Animal Stories

transcribed at

Animal Stories  [duchas:4621472]

Fox: A man in Killaverin was awakened one night by a noise in his fowl house. When he went out he found a fox lying as if dead. "It's no use disturbing you when you are dead" he said. But in the morning he found that the fox had disappeared.

Fairy Hare: There was once a man whose horse was stolen by the fairies. One night while minding a sick cow in the field a hare came and started to suck the milk from the cow. He chased the hare with his hound. The chase lasted so long that the hare started to screech, and the man recalled his dog and let the hare escape. A few days later as the

Animal Stories  [duchas:4621473]

man was walking along the road, his horse trotted up beside him and the hare on his back. "Now," said the hare, "I bring you back your horse because you saved me from the hound."

Weasel: The weasel's spittle is traditionally supposed to be poisonous. 
Once a crowd of men were saving hay and coming across a weasel's nest they destroyed it. Later they saw the weasel spitting into a can of milk which they had left beside the fence. They then repaired the nest as well as they could, and were later surprised to see the weasel upset the can of milk which she had spat into previously.

Fairy Hare: A man named John Johnson lived in Hoonaum[?]. He was very fond of shooting hares, the skins of which he threw on the loft over the fireplace. One night as he sat by the fireside he heard great noise and ruaille buaille in the loft, and on looking up he saw a number of hares jump from the loft and run out the door. He believed afterwards that those were "fairy hares" which had come back to "life".

Fairy Hare: A man named Woods who lived in Ballinamona threw a stick at a hare which he found milking his cow one day and wounded her on the leg.

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The hare however managed to reach the shelter of a nearby uninhabited cabin. When the man entered he discovered an old woman nursing a bleeding leg. He pulled her out but she took the form of a hare and escaped.

Fairy Hare: About a hundred years ago Pat Clancy of Currandoo shot at and wounded the same hare on three consecutive days. On the third occasion the shot returned and hit him on the hand, paralysing his hand for life.

Fox: The fox lies in fields with his eyes open and feigns death. When the crows or magpies come to pick his eyes out he catches them and eats them.

Fairy Hare: A man who went hunting one day shot a hare which he took home and skinned and put into the pot to boil. When he lifted the lid to take out the boiled hare a little woman jumped out and took her place at the table to eat with the man. He ran in terror to a neighbour's house and when the neighbours returned with him they saw the hare running from the house. The next day he got a severe headache and his head split in two and he died.

Fairy Hare: There is a garden in Colmanstown called "Garrdha Chaitlin" which was once owned by a hag called

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Caitlin who was supposed to be able to change herself into a hare. Once when in the hare's form she was captured and boiled, but when the lid was taken off the pot the hare jumped out and escaped.

Fox: A man who caught a fox tied him to a pole in his garden and fed him on maize meal. Unknown to the man the fox spread the meal in a ring as far as his chain would allow and when the hens came to eat it and he caught them.

Fox: Michael Connely, Monirea, had a stable which he divided into two parts, one for his horse and the other for his hends. The fox got in through a hole in the roof and killed all his hens, but when trying to get out by climbing on the horse's backs and made so many attempts that the poor horse's back was completely bald in the morning.

Weasel: One day when a man was walking to Galway he saw a rat and a weasel fighting on the roadside. The rat was getting the better of the weasel and when the men stooped down to kill the rat it hit him on the hand. When the man returned from Galway his had became septic and he spent many days in bed, but in vain. Nothing seemed to do any good. One

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morning the weasel arrived at the man's door with a green leaf in its mouth. The woman of the house put the leaf in the man's septic hand and in a few days the wound was healed.

Fairy Hare: Two men caught a hare and put it into the pot to boil. When stirring the soup with a fork they heard a voice from the pot saying "Do not stick me, do not stick me."