Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/200

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192
Folk-lore Gleanings from County Leitrim.

"Three babes I bore for thee,
Three basin-full of tears
I shed for thee.
Seven long years I spent
Climbing up the glass mountains,
And my bonny bull of oranges (sic),
Will you not turn to me?"

She continued saying this the whole night, but he was so fast asleep he never found her.

She had to rise early before he awoke, and the mistress hid her until the gentleman went away shooting. She took out the scissors, and told her anything she would cut with that would be the nicest thing in the world, and she would give it to her if she would let her sleep another night with her husband. She said she would. So she gave him a drink the next night, and put sleeping-drops on it, so she let her sleep with her husband the second night. She said:

"Three babes I bore for thee.
Three basin-full of tears
I shed for thee.
Seven long years I spent
Climbing up the glass mountains.
And my bonny bull of oranges (sic),
Will you turn to me?"

He was so fast asleep that he never found her. She had to arise early before he awoke. The mistress hid her. The gentleman arose and went away shooting. There was another young gentleman that slept in the next bedroom to them. He said to the gentleman next day, "There is a ghost in your bedroom, did you not hear it? I have heard it say for the last two nights:

'Three babes I bore for thee.
Three basin-full of tears
I shed for thee.
Seven long years I spent