illan was a friend of Fion, and was willing to become more intimately connected with him by marrying his aunt Tuirrean. It had come to Fion's ears that Illan was already provided with a sighe-love, so...

The Misfortunes Of Barrett The Piper

Barrett the Piper, you see, lost his skill, and was advised to go to the Black North to recover it (Barrett was a Munster man). Well, he took his little boy with him and they walked and they walked ti...

The Woman In White

Pat Gill, of the county of Kildare, was driving towards Dublin, with a load of country produce. He had made a comfortable seat for himself on the car, and had plenty of hay about him and under him. He...

The Queen's County Ghost

Squire Garret (let us say), whose seat lay near Kilcavan, was not a pattern for faith or morals while above mould, and afterwards caused considerable annoyance to his surviving friends and dependents....

The Ghost In Graigue

A lady in the neighbourhood of that old town, much celebrated for her charities, died, and great sorrow was felt for her loss. Many masses were celebrated, and many prayers offered up for the repose o...

Droochan's Ghost

A townland north of Mount Leinster is infested by the above-named evil spirit. Within a few years, sundry people returning from a cross-roads' dance, on a Sunday evening, just as night had set in, wer...

The Kilranelagh Spirit

Two men repairing to their homes just in the twilight, were obliged to pass through this churchyard, or take a considerable circuit. They had come up the hill, and were beginning to proceed through th...

The Doctor's Fetch

In one of our Irish cities, and in a room where the mild moonbeams of a summer night were resting on the carpet and on a table near the window, Mrs. B-, wife of a doctor in good practice and general e...

The Apparition In Old Ross

An instance came under our own notice of the almost establishing of a ghost story that would have braved investigation and contradiction. A gentleman farmer, Mr. J--of Old Ross, was returning home in ...

Part IV: Ossianic And Other Early Legends

Ossianic And Other Early Legends

It never entered the head of the glorious author of the Iliad, or his separate rhapsodies, to publish his work by subscription, or sell his copyright to the Longmans, or the Murray, or the Macmillan o...

Fann Mac Cuil And The Scotch Giant

The great Irish joiant, Fann Mac Cuil, lived to be a middle-aged man, without ever meeting his match, and so he was as proud as a paycock. He had a great fort in the Bog of Allen, and there himself an...

How Fann Mac Cuil And His Men Were Bewitched

The King of Greek's daughter had a great spite to Fann Mac Cuil, and Goll, one of his great heroes, and Oscur his grandson. So she came one day and appeared like a white doe before him ; and bedad he ...

Qualifications And Duties Of The Fianna Eirionn

With the name and opinions of modern Fenians every one's ears have been dinned. For the sake of that portion of our readers who have not devoted much attention to Gaelic archaeology, we devote a few p...

The Battle Of Ventry Harbour

On one occasion, while their chief, Fion, and his friends, were enjoying existence, swimming and fishing in the Sionan, word was brought to him from the warder stationed at the harbour of Finntraighe ...

The Fight Of Castle Knoc

Cumhail, father of Fion, King of Leinster, and head of the Clan Baoisne, ruled the Fianna in the reign of Con of the Hundred Battles. While in Alba (the Highlands), checking the attempts of the Romans...

The Youth Of Fion

The faithful Boghmin lovingly executed her trust, and, assisted by the sage woman Fiecal, reared up the son of Cumhail in a cavern on the side of Slieve Bloom (Blama). She called him Deimne, and he ga...

Fion's First Marriage

The only other adventure of Fion's youth for which we can find space could only be suitably told in the language of the old story-tellers. See Ossianic Transactions, vol. ii. Fion thus relates the exp...

How Fion Selected A Wife

This great chief had more than one bosom-partner in his time ; but as we do not hear much of the institution of polygamy among the ancient Celts, it is to be hoped that he did not marry any one of the...

