I remember hearing this next story long ago, in a cottage near Tulla. My friends’ old neighbour was in their kitchen, sitting in the corner by the range in his finest suit and hat, supping a cup of extra-strong tea. His trousers were too loose for him at the waist and he had fashioned a belt for himself with some brightly coloured baler twine. His dark eyes twinkled in the poor light, as he told tales of young fellows’ devilment.
There was an old bachelor who lived somewhere between Tulla and Ennis who loved nothing more than to go eating and drinking the town of Ennis. This man had a great appetite, and he mightily enjoyed his food, so whatever you had served him up, he would be thanking you after it as if it were the best of cordon bleu cooking, even though it were just bacon and cabbage. And when he’d eaten his fill of it, he enjoyed his pint or two of porter, and whatever you’re having yourself.
Every Saturday he made his way to Ennis on his ass and car. He’d be there all day, meeting his old cronies and talking about the price of this and the cost of that, and wheeling and dealing and eating and drinking. By the time he was back on his ass and car and ready for the journey home, it was dark already. He was that fond of the drink that he usually had more than was good for him. Sometimes he’d be singing loudly along the road, but just as often he would fall asleep on the car. Well now, the ass had walked that road so often, it knew the way and could bring him home without him needing to direct it.
So this one night he’d had more than enough to drink, and he was fast asleep on the car all the way from Ennis. He was so drunk that he didn’t wake when the ass had stopped outside the gate. He just slept there, where he was.
Now, there were four lads passing that night that knew him well, and they found him snoring away fast asleep on the car outside his own gate. The lads thought they would have some sport with old fellow, and play a trick on him.
They lifted him down from the car and carried him into his own house, and were careful not to laugh out loud in case they woke him. Then they unhitched the ass from the car and brought the ass inside the house too.
Next they took the wheels off the car and carried it into the house. When they’d got all that inside, they brought in the wheels and put them back under the car again. The lads hitched the ass to the car again, and gently lifted the old fellow back up onto the car, and all this time the old man is still snoring away, fast asleep.
When they had that all done, the lads went out and closed the door behind them. Oh, they laughed all the way home at what they’d done, wondering what the old fellow would make of it when he woke up on the cart inside the house.
Well, when the man awoke, he could not believe his eyes! He nearly died of fright when he saw he was on the ass car – in his own kitchen! He sat there rubbing his eyes, shaking his head, trying to make sense of it all. He knew there was no way the ass and car would pass through the door of the house. It was just too wide! He thought it must have been the fairies playing tricks on him. Or maybe he did have too much to drink last night? This last thought was a sobering one for the old bachelor, and he never came home drunk from the town of Ennis again.
There were three women who were neighbours out in the country somewhere. Each of them was called Mary, and each of them was married to a man called John.
Christmas was coming soon, and it was time for the three Marys to go to the nearest town to bring home the Christmas. They were clever women who knew the price of shoe leather, so they wore their best dresses and walked barefooted, carrying their shoes and stockings in their hands. They would put on their shoes and stockings to look respectable when they reached the edge of the town. On their backs they were carrying big baskets full of eggs and butter to sell, and they were sure to get plenty of money to enjoy their day in the town.
They had a great day, sold all the eggs and butter, and bought in everything they would need for the Christmas feast.
They were talking over the events of the day as they walked homewards, when they spotted a large brown paper parcel all tied up with striped string sitting in the middle of the road ahead of them. They agreed that the first to reach the parcel could claim it as her own. They began to run, each trying to be first to touch it. All three reached it at the same moment, and they began to quarrel about who had the most right to open the package.
A man was coming along the road just then and saw the women quarrelling. He stopped and asked what they were fighting about. The women explained the situation, and they asked if he could decide the matter for them.
He paused to think for a moment and then he said, ‘My dear ladies, I believe I have found the solution to your conundrum.’ He was obviously a learned man. ‘Let me take charge of the parcel for now. The winner should be the one of you that makes the biggest fool of her husband once you get home. I cannot say fairer than that.’
The women agreed, and they went on their way. They reached home just as the sun was setting.
When the first Mary got home, her husband said to her, ‘Did you have a grand day at the town?’ Mary did not answer him, but just got on with her work. John did not know what the matter with her was. Had he done something to anger her? He went out for a bit, thinking that would give her time to cool off. When he came back in, he asked her if she had the tea ready. ‘Why would I be giving a strange man tea, when my own husband is out working in the haggard? Go out and call him in.’ John did as his wife said, and out he went to the haggard, but of course there was no man out there. So that was how the first John was fooled.
The second Mary, when she got home, told her husband John that he was dead. He did not believe her at first, but as his wife just kept on telling him so, in the end he had to believe her, it must be so. Mary sent for the coffin and held the wake and arranged the funeral for the following day. So that was how the second John was fooled.
The third Mary, she stayed at the wake that night and went home early the next morning. She found her husband still asleep in his bed. She shook him awake, saying, ‘Why are ye in your bed? Did ye not think to go to the funeral with all your neighbours?’
‘I never heard of a funeral,’ said the third John. ‘Who is it that died?’
‘It was your good neighbour John that died.’ said Mary. ‘They are just leaving the house now. If you are quick you can join them.’
John leapt for his clothes, but Mary said, ‘You’ve no time for putting on clothes. You best run along as you are, or you will be too late!’
