se of the point is almost unknown in Irish conflicts. My countrymen
twirl their shillalahs above their heads with a whirring noise, and
endeavour to knock off their opponents' hats so as to get at their
heads. Then begins the fun of the fair--all is slashing and whacking,
and the hardest skull generally comes off the best. Sometimes a great
deal of skill is displayed, and I often wonder whether a really expert
swordsman would be much more than a match for some quick, strong, Kerry
boys I could pick out. Be it remembered, a swordsman invariably keeps
his left hand behind his back, whilst an Irishman nearly always makes
his left forearm the guard for the left side of his head, and so has
more scope for hitting than he would otherwise have. One is here
reminded of the conflict between Fitz-James and the Highland Chieftain,
Roderick Dhu:--

"Ill fared it then with Roderick Dhu,
That on the field his targe he threw,
Whose brazen studs and tough bull-hide
Had death so often dashed aside;
For, trained abroad his arms to wield,
Fitz-James's blade was sword and shield."

The left arm, supplying the place of the targe, alluded to in Scott's
lines, is doubtless an advantage; but, in the case of the two combatants
whose merits we are considering, the ordinary swordsman possesses
superior reach, can lunge out further, and knows full well the value of
the point.

A melee at an Irish fair is worth seeing, but it is better not to join
in it, if possible.

A number of the "boys," from Cork or an adjacent county, were once had
up before Judge Keogh for beating a certain man within an inch of his
life. A witness under examination--after graphically describing how one
of the prisoners had beaten the poor man "wid a stone, and he lying
senseless in the road;" how another had hit the "crater wid a thick
wattle;" and how a third had kicked him in the back--was asked what one
Michael O'Flannagan, another of the prisoners, had done. "Begorra, your
honour," said the witness, "devil a hap'orth was Micky doing at all, at
all; he was just walking round searching for a vacancy."

A similar story is told of about a dozen tinkers who had set upon one
man and were unmercifully beating him. Presently there was a lull in the
proceedings, and a little deformed man, brandishing a very big stick,
elbowed his way through the crowd, shouting, "Och, now, boys, for the
love of mercy let a poor little cripple have just one stroke at him."