Pursuit Of Diarmuid And Grainnf

Diarmuid was unhappily gifted with a ball seirce (beauty spot) on his shoulder, and Grainne, catching sight of it while sitting at the window of her Grianan (sunny chamber) while looking at him hurlin...

The Flight Of The Sluggard

After a great feast held at the palace of Almhuin, the Fianna betook themselves to Knockany, in Limerick. There Fion, setting up his tent, despatched his warriors to search the mountains that lie on t...

Beanriogain Na Sciana Breaca

Fion son of Cumhail was one day separated from his knights as they were engaged at the chase, and came out on a wide grassy plain that stretched along the sea strand. 1 The Fianna were disturbed by...

Conan's Delusions In Ceash

As Fion and some of his curai were one day employed in the chase, a druidic dwarf observing that they were tired, invited them to his hut. However much they distrusted him, they would have deemed it u...

The Youth Of Oisin

As the Fianna were one day returning from the chase, a beautiful fawn was started, which fled towards their own dun. At last all had fallen back, both men and dogs, except Fion and his two favourite h...

The Favourite Music Of Fion Mac Cumhail

When my seven battalions gather on the plain, And hold aloft the standards of war, And the dry cold wind whistles through the silk,- That to me is sweetest music ! When the drinking-hall is fur...

The Old Age Of Oisin

After the fatal battle of Gavra the only surviving warrior, Oisin, son of Fion, was borne away on the Atlantic waves by the Lady Niav of resplendent beauty, and for a hundred and fifty years he enjoye...

Legend Of Loch Na Piasta

A long time ago, the pool near the bridge of Thuar was infested by a terrible beast in the shape of a dragon. He laid waste all the Duffrey from Kilmeashil out to Moghurry, and the king of this part o...

The King With The Horse's Ears

The story I'm going to tell yous is not to be met every day. I heard little Tom Kennedy, the great schoolmaster of Rossard, say that he read it in the history of Ireland, and that it happened before t...

The King With The Horse's Ears. Continued

1 The editor has not ventured to print this bizarre pleonasm without legitimate authority. The doctor was hardly out of the house when Thigue was up, and creeping off to the wood. He was afraid to ...

The Story Of The Sculloge's Son From Mu Skerry

A long time ago, before the Danes came into Ireland, or made beer of the heath flowers, a rich man, though he was but a sculloge, lived in Muskerry, in the south, and he died there too, rolling in ric...

The Story Of The Sculloge's Son From Mu Skerry. Part 2

If I knew your name, said Sculloge, I would wish you the compliments of the evening, for I think it is lucky to meet you. I don't care for your compliments, said the other, but I am not asha...

The Story Of The Sculloge's Son From Mu Skerry. Part 3

1 Pronounced Chloive ; Fath nearly as faw. Claymore is made up of Cloidheamh and mhor, large. Glaive is evidently a cognate word. He returned home more dead than alive, and Saav, the moment she cau...

Fios Fath An Aon Sceil

I am, said he, the eldest of three brothers, the Sighe Draoi, Lassa Buaicht, being the youngest. By birthright I inherited the great family treasure of the Cloidheamh Solais, and my youngest brot...

An Br Aon Suan Or

The lovely Fiongalla (fair cheek) was daughter to Glas, chief of a district in the south-west of Desmond.2 She would have been his great happiness, but for a fate that had brooded over his house for n...

The Children Of Lir

Lir, though the father of a demi-god, was not able to secure domestic comfort. Having lost his beloved wife he sought relief in travel; and being on a visit with Bogha Derg, King of Conacht, he was in...

Lough Neagh

This beautiful sheet of water issued from a spring well which only waited an opportunity of being left uncovered, to send forth a mighty flood. The inhabitants of the neighbourhood, aware of the dange...

Killarney

Killarney's fair lake was formed under the following romantic circumstances-the historian omitting to state whether the inhabitants that dwelt beneath the level of its present waves were good or bad, ...

