Celtic Fairy Tales (13 page)

"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 we'd
get only for the honest porter! here's his purty health!"

"The porter's purty health!" cried out every one of them, and Jack
bent his finger at his comrades.

"Close your ranks, my men," says he in a whisper, "and let every one
mind the word of command."

So the ass put his fore-hoofs on the sill of the window, the dog got
on the ass's head, the cat on the dog's head, and the cock on the
cat's head. Then Jack made a sign, and they all sung out like mad.

"Hee-haw, hee-haw!" roared the ass; "bow-wow!" barked the dog;
"meaw-meaw!" cried the cat; "cock-a-doodle-doo!" crowed the cock.

"Level your pistols!" cried Jack, "and make smithereens of 'em.
Don't leave a mother's son of 'em alive; present, fire!" With that
they gave another halloo, and smashed every pane in the window. The
robbers were frightened out of their lives. They blew out the
candles, threw down the table, and skelped out at the back door as
if they were in earnest, and never drew rein till they were in the
very heart of the wood.

Jack and his party got into the room, closed the shutters, lighted
the candles, and ate and drank till hunger and thirst were gone.
Then they lay down to rest;—Jack in the bed, the ass in the stable,
the dog on the door-mat, the cat by the fire, and the cock on the
perch.

At first the robbers were very glad to find themselves safe in the
thick wood, but they soon began to get vexed.

"This damp grass is very different from our warm room," says one.

"I was obliged to drop a fine pig's foot," says another.

"I didn't get a tayspoonful of my last tumbler," says another.

"And all the Lord of Dunlavin's gold and silver that we left
behind!" says the last.

"I think I'll venture back," says the captain, "and see if we can
recover anything."

"That's a good boy!" said they all, and away he went.

The lights were all out, and so he groped his way to the fire, and
there the cat flew in his face, and tore him with teeth and claws.
He let a roar out of him, and made for the room door, to look for a
candle inside. He trod on the dog's tail, and if he did, he got the
marks of his teeth in his arms, and legs, and thighs.

"Thousand murders!" cried he; "I wish I was out of this unlucky
house."

When he got to the street door, the cock dropped down upon him with
his claws and bill, and what the cat and dog done to him was only a
flay-bite to what he got from the cock.

"Oh, tattheration to you all, you unfeeling vagabones!" says he,
when he recovered his breath; and he staggered and spun round and
round till he reeled into the stable, back foremost, but the ass
received him with a kick on the broadest part of his small clothes,
and laid him comfortably on the dunghill.

When he came to himself, he scratched his head, and began to think
what happened him; and as soon as he found that his legs were able
to carry him, he crawled away, dragging one foot after another, till
he reached the wood.

"Well, well," cried them all, when he came within hearing, "any
chance of our property?"

"You may say chance," says he, "and it's itself is the poor chance
all out. Ah, will any of you pull a bed of dry grass for me? All the
sticking-plaster in Enniscorthy will be too little for the cuts and
bruises I have on me. Ah, if you only knew what I have gone through
for you! When I got to the kitchen fire, looking for a sod of
lighted turf, what should be there but an old woman carding flax,
and you may see the marks she left on my face with the cards. I made
to the room door as fast as I could, and who should I stumble over
but a cobbler and his seat, and if he did not work at me with his
awls and his pinchers you may call me a rogue. Well, I got away from
him somehow, but when I was passing through the door, it must be the
divel himself that pounced down on me with his claws, and his teeth,
that were equal to sixpenny nails, and his wings—ill luck be in his
road! Well, at last I reached the stable, and there, by way of
salute, I got a pelt from a sledge-hammer that sent me half a mile
off. If you don't believe me, I'll give you leave to go and judge
for yourselves."

"Oh, my poor captain," says they, "we believe you to the nines.
Catch us, indeed, going within a hen's race of that unlucky cabin!"

