One of these old men, whom I often talk with,
has some fame as a bone-setter, and is said to have done remarkable
cures, both here and on the mainland. Stories are told of how he has
been taken off by the quality in their carriages through the hills
of Connemara, to treat their sons and daughters, and come home with
his pockets full of money.
Another old man, the oldest on the island, is fond of telling me
anecdotes - not folktales - of things that have happened here in his
lifetime.
He often tells me about a Connaught man who killed his father with
the blow of a spade when he was in passion, and then fled to this
island and threw himself on the mercy of some of the natives with
whom he was said to be related. They hid him in a hole - which the
old man has shown me - and kept him safe for weeks, though the police
came and searched for him, and he could hear their boots grinding on
the stones over his head. In spite of a reward which was offered,
the island was incorruptible, and after much trouble the man was
safely shipped to America.
This impulse to protect the criminal is universal in the west. It
seems partly due to the association between justice and the hated
English jurisdiction, but more directly to the primitive feeling of
these people, who are never criminals yet always capable of crime,
that a man will not do wrong unless he is under the influence of a
passion which is as irresponsible as a storm on the sea. If a man
has killed his father, and is already sick and broken with remorse,
they can see no reason why he should be dragged away and killed by
the law.
Such a man, they say, will be quiet all the rest of his life, and if
you suggest that punishment is needed as an example, they ask,
'Would any one kill his father if he was able to help it?'
Some time ago, before the introduction of police, all the people of
the islands were as innocent as the people here remain to this day.
I have heard that at that time the ruling proprietor and magistrate
of the north island used to give any man who had done wrong a letter
to a jailer in Galway, and send him off by himself to serve a term
of imprisonment.
As there was no steamer, the ill-doer was given a passage in some
chance hooker to the nearest point on the mainland. Then he walked
for many miles along a desolate shore till he reached the town.
