Off I have some difficulty in giving
them the entertainment they seem to expect from my company. To-day I
showed them some simple gymnastic feats and conjurer's tricks, which
gave them great amusement.
'Tell us now,' said an old woman when I had finished, 'didn't you
learn those things from the witches that do be out in the country?'
In one of the tricks I seemed to join a piece of string which was
cut by the people, and the illusion was so complete that I saw one
man going off with it into a corner and pulling at the apparent
joining till he sank red furrows round his hands.
Then he brought it back to me.
'Bedad,' he said, 'this is the greatest wonder ever I seen. The cord
is a taste thinner where you joined it but as strong as ever it
was.'
A few of the younger men looked doubtful, but the older people, who
have watched the rye turning into oats, seemed to accept the magic
frankly, and did not show any surprise that 'a duine uasal' (a noble
person) should be able to do like the witches.
My intercourse with these people has made me realise that miracles
must abound wherever the new conception of law is not understood. On
these islands alone miracles enough happen every year to equip a
divine emissary Rye is turned into oats, storms are raised to keep
evictors from the shore, cows that are isolated on lonely rocks
bring forth calves, and other things of the same kind are common.
The wonder is a rare expected event, like the thunderstorm or the
rainbow, except that it is a little rarer and a little more
wonderful. Often, when I am walking and get into conversation with
some of the people, and tell them that I have received a paper from
Dublin, they ask me - 'And is there any great wonder in the world at
this time?'
When I had finished my feats of dexterity, I was surprised to find
that none of the islanders, even the youngest and most agile, could
do what I did. As I pulled their limbs about in my effort to teach
them, I felt that the ease and beauty of their movements has made me
think them lighter than they really are. Seen in their curaghs
between these cliffs and the Atlantic, they appear lithe and small,
but if they were dressed as we are and seen in an ordinary room,
many of them would seem heavily and powerfully made.
One man, however, the champion dancer of the island, got up after a
while and displayed the salmon leap - lying flat on his face and then
springing up, horizontally, high in the air - and some other feats of
extraordinary agility, but he is not young and we could not get him
to dance.