Well, before the sun shook his doublet next morning, Jack and his
comrades were up and about. They made a hearty breakfast on what was
left the night before, and then they all agreed to set off to the
castle of the Lord of Dunlavin, and give him back all his gold and
silver. Jack put it all in the two ends of a sack and laid it across
Neddy's back, and all took the road in their hands. Away they went,
through bogs, up hills, down dales, and sometimes along the yellow
high road, till they came to the hall-door of the Lord of Dunlavin,
and who should be there, airing his powdered head, his white
stockings, and his red breeches, but the thief of a porter.

He gave a cross look to the visitors, and says he to Jack, "What do
you want here, my fine fellow? there isn't room for you all."

"We want," says Jack, "what I'm sure you haven't to give us—and
that is, common civility."

"Come, be off, you lazy strollers!" says he, "while a cat 'ud be
licking her ear, or I'll let the dogs at you."

"Would you tell a body," says the cock that was perched on the ass's
head, "who was it that opened the door for the robbers the other
night?"

Ah! maybe the porter's red face didn't turn the colour of his frill,
and the Lord of Dunlavin and his pretty daughter, that were standing
at the parlour window unknownst to the porter, put out their heads.

"I'd be glad, Barney," says the master, "to hear your answer to the
gentleman with the red comb on him."

"Ah, my lord, don't believe the rascal; sure I didn't open the door
to the six robbers."

"And how did you know there were six, you poor innocent?" said the
lord.

"Never mind, sir," says Jack, "all your gold and silver is there in
that sack, and I don't think you will begrudge us our supper and bed
after our long march from the wood of Athsalach."

"Begrudge, indeed! Not one of you will ever see a poor day if I can
help it."

So all were welcomed to their heart's 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 hands, dressed
him from top to toe in broadcloth, and frills as white as snow, and
turnpumps, and put a watch in his fob. When they sat down to dinner,
the lady of the house said Jack had the air of a born gentleman
about him, and the lord said he'd make him his steward. Jack brought
his mother, and settled her comfortably near the castle, and all
were as happy as you please.

The Shee an Gannon was born in the morning, named at noon, and went
in the evening to ask his daughter of the king of Erin.

"I will give you my daughter in marriage," said the king of Erin;
"you won't get her, though, unless you go and bring me back the
tidings that I want, and tell me what it is that put a stop to the
laughing of the Gruagach Gaire, who before this laughed always, and
laughed so loud that the whole world heard him. There are twelve
iron spikes out here in the garden behind my castle. On eleven of
the spikes are the heads of kings' sons who came seeking my
daughter in marriage, and all of them went away to get the knowledge
I wanted. Not one was able to get it and tell me what stopped the
Gruagach Gaire from laughing. I took the heads off them all when
they came back without the tidings for which they went, and I'm
greatly in dread that your head'll be on the twelfth spike, for I'll
do the same to you that I did to the eleven kings' sons unless you
tell what put a stop to the laughing of the Gruagach."

The Shee an Gannon made no answer, but left the king and pushed away
to know could he find why the Gruagach was silent.

He took a glen at a step, a hill at a leap, and travelled all day
till evening. Then he came to a house. The master of the house asked
him what sort was he, and he said: "A young man looking for hire."

"Well," said the master of the house, "I was going tomorrow to look
for a man to mind my cows. If you'll work for me, you'll have a good
place, the best food a man could have to eat in this world, and a
soft bed to lie on."

The Shee an Gannon took service, and ate his supper. Then the master
of the house said: "I am the Gruagach Gaire; now that you are my man
and have eaten your supper, you'll have a bed of silk to sleep on."

Next morning after breakfast the Gruagach said to the Shee an
Gannon: "Go out now and loosen my five golden cows and my bull
without horns, and drive them to pasture; but when you have them out
on the grass, be careful you don't let them go near the land of the
giant."

The new cowboy drove the cattle to pasture, and when near the land
of the giant, he saw it was covered with woods and surrounded by a
high wall. He went up, put his back against the wall, and threw in a
great stretch of it; then he went inside and threw out another great
stretch of the wall, and put the five golden cows and the bull
without horns on the land of the giant.

