Poets and Dreamers: Studies and translations from the Irish

'Then the stranger got up and went over to where his sister was, and slipped a letter into her apron that told who he was. And then he quenched the dip-candle over her, that was...

Another old man said: 'There was a young man looking for service one time; and a farmer said he would take him to mind his cattle. For a great many of his cattle had died with t...

'"And as to the three women in the kitchen," he said, "those were my own three wives. And when I asked the first wife for my dinner, she gave me nothing but brown bread and a ju...

Another neighbour, who has herself some reputation as an herb-doctor, says:--'Monday is a good day for pulling herbs, or Tuesday--not Sunday: a Sunday cure is no cure. The _Cosa...

HANRAHAN. Ah, Oona, it is a great blessing, but it is a great curse as well for a man, he to be a poet. Look at me: have I a friend in this world? Is there a man alive that has...

'The lamb and the sheep are there; the cow and the calf are there; fine lands are there without heath and without bog. Ploughing and seed-sowing in the right month, and plough a...

A red-faced, farmer-like man says: 'There was a poor man one time--Jack Murphy his name was; and rent day came, and he hadn't enough to pay his rent. And he went to the landlord...

MARY. Oh, he is not mocking you; he would not do a thing like that. There is no company here; for we have nothing in the house to give them.

But his most serious rival in his own part of the country was Callinan, the well-to-do farmer who lived near Craughwell, of whom the old women in the workhouse spoke. I have hea...

And he has written a little play, having Raftery for its subject; and at a Galway Feis this year he himself acted, and took the blind poet's part; and he will act it many times...

The Irish poem I give this translation of was printed in the _Revue Celtique_ some years ago, and lately in _An Fior Clairseach na h-Eireann_, where a note tells us it was taken...

'Will you seek afar off? You surely come back at last, In things best known to you finding the best, or as good as the best; In folks nearest to you finding the sweetest, strong...

'She comes to me like a star through the mist; her hair is golden and goes down to her shoes; her breast is the colour of white sugar, or like bleached bone on the card-table; h...

But these national ballads, though very popular, are, I think, not so good as his more personal poems. I suppose no narrative of what others have done or felt or suffered can mo...

TEACHER. I heard your prayer, old man; but there is no good in it. I praise you greatly for it, but that child is half-witted. I prayed to God myself once or twice on his accoun...