Legend Of The Lake Of Inchiquin

Below the present surface of this lake was once a level plain, over one part of which towered a castle, or dun at least. A cavern under this castle led to some unexplored region, and a beautiful sprin...

How The Shannon Acquired Its Name

A long time ago there was a well in Ossory, shaded by a rowan-tree. When the berries became ripe they would drop into the water, and be eaten by the salmon that had their residence in the well. Red sp...

The Origin Of The Lake Of Tiis

Soon after the preaching of Christianity in Zealand, a church was raised in Kund, and the cheerful clang of the bells was often heard, scattering their holy music abroad, and exciting devotion. But th...

The Building Of Ardfert Cathedral

When St. Brendain, who went to search for the sunk isle of Hy-Breasil, was about to build his Cathedral of Ardfert in the kingdom of Kerry, he fixed on a spot where lay the remains of a deserted lios....

How Donaghadee Got Its Name

In the fine old kingdom of Kerry lived Donogha and Vauria, man and wife. Had they been a happy pair, their names and their little disagreements would not have reached our times. Donogha was lazy, Vaur...

The Borrowed Lake

A young chief once wooed the daughter of another chief, whose dun lay by the edge of Loch Ennel in Westmeath. The damsel was rather haughty and fastidious, and plainly told him that she would not requ...

Kilstoheen In The Shannon

The Regia of Ptolemy is supposed to be in existence, and inhabited by beings who once breathed the upper air. It lies in the bed of the Shannon towards its mouth, and is visible once in every seven ye...

The Isle Of The Living

Wonderful as were the stories concerning our lakes, islands, and sunk cities, related by native historians, they were excelled in some respects by the reports of foreign writers, who put down for subj...

Fionntuin Mac Bochna

In the days of Noah, and while the ark was being built, there dwelt in the forests by the banks of the Tigris, Bith, with his wife Birren, of the race of Cain. Near them lived their daughter, Kesara, ...

The Firbolgs And Danaans

Nemedius (a wanderer from the East) and his thousand men reached Erinn from Thule (Jutland, or the Belgian Peninsula), in thirty skin-covered corrachs. He employed four Phoenician or African architect...

Ints Na Muic

The fated children of Gael Glas sailed from Egypt into the Black Sea, and thence through the waters which filled the Riphean Valley,2 and made a temporary lodgement in the southern part of Scandinavia...

The Bath Of The White Cows

A great many years ago, when this county was so thick with woods that a very light person might walk on the tops of trees from Kilmeashal to the Lady's Island, a little king, or a great chief, had a f...

The Quest For The "Tain-Bo-Cuailgne."

Among the Celtic fictional remains, the Tain-bo-Cuailgne is one of the most remarkable. It was in such high consideration, that the author of the Proceedings of the Bards ascribed its production to ...

The Progress Of The Wicked Bard

There flourished in Ulster in the days of the Knights of the Red Branch and their Grand Master, Connor Mac Nessa, a poet named Aithirne the Importunate. He well deserved his sobriquet, for he seldom a...

Part V: Legends Of The Celtic Saints

Legends Of The Celtic Saints

Before the name of a person, however ascetic may have been his or her life, can be formally enrolled in the list of those whom the Roman Catholic Church pronounces worthy to be invoked in her public p...

St. Patrick

Our subject requires that we should give the place of honour to St. Patrick, whose biography, divested of its legendary adjuncts, may be consulted in the great work of Rev. Alban Butler. Jocelyn, Monk...

How St. Patrick Received The Staff Of Jesus

When our saint was returning from Rome to France in his way to Ireland he stopped at a religious house in an isle in the Gulf of Genoa, and was entertained for a night by the inmates, whose self-impos...

The Fortune Of Dichu

On his first landing on the eastern coast a tall savage man named Dichu, attended by a no less savage dog, attacked him in presence of a large crowd, and both in a moment became as stiff in joint and ...

