VI. Underground Folk.
To underground folk, other than fairies, I have only found few and uninteresting references, such as,—" an old woman looked out of the side of the fort, and the man ran away"; "he heard them talking inside the hill"; and "the little old man came out of the fort, and shut it behind him."
VII. Water Spirits and Mer-folk.
The Shannon, according to the Dindsenchas, derived its name from a sea-lady, but evidently not a "water-breather." Sinenn, daughter of Lodan, came from Tir-tairngire, the Land of Youth, under the sea, to visit the well of Connla, under the river now called Shannon. She came to Linn na feile, but was drowned at Tarrchinn "on this side Shannon," and gave her name to the great river.[1] A water spirit, or mermaid, is remembered at Killone Lake and Newhall. The legend is preserved in several variants. In 1839 it was told how O'Brien of Killone saw a lovely girl in the lake, and caught her. Bringing her home, he found to his great disgust and disappointment that she had a fish's tail. He ordered her to be kept in a "crib," and fed and well-treated. As she never spoke, a local fool threw scalding water on her to make her say something. He was only too successful, for, after a wild, blood-curdling shriek, she cried:
"As the return of the salmon from the stream,
A return without blood or flesh,
May such be the departure of the O'Briens
Like ears of wild corn from Killone."[2]
The legend recorded, almost at the same time (1840), by Crofton Croker was told to me by the old peasantry, about 1876, as follows:—A mermaid used to swim up a stream that flowed under the cellars of Newhall, in order to steal wine. The "master" (an O'Brien), or the butler, hid and stabbed her, (or threw her into a tub of scalding water where she became a big lump of jelly), and her blood ran down the stream and
