Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/363

 Rh An' when he went home, his next door neighbour was dead, an' he met the fairies coming along the road, and this woman was with them. The fairies had taken her—she had just had a baby that night—an' they just left an ould lump of wood in her place, in the shape of a woman. So he heard one fairy sayin' to another that such an a man would be sorry for his wife, "but he has as much in her place now as will do him." With that the man threw an iron hoop round her an' his own coat—they say, if you can get an iron hoop an' a man's coat roun' any one the wee-folk can't touch them—an' he got a hoult of her, an' the fairies they kicked an' blackened him, but he held on like grim death, an' he took her from them, an' took her to his own house. An' when he went in with her, his own wife was at the wake next door. He put her into bed an' gave her a drap o' warm milk; they were both all clabber with the wrastling with the wee-folk.

So he took his own supper, an' then he went up to the wake; an' he took in kreels an' kreels of turf an' piled on a big fire. His own wife came for-ead, an' says she: "In the name of God, are you goin' out of your senses, an' what do you mean at all puttin' on such a fire? what do you want? sure the people 's too warm." "Hold your tongue," says he; "if I am goin' wrong in the mind I'11 be worse before long." Then says he to a boy, says he: " Come up here an' get a hoult of this in the bed, an' I'll soon roast it." So the boy he came up, an' got her by the heels, an' he got her by the two showl'ers, an' they threw her into the fire. She went up the chimly, an' spat back at them. Says he to her husband: "Come on down to my house; your wife's safe an' sound in my house." An' he went an' got his wife back safe an' sound.—, Derry, pedlar.

Cures for Warts.—Cut a potato, and cut it into ten sllces count out nine, and throw away the tenth. Rub the warts with the nine, then bury them, and as they rot the warts will go away.—, co. Derry, domestic servant, and others.

Look at the new moon. As you keep your eye on her, stoop down an' lift some dust from under your right foot, an' rub the wart with it, an' as the moon wanes the wart dies.—, co. Derry, labourer.

If you see a funeral passing, stoop down an' lift some clay from under your right foot, an' throw it in the same road that the