Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 5, 1894.djvu/209

 Further Notes from Comity Leiirim^ 201

dancingwhich is carried on. As the people say, "if ten men and ten dogs were chasing ten hares they wouldn't take the dew off more." A horse, if left in the field in which the fort is situated, is often so dead tired that it cannot be used next morning, having been over- ridden by the "good people" in their midnight frolics. In another field hard by is a very fine cromlech, and a second, broken down, is called " Labby Ermaid" {i.e., Diarmuid's Bed), a name commonly given by the peasantry to cromlechs, which were associated with the Finn legend of the Pursuit of Diarmuid and Grainne. I say " were", for, so far as I can ascertain, the story has now completely died out in the district, save the above name, which the people could not explain.

Such is, in brief, the story of the place as told by Mr. John Dogherty, farmer, of Drumany, who lives not far from the ruins of the church. It is difficult to account for the presence of such a building in such a spot, though doubt- less the population has shifted considerably of late years. The people say that the saints who built these churches never knew themselves where the next one was to be erected, but that a little bird always appeared and took up some of the mortar in its beak, and, flying slowly away, left it down on the spot selected for the new building.

The story goes that when the Abbey at Fenagh was finished, the little bird appeared and went off towards Cloone. The men followed in single file within speaking distance from one another, as was the custom. As they approached Cloone the first man discovered he had left some of his tools behind at Fenagh, so, without taking his eyes off the bird, he called back to the man behind him, and the message was sent on this way to the last man who was just leaving Fenagh, and he brought the tools with him.

In bringing these notes to a conclusion, it will be as well to state that they are all derived from the peasantry, and I have endeavoured to put them forward here without altera-