Then he climbed a tree, ate the sweet apples himself, and threw the
sour ones down to the cattle of the Gruagach Gaire.

Soon a great crashing was heard in the woods,—the noise of young
trees bending, and old trees breaking. The cowboy looked around and
saw a five-headed giant pushing through the trees; and soon he was
before him.

"Poor miserable creature!" said the giant; "but weren't you impudent
to come to my land and trouble me in this way? You're too big for
one bite, and too small for two. I don't know what to do but tear
you to pieces."

"You nasty brute," said the cowboy, coming down to him from the
tree, "'tis little I care for you;" and then they went at each
other. So great was the noise between them that there was nothing in
the world but what was looking on and listening to the combat.

They fought till late in the afternoon, when the giant was getting
the upper hand; and then the cowboy thought that if the giant should
kill him, his father and mother would never find him or set eyes on
him again, and he would never get the daughter of the king of Erin.
The heart in his body grew strong at this thought. He sprang on the
giant, and with the first squeeze and thrust he put him to his knees
in the hard ground, with the second thrust to his waist, and with
the third to his shoulders.

"I have you at last; you're done for now!", said the cowboy. Then he
took out his knife, cut the five heads off the giant, and when he
had them off he cut out the tongues and threw the heads over the
wall.

Then he put the tongues in his pocket and drove home the cattle.
That evening the Gruagach couldn't find vessels enough in all his
place to hold the milk of the five golden cows.

But when the cowboy was on the way home with the cattle, the son of
the king of Tisean came and took the giant's heads and claimed the
princess in marriage when the Gruagach Gaire should laugh.

After supper the cowboy would give no talk to his master, but kept
his mind to himself, and went to the bed of silk to sleep.

On the morning the cowboy rose before his master, and the first
words he said to the Gruagach were:

"What keeps you from laughing, you who used to laugh so loud that
the whole world heard you?"

"I'm sorry," said the Gruagach, "that the daughter of the king of
Erin sent you here."

"If you don't tell me of your own will, I'll make you tell me," said
the cowboy; and he put a face on himself that was terrible to look
at, and running through the house like a madman, could find nothing
that would give pain enough to the Gruagach but some ropes made of
untanned sheepskin hanging on the wall.

He took these down, caught the Gruagach, fastened him by the three
smalls, and tied him so that his little toes were whispering to his
ears. When he was in this state the Gruagach said: "I'll tell you
what stopped my laughing if you set me free."

So the cowboy unbound him, the two sat down together, and the
Gruagach said:—

"I lived in this castle here with my twelve sons. We ate, drank,
played cards, and enjoyed ourselves, till one day when my sons and I
were playing, a slender brown hare came rushing in, jumped on to the
hearth, tossed up the ashes to the rafters and ran away.

"On another day he came again; but if he did, we were ready for him,
my twelve sons and myself. As soon as he tossed up the ashes and ran
off, we made after him, and followed him till nightfall, when he
went into a glen. We saw a light before us. I ran on, and came to a
house with a great apartment, where there was a man named Yellow
Face with twelve daughters, and the hare was tied to the side of the
room near the women.

"There was a large pot over the fire in the room, and a great stork
boiling in the pot. The man of the house said to me: 'There are
bundles of rushes at the end of the room, go there and sit down with
your men!'

"He went into the next room and brought out two pikes, one of wood,
the other of iron, and asked me which of the pikes would I take. I
said, 'I'll take the iron one;' for I thought in my heart that if an
attack should come on me, I could defend myself better with the iron
than the wooden pike.

"Yellow Face gave me the iron pike, and the first chance of taking
what I could out of the pot on the point of the pike. I got but a
small piece of the stork, and the man of the house took all the rest
on his wooden pike. We had to fast that night; and when the man and
his twelve daughters ate the flesh of the stork, they hurled the
bare bones in the faces of my sons and myself. We had to stop all
night that way, beaten on the faces by the bones of the stork.