Page:The Land of Wonders - O Conaire.pdf/131

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
THE LAND OF WONDERS
125

them, but, at times, when you would be speaking to the Burla, you would be frightened at hearing him roar like a lion, or screech like an owl, or utter the cry of some other animal or bird. A tactful person would not pretend that he had heard the unusual sound, and when this was the case, the Burla would resume his ordinary speech.

Many stories and rumours were circulated At times she would go out to about Maire, too. the mountains and the woods, and it is extra ordinary what people said about the tricks she practised, but as there was no good authority for these stories, I will say no more about them here.

She married a man of substance from the Co. Mayo—a relative of my own—and reared him a big family, but a couple of years ago she was found dead in the little wood near Maam, and the doctors could not tell what had happened to her.

As for the cook who lost his nose, he became pious towards the end of his life and entered a monastery as a brother, where he still is, unless he died recently.

The Burla is still living. He spent most of his life in the city of Galway —he and the old lion, Daddy-oh, whom he had brought home on the Brideog. Sometimes he would frighten the school-children by letting loose Daddy-oh and