66

" Why

trouble and expense of all this?" then, Sir, by this blessed place, myself don't know, only as I heard say from my grandmother, God rest her soul; and she said, and upon my troth she did not like to tell it-how Father Dennis was a Friar that said mass at Abbey Shrowry, near Skibbereen; and once on a time as he came to a station and patron here, the devil tempted him to get drunkand drunkenness you know is the latch which the ould enemy lifts, when he wishes to send mortal sin into a poor soul; and so it was with Friar Mahony. He was found after breaking his sacred vows here, and no Confessor in Munster would hear his confession, or give him absolution; so off he went to the world's Father, the holy Pope at Rome, and his holiness ordered him to come here, and build this blessed place, and live here all his life; so he begged through France and Spain, and all parts beyond sea, where good Christhens do be, and he came home with a big beard and long purse; and he set up, as it is, this mighty sacred place. And

sure it has been the blessing of the country unto this day." "But why, Cornelis, is it called Gougan Barry ?" "Why, Sir, as ould people tell me, it was once only a little wee bit of an island, not much bigger than a potato platter, and therefore it was called Gougan Barry, which means St. Barry's trifle; but now, when it is no longer a trifle, but a fine large and lovely place, it is still called by its ould name." 66 But, Cornelis, when is the patron here; I suppose it is a fine holy time then." "Oh, Sir, our Bishop has put a stop to the patron-his great Reverence, the 'Soggarth More,' has excommunicated it; and even our own parish priest came by his command, and threw our crucifixes into the lake - for every one of these churches (so Cornelis called the little vaults) had a crucifix of its own. Well, Sir, the Priest threw them all into the lake as he thought-but you see we were too cute for the clargy. We stole one crucifix unknownst to him, and there it is in that calleen's hand, who is now going her rounds." "Oh, then," says I," the Bi

shop and Priest want to stop the rounds." "Oh, no, Sir, I wont say as to that all out; but they excommunicated the patron that was here; and sure enough they might have let that alone. As good Priests as ever they were, God rest their souls, gave their good will, and often their company, to the merry and meritorious patron we used to hold here on Midsummer-day. Oh, what a lovely gathering! They came from Kerry and Connaught, and the world's end here; such praying in the morning, and dancing in the evening-groaning and craw-thumping as they went along on their bare marrow-bones, performing the sacred rounds: and then such shouting, and sporting, and carousing, and all ending in a fight and a scrimmage. Och, there was not a piper or a fiddler from Cork to Bantry that was not here. It was fine times for us in our little village we could turn a dacent penny upon the whiskey and bacon that day. O, then, God forgive the Bishop for putting a stop to it all! Not a tenpenny has crossed my hand since that

black excommunication came against Gougan Barry." "Yes, but Cornelis, why did they put a stop to it now, and not before?" "Ah, Sir, they tould lies about it; besides, they say the Bishop and his Clargy were afraid of the Protestants. There are talks about a Bible people that are after playing the very puck in the world, turning the people all Swaddlers and Carmelites-making fools, as a body may say, of our fathers and grandfathers, who, God be good to their souls, lived and died without any of their bother; and after all let me tell you, that the old priests were asier and dacenter and more portly, and they were jollier than those cross crathurs who come from the new College. There was Father Nevil, God's rest be with his soul-he never stopped our patron; no, the good crathur used to come and look in on us here, and just slip into a tent, and take a drop; for sure said he all was done for God's honour; and now his soul's in glory, and rounds are gone about his own grave at Inchigeela, and the clay is blessed over his holy bones; which

is more than will ever happen to the dark and crabbed men who have put a stop to the merriment of Gougan Barry."

Talking this way, we came to the end of the ash grove, where lay the trunk of an immense old crab tree, which appeared to have been blown down by the last winter's storm. "A fine old tree this was, Cornelis." "Oh then, Sir, wasn't it a thousand murthers that ever it fell? but in its fall, it speaks to my heart, that grace and luck are leaving this place. Sir, when Gougan Barry was in its glory-when people from the east and from the west, came here, it used to bear sweet apples with cherry cheeks: happy was the pilgrim who could get, for love or money, a bite of one of them; but now of late, since the times have begun to look black, and the priests voteen and sour, this holy apple tree bore nothing but crabs; and they tasted like alum and sorrel juice; and there it now lies; and myself did not much care if I was dead and down, and decayed like it."

Passing the fallen crab tree, we came to