The second Dromintee man read that Book of Harry Stotle and it got a hault of him and he couldn’t get shot of it. He did in the end, wi’ the help of a Father Duggan – a silenced priest. Somehow they had more power.
Culture
The Book of Harry Stotle
There’s them kin work the Black Art of the Divil and there’s not a word of lie in that. It cud be done before and it can still be done. I heared a priest in Dundalk the other week preaching that it cud be done!
There’s several ways of doing it. A man cud sell his soul to the devil and be free and rich and merry for seven years and then the devil wud come till claim him. But he cud make the devil sweep the bottom of the seven seas for him before he’d go and all the time the money pouring out of the tops of he’s boots.
There was some way of swearing on an anvil in a blacksmith’s forge. Sure Willy the Wisp was a blacksmith in the first place that sold himself till the Divil an’ beat him in the end. An’ they cud hold up the Ace of Hearts at the Consecration of the Mass and they’d get the Black Art. Or gather the seeds of the bracken on black plates on Hallow Eve at midnight. And ye cud read some book that came from foreign parts: it was a book with black pages and white writing and you had to read it from back to front and from right till left. They called it the Book of Harry Stotle. And it warned you
‘Read me through
Peruse me not
Or Hell’s Fire
Will be your lot.’
Sure I’ll tell ye more the next time ye call on your ceili!
Whistlin’ In The Barn
Peader was reflecting on days and people, and a way of life that were gone. He spoke of a travelling woman of these parts who stayed in his parent’s place one time, and who took over the settlebed and made the people ‘wait hand and foot’ on her for a week.
She was nothing to the old Travelling Woman who was snow-bound in his grandfather’s on the Dromintee Old Road. She had her own flour with her, which she had begged. When given permission to make her own griddle of bread she told the grandfather at the fireside to ‘quit yer smokin’ and spittin” while she was around the hearth. She backed this up with the remark that she had ‘once owned three cows in the County of Monaghan’. War ensued in which even the cat – and the traditional South Armagh hospitality – fled. Out she had to go into the snow-drifts.
The grandmother couldn’t have this and pleaded for a compromise that allowed the travelling woman a temporary banishment only to the barn. She began loudly to play a tin whistle out there so that the neighbours might learn of her banishment. He saw the gathering throng of spectators on the ten-foot drifts on the road overlooking the wall and the fear of local ridicule caused him to relent. She was brought back to the house.
Fews Glossary: R 2
Right complete, thorough, ‘he’s a right gentleman’
Rightly fine, ‘I’m doing rightly’ well, ‘I know it rightly’
Rigmarole a convoluted, unbelievable story
Rise rib, tease, raise his temper, ‘don’t rise him!’
Rogue v. cheat, ‘he’d rogue ye if he had the chance’
Roughness plenty
Rub n. praise or disparage, ‘he’d give ye a wee rub’
Ructions a hullaballu, a row, ‘he raised ructions over it’
Rue regret, repent, ‘she rued the day that…’
Rug to pull
Rummel to shake
Run leak, ‘the water has all run out of the pot’
Rung step of chair or ladder
Runner one always in someone else’s house, ‘ceilier’
Runs goes, ‘the road runs all the way till Armagh’
Runt small, reject, ‘Pay no heed of the wee runt’
Rust take fright, to refuse, ‘the horse rusted on me’
Fews Glossary: Q
Dialect ‘Q’
Qua marshy land, shaky bog-land
Quare exceptional, usually qualifying a noun, from ‘queer’
Quare head scholar, or pejorative, ‘I woke with a quare head on me’, i.e. hangover effects
Quare geg ‘he’s a quare geg’, comic character not to be taken seriously
Quare-cleft partly silly
Quicks thorn plants
Quit Put an end to, ‘quit yer blettering, will ye?’
Quit acquit, ‘I quit ye of blame for it’
Quiz question, ‘quiz him as to where he was’
Quet alternative pronunciation of ‘quit’
Quest party search party, ‘the quest party looked for the lost gassun’
Fews Glossary: P 2
Dialect ‘P’ 2
Play conduct, ‘it will be the best of your play, not to meddle with him’
Plenish stock, furnish, ‘a well-plenished house or farm’
Polished consummate, ‘a polished rascal, him’
Poor mouth v. denigrate
Power quantity, ‘a power of money’
Prentice apprentice
Prig haggle or steal
Prod push or stick
Prog steal
Pross sue
Prough plenty, ‘he has a brave prough with him’
Poor, ‘a wee prough of a place’
Puke vomit, n. miserable, disagreeable type of person
Purty pretty
Purty-bread potato-bread
Purty-middling fair well
Puss sour-puss, miserable-looking face
Put by, Put about upset
Put by iridescent, ‘I was put by myself with anger’
Put on dress, ‘she had hardly time to put on herself’, pretending, ‘she’s good at putting it on’
Put out story, ‘that’s a quare put-out for you to repeat’
Putting a face on him showing his annoyance
Customs
Blessed Candles were once tied onto the tail of milch cows on Hallow Eve. People firmly believed that evil spirits were abroad and they had to protect their most prized animal.
Fews Glossary: N
Dialect ‘N’
Nail strike, ‘nail him on the chin’
(on the) nail promptly, ‘pay on the nail for it’
Narra narrow
Narley small, ‘narley potatoes,’ ‘a wee narl of a calf’
Near close, ‘a near friend’, ‘near hand’, ‘near hand couped’, almost overturned, ‘a near hand way’, short cut, mean, ‘she’s that near, she’d starve ye’.
Near-legged bandy-legged
Neb nose
Nebby inquisitive
Newance news, ‘it’s newance to me’
Newans unexpected, ‘it’s newans to see you’
Newfangled fancy
Nick devil; ‘nick of time’, a nick in the post, a mark
Nick to steal: past tense, nyuck, ‘He nyuck it on me’ (Newry Nyuck – see Guestbook) Nicker ‘the horse nickered’, neighed
Nip to punch or nip
Nips little bits
Nipping cold, ‘my toes are nipping’
Nobbin raised land in a field, a small hill
Norration oration, speech, ‘I heared the norration’, ‘that was the bloodiest norration ye ever heard’, commotion
Note time of cow’s calving
Notice small nip of drink, ‘just what ye’d notice in the glass’
The Spadesman
Mick was a true spadesman and in his hands that tool acted like something bewitched. He never put a foot to it.