The Charm Of Ireland Part 33

It was to mark the graves of the warriors who fell in that dim-distant fray that the circles and cromlechs which dot its site were probably erected; but the Irish have another theory, which we shall hear presently.

I shall not soon forget that walk, at first through the busy streets of the town, past solid, well-built houses of brick, with bright shops on the lower floor and living-rooms above; then into the poorer and quainter quarter, where the houses are all one-storied, built of rubble, roofed with straw, and, as we could see through the open doors, stuffed with trash, as all these little Irish houses seem to be; and finally out along the country road, between fragrant hedges, occasionally pa.s.sing a pretty villa, set in the midst of handsome grounds--and then we came to a place where the road branched, and we stopped.

Our guide-book gave no definite directions as to how to get to Carrowmore. "On Carrowmore," it says, with magnificent vagueness, "within three miles south-west of Sligo, is a large and most interesting series of megalithic remains"; nor does it tell how far the remains are apart, or how to find them. If it had been Baedeker, now, we would not have stood there hesitant at the cross-roads, because he would not only have told us which way to turn, but would have provided a diagram, and led us step by step from one cromlech to the other. There is no Baedeker for Ireland, which is a pity, for I have never yet found a guide to equal that painstaking German.

There was no one to ask, so we took the road which led toward Knocknarea; but after we had gone some distance, a telegraph-boy came by on his wheel, and told us that we should have taken the other road; so we walked back to the branch and turned up it. The road mounted steadily, and after about a mile of up-hill work, we came to a cl.u.s.ter of thatched houses, and I went up to one of them to ask the way of a woman who was leaning over her half-door.

I think I have already said somewhere that Irish directions are the vaguest in the world--perhaps this is the reason Murray is so vague, since it is written by an Irishman!--and the conversation on this occasion ran something like this:

"Good morning," I began. "It is a fine day, isn't it?"

"It is so, glory be to G.o.d."

"Can you tell me how to get to the cromlechs?"

"The cromlechs? What might that be?"

"The big stone monuments that are back here in the fields somewhere."

"Ah--so it is the big stones you would be after?"

"Yes. Can you tell me how to get to them?"

"I might," said the woman cautiously. She had been looking at me all this time with the brightest of eyes, and then she looked at Betty, who had remained behind at the gate. "Is yon one your wife?" she asked, with a nod in Betty's direction.

"Yes."

"You would be from America."

"Yes."

"Have you people hereabouts?"

"Oh, no; we haven't any relatives in Ireland."

"And would you be comin' all this way just to see the big stones?"

"We want to see everything," I explained. "The stones are near here, aren't they?"

"They are so. Just a step up yonder lane, and you are right among them."

She was preparing to ask further questions; but this direction seemed definite enough, so I thanked her and fled, and Betty and I proceeded to take a step up the lane. We took many steps without seeing any stones; and finally we turned up a narrow by-lane, and came to a tiny cottage, hidden in the trees. We were greeted by a noisy barking, and then a man hurried out of the cottage and quieted the dog and told us not to be alarmed. We told him we were looking for the stones.

"There be some just a small step from here," he said; "but you would never find them by yourselves, so I will go with you. You are from America, I'm thinking?"

"Yes," I admitted, wondering, with sinking heart, if it was going to begin all over again.

"I have four brothers in America, and all doing well, glory be to G.o.d, though seldom it is that I hear from them."

"How did you happen to stay in Ireland?" I asked.

"One must stay with the mother," he explained simply. "I was the oldest, so that was for me to do."

He was a nice-looking man of middle age, with a kindly, intelligent face, and eyes very bright; and while his clothes were old and worn, they were clean.

"She is dead now, G.o.d rest her soul," he added, with a little convulsion of the face I didn't understand till later, "and I am alone here."

"What," I said; "not married?"

"No," he answered, with a smile, "there's just Tricker and me."

"Tricker?"

"Sure that's the dog, and a great help he is to me. Come here, Tricker, and show the lady and gentleman what you can do." The s.h.a.ggy black dog came and sat down in front of him, looking up at him with s.h.i.+ning eyes.