St. Patrick's Contest With The Druids

At the moment when the high pile of brushwood, crowned with flowers, was about to be lighted up by the hands of the Chief Druid, the King's eyes sparkled with rage, for eastward a weak but steady ligh...

The Baptism Of Aongus

The Apostle passing into Munster was kindly received by Aongus, King of Cashel, who on being duly instructed presented himself for baptism. St. Patrick, as already mentioned, bore with him in all his ...

The Decision Of The Chariot

St Fiech, when a Druid at the court of the Ard Righ, was one of the two who stood up to receive the saint. He assisted him afterwards in his apostolic labours, and, becoming infirm, was indulged with ...

Conversion Of The Robber Chief, Macaldus

A district adjoining the Boyne was infested by a band of robbers, under the command of a chief named Macal-dus. Some of these had been converted from their evil ways by the missionaries, and their chi...

Baptism After Death

The saint was not insensible to the charms of poetry, nor to the merits of the pieces in which the heathen bards of Ireland celebrated the fame of their dead heroes. He lamented the fate of so many no...

The Vision Of St. Brigid

Brigid, daughter of the converted Druid, Dubhthach, was distinguished from her girlhood by an intense spirit of piety. Once while listening to one of St. Patrick's discourses she was observed to fall ...

Death And Burial Of St. Patrick

As St. Patrick was approaching his hundredth year, he received assurance of his labours being near their end, and his reward at hand. He accordingly turned the heads of his oxen towards his cathedral ...

The Corpse-Freighted Barque

Colum Cille, who had preached the Gospel to the heathen Picts, and built the monastery of Iona in the Hebrides, the chief seat of religion in the Highlands and isles for centuries, died there after a ...

St. Brigid's Cloak

The King of Leinster at that time was not particularly generous, and St. Brigid found it not easy to make him contribute in a respectable fashion to her many charities. One day when he proved more tha...

St. Brigid And The Harps

It was not in the nature of things that a Celtic saint should despise music or poetry. St. Brigid being once on a journey, sought hospitality for herself and her sisters in the lios of a petty king. T...

"Arran Of The Saints "1 And Its Patrons

Corbanus, who was still a heathen, and a churl to boot, vacated the isle, and conveyed his people and their property to the opposite coast. There he met with St. Enda and his monks preparing to cross ...

St. Fanchea's Visit To Arran

St. Enda's sister, Fanchea, accompanied by three of her nuns, once paid a visit to Arran to see how the good work was proceeding. She and they were much edified by the praying, and fasting, and labour...

St. Brendain's Voyage

The story-tellers of kings and chiefs among the Gael had their repertory very exactly arranged, the chief subjects, as before mentioned, being huntings, adventures in caverns, stormings of forts, pitc...

The Island Of The Birds

St. Brendain's barque having sailed long in a southwesterly direction in beautiful weather, came to anchor by a delightful island in which the fragrant turf came down to the very water. There were hil...

The Sinner Saved

On a Christmas-eve the barque reached an island, and brought comfort and joy to the heart of its only inhabitant ; for he had seen seven Christmas-days in this solitude without having been present at ...

A Legend Of St. Mogue1 Of Ferns

When St. Mogue was Bishop of Ferns, he had a wild brother that gave him a great deal of trouble, and at last ran away from him altogether. Well, the saint wasn't to be daunted. After waitine for a lon...

O'Carroll's Warning

Three Ulster students spent some time under him, and at last they formed a design of performing a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. They asked his permission, which he granted on one condition. You will die,...

How St. Eloi Was Cured Of Pride

Before St. Eloi1 became religious, and while he was still but a working goldsmith, he sometimes amused himself with shoeing horses. He was very proud of his skill, and often boasted that he never saw ...

St. Lateerin Of Cullin

St. Lateerin lived at Cullin, near Millstreet, and her sisters lived in her neighbourhood. They visited one another once a week, and because they had to pass through bogs and brakes, the angels made a...