Travelling Folk

transcribed at

Travelling Folk  [duchas:4996817]

Travelling folk still call to my home. The same people are doing so for many years. Some of them are not very poor for they have good horses and carriages with them. They sell small articles such as mats, pins, pictures and nice flowers. They also sell small tables. These tables are made from the wood of the white-thorn which is found growing along the country roads. They obtain their supplies in towns as they go along. In some places they are welcome but in other places they are not welcome. None of them stay longer than a week. They sleep in carriages along the road. They do not have food with them but they get food from the people as they go along. They accept any alms they get. Some of them travel on foot and more of them go in carriages. They travel in families. They come from the west of Ireland and the best known of them are the Cauleys, Maguires, and McDonaghs. The Cauleys visit my district

Travelling Folk  [duchas:4996818]

the oftenest. They generally come for the big fairs in Arva. They generally sell donkeys and ponies in the fairs to make money. These travellers bring news from one place to another. John Boylan an old man eighty years told me that in his young days he knew a little woman who went by the name of "Mary the Bunty". She went around from house to house gathering coppers. She got free lodging and food in the houses she visited. A bed of straw was made for her in the corner by the fire. Mary was a great walker and used to travel to Bundoran every year for the purpose of begging money from the people who were spending their holidays at this seaside resort. When Mary died she was wort [sic] two hundred pounds and she left it all to the Manager of Arva bank.