"You would hardly believe it, miss, but Tricker gathers all my eggs for me, and he can tell a duck egg from a hen egg. If I do be having a bit of company, I will tell Tricker to go out and bring in some duck eggs, and I have never known him to make a mistake. Or perhaps I will be wanting some water from the spring, and I just give Tricker the bucket and send him for it. Or perhaps I will be wanting some coal, and then I just tell Tricker to fetch it."

There was a little pile of coal lying in one corner of the yard, and I had noticed it with some surprise, for we had seen nothing but turf in the west of Ireland; but our host told us that the coal came from Donegal and that it was better than turf and even cheaper in the long run.

"Tricker," he said, "take in some coal!"

Tricker ran to the coal and picked up a lump in his jaws and trotted through the open door of the house and laid the lump down on the hearth inside; then he came back and took in another lump, and then a third, and finally his master stopped him.

"He would be taking it all in if I left him to himself," he said. "He is not very well, for he was kicked by the mare the other day, and I thought for a time he was going to die on me. But he did not, glory be to G.o.d, and I think he will soon be well again. And now, if you will come this way, I will be showing you the stones."

He led the way across a field, which he said was his, and then over a stone wall into another; and in the middle of it was a depressed tomb with slabbed sides, in which, I suppose, at some far-off time, the body of some chieftain had been laid; and then our guide showed us the path which we must follow to get to the cromlechs; and then I put my hand in my pocket.

"Ah, no," he protested, drawing back.

"For Tricker," I said; "to get him some dainty, because he's ill."

His face softened.

"Ah, well, sir," he said, "if you put it like that, I'll take it, and Tricker and I both thank ye kindly; and you, miss. G.o.d speed ye," and he stood watching us for quite a while, as we made our way up toward the road which ran along the edge of the ridge above us.

As soon as we gained it, we saw the first of the cromlechs; and then, in a farther field, we saw another--great stones, standing upright in a circle of smaller ones, with a mighty covering slab on top, grey and lichened, and most impressive. They are supposed, as I have said, to mark the graves of warriors who fell in battle four thousand years ago; but the Irish peasantry explain them in a more romantic way, as the beds which Diarmuid prepared nightly for his mistress, Grainne, during the year they fled together up and down Ireland to escape the wrath of her husband, the mighty Finn MacCool.

Grainne, you will remember, was the daughter of King Cormac, and she it was who won that race up Slievenamon for the honour of Finn's hand.

There was a splendid wedding at Tara; but as Grainne sat at the feast, she looked at the man she had just married, and saw that the weight of years was on him; and then she looked about the board and noticed a "freckled, sweet-worded man, who had the curling, dusky black hair, and cheeks berry-red," and she asked who he was, and she was told that he was Diarmuid, "the white-toothed, of lightsome countenance, the best lover of women and of maidens that was in the whole world." And Grainne looked on him again, and her heart melted in her bosom; and she mixed a drink and sent it about the board, until there came upon all the company "a stupor of sleep and deep slumber."

Then she arose from her seat and went straight to Diarmuid, and laid a bond upon him that he should take her away; and Diarmuid, who was leal to Finn, asked his comrades what he should do, and they all said he must bide by the bond she had laid on him, for he was bound to refuse no woman, though his death should come of it.

"Is that the counsel of you all to me?" asked Diarmuid.

"It is," said Ossian and Oscar and all the rest; and then Diarmuid rose from his place, and his eyes were wet with tears, and he said farewell to his comrades, for he knew that from that day he was no longer a member of the goodly company of the Fianna, but only a hunted man.

And he and Grainne fled from Tara to Athlone, and crossed the Shannon by the ford there, with Finn's trackers close behind them; and for a year and a day they travelled through the length and breadth of Ireland; and every night Diarmuid built for his love a chamber of mighty stones, and carpeted it with sweet gra.s.s, and crept softly in beside her and held her in his arms till morning, so that no hurt might come to her. And there the chambers remain to this day, 366 of them, to prove the story true.

I wish I could tell the remainder of the legend, but there is no s.p.a.ce here; besides you will find it and many others like it very beautifully told in one of the most fascinating Irish books I know--Stephen Gwynne's "Fair Hills of Ireland"; a book which I have pillaged remorselessly, and which I recommend to every one planning to visit the Island of the Saints.