Phelim Otoole's Courtship and Other Stories. William Carleton
thin pike of a man, about sixty years of age, stood before him. He wore a brown great-coat that fell far short of his knees; his small-clothes were closely fitted to thighs not thicker than hand telescopes; on his legs were drawn gray woollen stockings, rolled up about six inches over his small-clothes; his head was covered by a bay bob-wig, on which was a little round, hat, with the edge of the leaf turned up in every direction. His face was short and sallow; his chin peaked; his nose small and turned up. If we add to this, a pair of skeleton-like hands and arms projecting about eight inches beyond the sleeves of his coat; two fiery ferret-eyes; and a long small holly wand, higher than himself, we have the outline of this singular figure.
“God save you, nabor,” said Larry.
“Save you, save you, neighbor,” he replied, without pronouncing the name of the deity.
“This is a thryin' time,” said Larry, “to them that has childhre.”
The fairy-man fastened his red glittering eyes upon him, with a sinister glance that occasioned Larry to feel rather uncomfortable.
“So you venthured to come to the fairy-man?”
“It is about our son, an' he all we ha—”
“Whisht!” said the man, waving his hand with a commanding air. “Whisht; I wish you wor out o' this, for it's a bad time to be here. Listen! Listen! Do you hear nothing?”
Larry changed color. “I do,” he replied—“The Lord protect me: Is that them?”
“What did you hear?” said the man.
“Why,” returned the other, “I heard the bushes of the rath all movin', jist as if a blast o' wind came among them!”
“Whisht,” said the fairy-man, “they're here; you mustn't open your lips while you're in the house. I know what you want, an' will see your son. Do you hear anything more? If you do, lay your forefinger along your nose; but don't spake.”
Larry heard with astonishment, the music of a pair of bagpipes. The tune played was one which, according to a popular legend, was first played by Satan; it is called: “Go to the Devil and shake yourself.” To our own knowledge, the peasantry in certain parts of Ireland refuse to sing it for the above reason. The mystery of the music was heightened too by the fact of its being played, as Larry thought, behind the gable of the cabin, which stood against the side of the rath, out of which, indeed, it seemed to proceed.
Larry laid his finger along his nose, as he had been desired; and this appearing to satisfy the fairy-man, he waved his hand to the door, thus intimating that his visitor should depart; which he did immediately, but not without observing that this wild-looking being closed and bolted the door after him.
It is unnecessary to say that he was rather anxious to get off the premises of the good people; he therefore lost little time until he arrived at his own cabin; but judge of his wonder when, on entering it, he found the long-legged spectre awaiting his return.
“Banaght dhea orrin!” he exclaimed, starting back; “the blessing of God be upon us! Is it here before me you are?”
“Hould your tongue, man,” said the other, with a smile of mysterious triumph. “Is it that you wondher at? Ha, ha! That's little of it!”
“But how did you know my name? or who I was? or where I lived at all? Heaven protect us! it's beyant belief, clane out.”
“Hould your tongue,” replied the man; “don't be axin' me any thing o' the kind. Clear out, both of ye, till I begin my pisthrogues wid the sick child. Clear out, I say.”
With some degree of apprehension, Larry and Sheelah left the house as they had been ordered, and the Fairy-man having pulled out a flask of poteen, administered a dose of it to Phelim; and never yet did patient receive his medicine with such a relish. He licked his lips, and fixed his eye upon it with a longing look.
“Be Gorra,” said he, “that's fine stuff entirely. Will you lave me the bottle?”
“No,” said the Fairy-man, “but I'll call an' give you a little of it wanst a day.”
“Ay do,” replied Phelim; “the divil a fear o' me, if I get enough of it. I hope I'll see you often.”
The Fairy-man kept his word; so that what with his bottle, a hardy constitution, and light bed-clothes, Phelim got the upper hand of his malady. In a month he was again on his legs; but, alas! his complexion though not changed to deformity, was wofully out of joint. His principal blemish, in addition to the usual marks left by his complaint, consisted in a drooping of his left eyelid, which gave to his whole face a cast highly ludicrous.
When Phelim felt thoroughly recovered, he claimed a pair of “leather crackers,” * a hare-skin cap, and a coat, with a pertinacity which kept the worthy couple in a state of inquietude, until they complied with his importunity. Henceforth he began to have everything his own way. His parents, sufficiently thankful that he was spared to them, resolved to thwart him no more.
* Breeches made of sheep's skin, so called from the
noise they make in walking or running.
“It's well we have him at all,” said his mother; “sure if we hadn't him, we'd be breakin' our hearts, and sayin' if it 'ud plase God to send him back to us, that we'd be happy even wid givin' him his own way.”
“They say it breaks their strinth, too,” replied his father, “to be crubbin' them in too much, an' snappin' at thim for every hand's turn, an' I'm sure it does too.”
“Doesn't he become the pock-marks well, the crathur?” said the mdther.
“Become!” said the father; “but doesn't the droop in his eye set him off all to pieces!”
“Ay,” observed the mother, “an' how the crathur went round among all the neighbors to show them the 'leather crackers!' To see his little pride out o' the hare-skin cap, too, wid the hare's ears stickin' out of his temples. That an' the droopin: eye undher them makes him look so cunnin' an' ginteel, that one can't help havin' their heart fixed upon him.”
“He'd look betther still if that ould coat wasn't sweepin' the ground behind him; an' what 'ud you think to put a pair o' martyeens on his legs to hide the mazles! He might go anywhere thin.”
“Throth he might; but Larry, what in the world wide could be in the Fairy-man's bottle that Phelim took sich a likin' for it. He tould me this mornin' that he'd suffer to have the pock agin, set in case he was cured wid the same bottle.”
“Well, the Heaven be praised, any how, that we have a son for the half-acre, Sheelah.'
“Amin! An' let us take good care of him, now that he's spared to us.”
Phelim's appetite, after his recovery, was anything but a joke to his father. He was now seldom at home, except during meal times; for wherever fun or novelty was to be found, Phelim was present. He became a regular attendant upon all the sportsmen. To such he made himself very useful by his correct knowledge of the best covers for game, and the best pools for fish. He was acquainted with every rood of land in the, parish; knew with astonishing accuracy where coveys were to be sprung, and hares started. No hunt was without him; such was his wind and speed of foot, that to follow a chase and keep up with the horsemen was to him only a matter of sport. When daylight passed, night presented him with amusements suitable to itself. No wake, for instance, could escape him; a dance without young Phelim O'Toole would have been a thing worthy to be remembered. He was zealously devoted to cock-fighting; on Shrove-Tuesday he shouted loudest among the crowd that attended the sport of throwing at cooks tied to a stake; foot-ball and hurling never occurred without him. Bull-baiting—for it was common in his youth—was luxury to him; and, ere he reached fourteen, every one knew Phelim O'Toole as an adept at card-playing. Wherever a sheep, a leg of mutton, a dozen of bread, or a bottle of whiskey was put up in a shebeen house, to be played for by the country gamblers at the five and ten, or spoil'd five, Phelim always took a hand and was generally successful. On these occasions he was