Oh, dear! O, dear! what headstrong crathers the womankind is! The more you want them to do any thing that’s right, the surer they are not to do it, unless the advice is given to a young girl by a gay deludher of a young man something above her station, or to a mistress of a family by some tay-dhrinking, gossiping, cabin-hunting, idle sthra that does nothing but go about pretending to knit a stocking, and she does knit it at the rate of four rounds in the day. It reminds me of the tailor and his wife that were not satisfied without bringing trouble into their cabin, when it pleased Providence not to be sending any. The poor man was sitting contentedly on his board stitching away (I’m sure I wish I knew how a tailor manages to keep his thraneens of legs the way he does for so long), and his wife that was cabin-hunting may be, bawled out, just as she was darkening the door, “Ah, you idle sthronshuch! there you are sitting at your [101]aise, and a hundred geese trampling down our little oats; get up, you lazy drone, and drive them away.” “Musha, I think,” says he, “you’re more at leisure yourself; but rather than have a scolding match, here we go.” So getting up, he went out, and when he looked to the field, “Arrah, woman,” says he, “what’s on your eyes at all? I see but two geese.” “Two geese, inagh! purshuin’ to the goose less than fifty there, any way.” “Fifty? I wish I was as sure of fifty guineas as that there is only two in it.” “Ah! goodness help poor creatures of women with their tyrants of husbands! I tell you up to your teeth, there is forty geese there destroying the oats, as sure as there is one.” “Well, well, two, or forty, or a hundred, I had better drive them off.”

When dinner came she poured out the potatoes, and laid his noggin of milk and plate of butter out for him; but went and sat in the corner herself, and threw her apron over her head, and began to sob. “Arrah, Judy acushla,” says he, “what’s this for? come over and take your dinner, and let us be thankful, instead of flying in God’s face.” “N-n-n-no indeed, I w-w-w-will not. To say such a thing as that there was only two ge-ge-ge-geese there when I reckoned a whole score!” “Oh! to Halifax with them for geese: let them go and be shot, woman, and come over to the table.” “Indeed and I will not till you own to the truth.” Well not a bit did she eat; and when night came, she make a shake down for herself, and would not gratify the poor tailor by sleeping in her own good high-standing bed. Next morning she did not rise; but when her husband spoke kindly, and brought some breakfast to the bedside, she asked him to go for her mother and relations till she’d take leave of them before she’d die, as there was no use living any more, when all love was gone from him. “But, Judy dear, why do you go on in this way? what have I done?” “Don’t you say there was only two geese there, and at the very lowest there could not be less than a dozen. Can’t you acknowledge the truth, you obstinate pig of a man, and let us be at peace again?”

Instead of making any answer, he walked over to her mother’s house, and brought her over, with two or three of her family; and they laid siege to the wife, but they might as well be preachin’ to a stone wall; and she almost persuaded them that her husband was to blame. “Now call him,” says she, “and I’ll insense you who is wrong. Darby, on the nick of your soul, and if you don’t intend to send me to my grave, speak the truth like a Christian, and don’t be heapin’ sins on your miserable head. I’ll leave you no back door, for I’ll only insist on three geese, though I’m sure there was six at the very least; wasn’t there three geese in the field when I called you out!” “Och, Judy asthore? never mind: let there be three-and-thirty if you like, but don’t let us be idlin’ and tormentin’ our people here. Get up in the name of goodness [102]and eat a bit.” “But wasn’t there three geese there, I say, Darby?” “Ah, dickens a one but two if you go to that.” “Oh, Vuya, Vuya! isn’t this a purty story? Go home, go home, all of yez, and bid Tommy Mulligan prepare my coffin, and bring it over about sun-down, and just give me one night’s dacent waking:1 I won’t ax the two, for I don’t wish to give so much trouble to the neighbours, and indeed I think I couldn’t stand the ungratitude and conthrāriness of them that ought to know better, and feel for a body; and after all that I done and slaved for him, and gave up Neddy Brophy for him, that was six inches taller, and a carpenter besides.”

Well, thinking it might give her a fright, they went and brought a coffin that was ready made at the time, and some fresh shavings in the bottom; and the women of the town, that gathered as soon as the coffin came, ordered out the men till they’d wash the corpse.

She said nothing till the men were outside; but then she gave tongue, and asked how dare they think that she wanted washing! It might do well enough for a real dead body, but she was thankful it hadn’t come to that with her yet, and if she chose to die it was no concern of theirs; and if any one attempted to lay a drop of water on her skin, she’d lay the marks of her ten nails on their face. Well, she was got some way into the coffin, and a clean cap and frill put round her face; and, as she was not pale enough, a little girl shook some flour on her cheeks. Before the men and boys were let in, she asked for a looking glass, and when she saw what a fright she looked with the flour, she got a towel and rubbed every bit of it off again.

