Legendary fictions of the Irish Celts

Ossianic and other Early Legends. 205
and you'll see some of them sticking up out o' the say
where they light after a great fling. Maybe you'd like to
try your hand." He did try his hand, and after winding
it round and round his head he let fly, and it went half a
mile whistling through the air, and broke in a hundred
smithereens on a big stone in the bog. " You'll do
well," says the boy, " when you come to your full growth,
and get a year's practice or so with Fann." "To the
d— •— I pitch Fann and his finger stones ! " says the big
Red Man to himself.
" Well, is there any other way they divart themselves 1"
says the stranger. " Oh, yes," says the boy. " Fann
and his men does be throwing that handball (the ball was
a round stone that 'ud fill this hearth up to the mantel
beam) from the bawn here over the house, and running
round and catching it before it comes to the ground.
Every miss counts one lost." "Wonderful quare people
is the Irish," said the big man. " Maybe if it wouldn't
go over with me at the first offer, it might break down
the roof, and that 'ud annoy the vanithee. I'll pitch it
up in the air here, and you can mark." So he gave a
heave. " How high is it gone ? " " Up to the window
sill." "Now?" "Up to the eaves." "Dickens take
where is it 1 " " Oh, sir, it is on your head."
it ! Now
And indeed so it was, and levelled him also, and only he
had a reasonable hard noggin of his own, it would be
cracked in two with the souse the big stone gave it again'
the ground.
He got ujo, and rubbed his poor skull, and looked
very cross. " I suppose Fann won't be home to-night."
"Sir, he's not expected 'for a week." "Well, give the
vanithee my compliments, and tell her I must go back
without bidding her good bye, for fear the tide would
overtake me crossing the Causeway."