an who was taken in her youth. When she came home at the end of
seven years she had no toes, for she had danced them off. Now and then
one hears of some real injury being done a person by the land fairies,
but then it is nearly always deserved. They are said to have killed
two people in the last six months in the County Down district where I
am now staying. But then these persons had torn up thorn bushes
belonging to the Sheoques.

2. _The Merrows._--These water fairies are said to be common. I asked
a peasant woman once whether the fishermen of her village had ever
seen one. 'Indeed, they don't like to see them at all,' she answered,
'for they always bring bad weather.' Sometimes the Merrows come out of
the sea in the shape of little hornless cows. When in their own shape,
they have fishes' tails and wear a red cap called in Irish _cohuleen
driuth_ (p. 79). The men among them have, according to Croker, green
teeth, green hair, pigs' eyes, and red noses; but their women are
beautiful, and sometimes prefer handsome fishermen to their
green-haired lovers. Near Bantry, in the last century, lived a woman
covered with scales like a fish, who was descended, as the story goes,
from such a marriage. I have myself never heard tell of this grotesque
appearance of the male Merrows, and think it probably a merely local
Munster tradition.

THE SOLITARY FAIRIES

These are nearly all gloomy and terrible in some way. There are,
however, some among them who have light hearts and brave attire.

1. _The Lepricaun_ (Ir. _Leith bhrogan_, _i.e._ the one shoe
maker).--This creature is seen sitting under a hedge mending a shoe,
and one who catches him can make him deliver up his crocks of gold,
for he is a miser of great wealth; but if you take your eyes off him
the creature vanishes like smoke. He is said to be the child of an
evil spirit and a debased fairy, and wears, according to McAnally, a
red coat with seven buttons in each row, and a cocked-hat, on the
point of which he sometimes spins like a top. In Donegal he goes clad
in a great frieze coat.

2. _The Cluricaun_ (Ir. _Clobhair-cean_ in O'Kearney).--Some writers
consider this to be another name for the Lepricaun, given him when he
has laid aside his shoe-making at night and goes on the spree. The
Cluricauns' occupations are robbing wine-cellars and riding sheep and
shepherds' dogs for a livelong night, until the morning finds them
panting and mud-covered.

3. _The Gonconer o