She bid her husband be called in, and gave her sister and mother charge, in his hearing, to be kind and attentive to the poor angashore after she was gone: at any rate till he’d get a new wife, which she supposed would not be very far off; for though he was [103]unkind and conthrāry, thank goodness she knew her duty, and she supposed he could not help his nature, and it was better as it was, before they’d grow old, and she might get peevish and lose her temper, and they might become a gazabo to the neighbours by fightin’ and scoldin’. “I’ll engage now, after all is said and done, he won’t give way an inch, nor acknowledge the three geese.” Well, the moment the geese were mentioned, he put on his hat without a word, and walked out.

So evenin’ came, and the candles were lighted, and the tobacco and pipes were all laid out, and the poor dead woman had to listen to a good deal of discourse not at all to her liking; and the talk went on in this way. “Musha, neighbour, doesn’t the corpse look mighty well? When did she die, poor woman? What ailed her, did you hear?” “Indeed I believe it was Gusopathy, as Tom K. the schoolmaster called it just now; something with ‘goose’ in it any way: you know the way the skin does be in a sudden cold, with little white risings on it, they call it a goose’s skin. May be she had it very bad, and her husband could not bear it, and so she died of grief.” “Poor man, he’ll feel her loss for a week or two, she was a careful woman.” “Ah, but hadn’t she a bitter tongue of her own?” “Troth I think Darby will bear her loss with Christian patience. He is a young man for his years; he doesn’t look forty, he’ll be getting his choice of wives. I think poor Judy was careful and laid by a few guineas; won’t the new wife feel comfortable, and may be soon put wind under the money!” “To my notion, Judy was in too great a hurry to die. From her looks there, she might bury two tailors yet, and may be get a big bodagh of a farmer for her third husband. Well, it can’t be helped, but I would not like to be warming a bed for the best woman in the townland if I was Judy. She is at peace at last, poor woman; and mighty hard she found it to keep the peace with her neighbours while she was alive. Who is that you said used to be walking with Darby of odd Sunday evenings before his marriage? If ghosts are allowed to take the air on Sunday evenings, poor Judy’s will have something to fret her in a few weeks.”

Well, all this time, the poor dead woman’s blood was rushing like mad through her veins; and something was swelling in her throat as if she was going to be choked, but still the divel was so strong in her that she never opened her eyes nor her mouth. The poor broken-hearted husband came up after some time, and leaning over her face he whispered, “Judy, acushla, isn’t it time to be done with this foolery? Say but one reasonable word, and I’ll send all these people about their business.” “Ah, you little-good-for crather, you havn’t the spirit of a man, or you would never bear all they have been saying of your poor neglected wife these two hours past. Are the three geese there?” “Not a goose but [104]two if you were to be waked for a twelvemonth;” and off he went and sat in a dark part of the room till daylight.

He made another offer next morning, just as the led was puttin’ on the coffin, and the men were goin’ to hoise it on their shoulders; but not a foot she’d move unless he’d give in to the three geese.

So they came to the churchyard, and the coffin was let down in the grave, and just as they were preparing to fill all up, poor Darby went down, and stooping to where he had left some auger holes in the lid, he begged of her even after the holy show she made of himself and herself, to give up the point, and come home. “Is the three geese there?” was all he could get out of her, and this time his patience got so thread-bare, and he was so bothered by want of sleep, and torment of mind, that he got beside himself, and jumped up, and began to shovel the clay like mad, down on the coffin.

The first rattle it made, however, had like to frighten the life out of the buried woman, and she shouted out, “Oh, let me up! I’m not dead at all: let there be only two geese, Darby asthore, if you like.” “Oh, be this and be that,” said Darby, “it is too late: people have come far and near to the funeral, and we can’t let them lose their day for nothing: so for the credit of the family, don’t stir,” and down went the clay in showers, for the tailor had lost his senses. Of course the by-standers would not let the poor woman be buried against her own will; so they seized on Darby and his shovel, and when his short madness was checked, he fell in a slump on the sod. When poor Judy was brought to life, the first sight she beheld was her husband lyin’ without a kick in him, and a wag of a neighbour proposed to her to let Darby be put down in her place, and not give so many people a disappointment after coming far and near. The dead woman, by way of thanks, gave him a slap across the face that he felt for two days; and not minding the figure she cut in her grave-clothes, fell on poor Darby, and roared and bawled for him to come to life, and she’d never say a conthrāry word to him again while she lived. So, some way or other they brought the tailor round; but how her and him could bear to look each other in the face for a while, I don’t know. May be as there was a good deal of love under all the crossness, they found a way to get into their old habits again, and whenever she felt a tart answer coming to her tongue, she thought of the rattling of the clay on the coffin, and of the three geese that were only two after all; and if they didn’t live happy——but that’s the end they put to lying fairy stories, and as this one is so true and moral, it can afford to do without a tail.

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When the applause and remarks occasioned by this story had somewhat subsided, our hostess spoke a few words in her husband’s [105]ear; she might have meant to whisper, but the guest asked what she said about trouble. “That she and the rest,” replied our host, “wed beg and pray for ’e to tell them another story, but they were afraid to trouble ’e.”

“It will give me much pleasure,” said the Irish gentleman, “to tell another, of quite a different sort,” and he presently told the following story of a brave Irish boy’s luck.