So John ran out as he was, after the funeral. When the people saw the naked man running towards them, they thought he must be mad, and possibly dangerous! The men carrying the coffin set it down on the road and the people ran off in all directions.
When John got to the coffin, he took off the lid, and there he found his good friend, not dead at all, but wondering what was John doing naked at his funeral? When they realised how they had been fooled by their wives, the men laughed out loud and made their way back home.
So that was how the three Marys fooled their husbands. Now, which one of the women do you think got the parcel?
There was once a blacksmith by the name O’Connor who lived at Mount Callan. He worked hard at his trade and had a reputation for quality and reliability. If he said he would do something for you, you knew that he would do it. The blacksmith was married and he had one son, who was now a grown man. I suppose he expected the son to follow him in his trade and become a blacksmith, but the son was a disappointment to him, as he never did a day’s work, not in the forge nor anywhere else. He would wander the roads doing nothing, just seeing where the road would take him, blackguarding his way through life. He was a cheat and a liar, and would sell his own father if he could find a buyer! O’Connor thought it such a waste that his son was a wastrel, but what could he do about that now?
There was an English gentleman travelling in the west of Ireland. One day he came to Spanish Point to take the air, and there he met the young O’Connor and thought him a charming fellow, with great wit, and with terribly amusing stories to tell. The gentleman decided to bring him back to England with him. The young man agreed, and they travelled over the sea.
When they arrived in England, the gentleman paid a tailor to measure the young O’Connor and make him a suit of smart clothes in a fine wool cloth with a narrow stripe, with a waistcoat and a silk cravat. He bought him a gold watch on a chain to fit in the waistcoat pocket. He bought him a good set of boots of shining black leather, and a tall stovepipe hat. What a transformation: the young O’Connor looked every inch a gentleman, quite handsome, and well-dressed in the fashionable clothes of the day.
When the gentleman went visiting a friend he brought O’Connor with him. The door of the house was opened by a servant who bowed low before them and showed them into a parlour. Here men and women sat on plump brocade sofas and chairs with gilded legs, sharing polite conversation and enjoying small cakes and fancies from china plates. The gentleman presented the young man to the company as ‘The son of Lord O’Connor of Mount Callan, whose acquaintance I was pleased to make whilst on my travels in the land of Ireland’.
The young lady of the house was quite taken by the charming young Irishman, who surely thought he had died and gone to heaven. As she was of a marriageable age, a match was made between the two. Her father sent his trusted steward to Ireland to visit Mount Callan and see what wealth and style she would be marrying into.
When he reached Ennis, the steward enquired for directions to Lord O’Connor’s of Mount Callan’s estate. People were puzzled, and no one he asked could tell him where this was. At last an old woman told him, ‘I never heard of a Lord O’Connor, but there is a little blacksmith by name of O’Connor who lives at Mount Callan. Maybe he’d be the one you are looking for?’
The steward set off for Mount Callan to see what he would find there. As he came to the forge, he met with seven goats in the doorway. The blacksmith was eating his dinner, and what a sight he was, sitting on the side of an old pig in the corner and eating potatoes with his hands out of an old scuttle! When he had finished eating, he got up off the pig, washed his greasy hands in a bog of water, dried them on his apron and reached out to shake the visitor’s hand.
The steward asked if he had by any chance a son. ‘Oh, I do indeed,’ said the blacksmith. ‘And is he not the biggest wastrel and blackguard that ever there was? He is gone these last months and I do not know where, and a shame to his father he is that never did a day’s work for his keep.’
The steward set off back to England, wondering what he would say to his master about what he had seen. The Lord O’Connor’s estate was just a humble pigsty of a place! There was obviously no money, no land, and no manners. Before he reached his master’s house, the gentleman met him on the road, saying, ‘I will give you ten good English pounds if you will paint your master a pretty picture of Lord O’Connor and his estate.’
‘I do not wish to lie to my master, sir.’ said the steward. ‘He knows me to be an honest man.’
‘Ah, I see, but could you stretch the truth a little? This ten pounds is yours if you can.’
The steward smiled as he tucked the money inside his shirt and went straight home.
They all came out to meet him, the master and his daughter, the prospective bride, and all their fancy guests dressed in their finest clothes. ‘Well, man, what was it like? Tell us all about the Lord O’Connor and his estate in the west of Ireland.’
The steward took a deep breath and prepared to stretch the truth of what he had seen, without actually telling a lie. ‘When I reached Lord O’Connor’s abode, I was saluted at the entrance by seven upstanding guards. Their master was eating his dinner when I arrived, and I waited until he had finished before I approached him. He was sat upon a most handsome and generously upholstered chair, eating from a platter with cutlery the like of which you would rarely see in England. He washed before he shook my hand, and the vessel in which he washed, well, all the money in England could not buy the like. The fine cloth on which he dried himself, could not be compared with any woven in England.’
‘You need say no more, steward,’ said the master. ‘I have heard enough to know that my daughter is marrying into a fine family. Let the wedding take place tonight!’
And so it was, the two were married, and lived happily in England thereafter, never visiting the ‘estate of Lord O’Connor’, which perhaps was for the best, after all.
The Biggest Fool: SFS (1937-38) Sean O Griobia, Glean Mor, Kilmihil, Clonigulane School.
A Fine Gentleman: SFS (1937-38) Michael MacDonnell, Carhunagry, Mullagh told to Mary O’Gorman, Carhunagry, Mullagh, County Clare, p.259.