Chapter XLII.

Self-Decapitation

An Irish peasant cutting his own head off by mistake - His reputed ghost - Natural deaths of the Irish peasantry - Reflections on the Excise Laws.

Amongst my memorandums of singular incidents I find one which even now affords me as much amusement as such a circumstance can possibly admit of; and as it is at the same time highly characteristic of the people amongst whom it occurred, in that view I relate it. A man decapitating himself by mistake is indeed a blunder of true Hibernian character.

In the year 1800, a labourer dwelling near the town Of Athy, County Kikdare, where some of my family then resided, was walking with his comrade up the banks of the Barrow to the farm of a Mr. Richardson, on whose meadows they were employed to mow; each, in the usual Irish way, having his scythe loosely wagging over his shoulder, and lazily lounging close to the bank of the river, they espied a salmon partly hid under the bank. It is the nature of this fish that when his head is concealed, he fancies no one can see his tail - there are many wiseacres besides the salmon of the same way of thinking. On the present occasion the body of the fish was visible.

"O Ned, Ned, dear!" said one of the mowers, "look at that big fellow there. Isn't it a pity we ha'nt no spear?"
"Maybe," said Ned, "we could be after piking the lad with the scythe-handle."
"True for you!" said Dennis: "the spike of yeer handle is longer nor mine; give the fellow a dig with it at any rate."
"Ay, will I," returned the other: "I'll give the lad a prod he'll never forget anyhow."

The spike and their sport was all they thought of; but the blade of the scythe, which hung over Ned's shoulder, never came into the contemplation of either of them. Ned cautiously looked over the bank; the unconscious salmon lay snug, little imagining the conspiracy that had been formed against his tail.

Now hit the lad smart !" said Dennis : "there, now, there! rise your fist; now you have the boy! now, Ned - success !"

Ned struck at the salmon with all his might and main, and that was not trifling. But whether "the boy" was piked or not never appeared; for poor Ned, bending his neck as he struck at the salmon, placed the vertebrae in the most convenient position for unfurnishing his shoulders, and his head came tumbling splash into the Barrow, to the utter astonishment of his comrade, who could not conceive how it could drop off so suddenly. But the next minute he had the consolation of seeing the head attended by one of his own ears, which had been most dexterously sliced off by the same blow which beheaded his comrade.

The head and ear rolled down the river in company, and were picked up with extreme horror at the mill-dam, near Mr. Richardson's, by one of the miller's men.

"Who the devil does this head belong to?" exclaimed the miller.
"Whoever owned it," said the man, "had three ears at any rate."

A search being now made, Ned's headless body was discovered lying half over the bank, and Dennis in a swoon, through fright and loss of blood, was found recumbent by its side. Dennis, when brought to himself, which process was effected by whisky, recited the whole adventure. They tied up the head; the body was attended by a numerous assemblage of Ned's countrymen to the grave; and the habit of carrying scythes carelessly very much declined. Many accidents had happened before from that cause; and the priest very judiciously told his flock, after the de profundis, that Ned's misfortune was a just punishment for his negligence, whereby he had hurt a child a day or two before.

From that time none of the country people would on any occasion go after dark to the spot where the catastrophe happened, as they say the doctor stole the head to natomise it; which fact was confirmed by a man without any head being frequently seen by the women and children who were occasionally led to pass the - moat of Ascole, three miles from Athy, in the night-time; and they really believed the apparition to be no other than the ghost of poor Ned Maker looking everywhere for his head, that the doctor had made away with.

This leads me to a digression more important. The superstition of the lower orders of Irish, when death occurs in any peculiar manner, is superlative. In truth, the only three kinds of death they consider as natural are - dying quietly in their own cabins, being hanged about the assize-time, or starving when the potato crop is deficient. All these they regard as matters of course; but any other species of dissolution is contemplated with much horror, though, to be sure, they make no very strong objection to being shot at by a regular army. They say their "fathers and forefathers before them were always used to that same;" and all they expect in such case is, that there should be some sort of reason for it, which they themselves frequently furnish. But those manslaughters which occur through the activity of the revenue-officers in prevention of distillation, they never can reconcile themselves to, and never forgive. They cannot understand the reason for this at all, and treasure up a spirit of savage revenge to the last day of their lives.

An ignorant poor cottager says, naturally enough, to his landlord, "Ough! then, isn't it mighty odd, plase your honour, that we are not hindered from eating oats whenever we can get any? but if we attempt to drink them, by J---s, we are kilt and battered and shot and burned out like a parcel of dogs by the excisemen, that's twice greater rogues nor we are, plase your honour."

In truth, it is to be lamented that his distinction between solids and fluids should not be better reconciled to the common-sense of the peasantry, or be somehow regulated so as to prevent perpetual resort to that erroneous system of mountain warfare and revenue bloodshed, which ever has kept and ever will keep whole districts of Ireland in a state of excitement and distraction. I know that I speak the sentiments of some of his Majesty's enlightened ministers on this subject.