Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/121

 Collectanea. 1 09

Da niezadajsia maje dzietocki My child have no dealings

Da z hetyni bilainiUom. With any gay fellow."

Da bila minie maci, And my mother struck me,

Da dwuma kulakami. With both her hands.

Da nie zadajsia maja C(')renka My child liave no dealings

Da z tymi dwarakami. With any such lordlings.

Da nie zadajsia maja corenka. My child have no dealings

Da z tymi dwar.akami." With any such lordlings."

H. IWANOWSKA.

H. Onslow. (To be continued.)

W.\TERFORD Folk-Tales, I.

The following folk-tales have been collected by a boy of twelve years of age in a remote region of the Decies without Drum, County Waterford. Its populous centre is a hamlet of half a dozen low lime-washed thatched cottages which straggle down a moorland hollow. Round about it the heather lies like a pall over a score of lapsed holdings, and fringes the little fields of oats, potatoes, turnips, and pasture for a dozen cows and a few sheep, goats, and donkeys. From the crests of neighbouring hills the settlement looks like a counterpane of square bright pieces flung flat upon a tract of wild brown or purple desolation backed by the blue Comeragh hills. These little fields have become the cottiers' property under the Land Purchase Act. They are beautifully kept, and their stone enclosures, two to five or even six feet across, are lasting memorials of the patient labour whereby countless generations have converted the sour peat into rent, rates, potatoes, bread (baked in a flat pan under wood ashes), and tea. From this tiny hamlet sixty people have emi- grated in as many years, others have fallen victims to consumption, and others again to insanity, while outside work at even eight or nine shillings a week is accepted as an escape from local condi- tions. Yet, at the Sunday dance at the cross-roads, in spite of heavy boots and empty stomachs, eight young couples go