Leaving the fable of the play of the "Death Fetch" altogether, and merely taking its name for the purpose of acquainting the reader with the attributes of a "fetch," recourse is had in the outset to the "Tales of the O'Hara Family." The notions of such of the good people of Ireland, as believe at this time in that "airy thing," are set forth with great clearness by the author of that work, who is a gentleman of the sister kingdom with well-founded claims to distinction, as a

man of genius and literary ability. The following is extracted preparatory, to other authorities regarding "fetches in general.

A Tale of the O'Hara Family.

I was sauntering in hot summer weather by a little stream that now scarce strayed over its deep and rocky bed, often obliged to glance and twine round some large stone, or the trunk of a fallen tree, as if exerting a kind of animated ingenuity to escape and pursue its course. It ran through a valley, receding in almost uniform perspective as far as the eye could reach, and shut up at its extremity by a lofty hill, sweeping directly across it. The sides of the valley bore no traces of cultivation. Briers and furze scantily clothed them; while, here and there, a frittered rock protruded its bald forehead through the thin copse. No shadow broke or relieved the monotonous sheet of light that spread over every object. The spare grass and wild bushes had become parched under its influence; the earth, wherever it was seen bare, appeared dry and crumbling into dust; the rocks and stones were partially bleached white, or their few patches of moss burnt black or deep red. The whole effect was fiercely brilliant, and so unbroken, that a sparrow could not have hopped, or a grass-mouse raced across, even in the distance, without being immediately detected as an intrusion upon the scene.

The desertion and silence of the place, sympathized well with its lethargic features. Not a single cabin met my eye through the range of the valley; over head, indeed, the gables of one or two peeped down, half hidden by their same

ness

of colour with the weather-tanned recks on which they hung, or with the

their inmates were obviously unconnected with the solitude in which I stood, their the level country, and thence the paths fronts and windows being turned towards that led to them must also have diverged. No moving thing animated my now almost supernatural picture; no cow, horse, nor sheep, saunteringly grazed along the little birds flew over it, I conveniently margin of my wizard stream. The very thought, with an agitated rapidity, or if one of them alighted on the shrivelled spray, it was but to look round for a moment with a keen mistrustful eye; and then bound into its fields of air, leaving action. If a sound arose, it was but what the wild branch slightly fluttered by his its own whispering waters made; or the herdsboy's whistle faintly echoed from far-off fields and meadows; or the hoarse and lonesome caw of the rook, as he winged his heavy flight towards more fertile places.

Amid all this light and silence, a very aged woman, wildly habited, appeared, I know not how, before me. Her approach had not been heralded by any accompanying noise, by any rustle among the bushes, or by the sound of a footstep; my eyes were turned from the direction in which she became visible, but again unconsciously recurring to it, fixed on the startling figure.

She was low in stature, emaciated, and embrowned by age, sun, or toil, as it might be; her lank white hair hung thickly at either side of her face; a short red mantle fell loosely to her knees; under it a green petticoat descended to within some inches of her ankles; and her arms, neck, head, and feet, were bare. There she remained, at the distance of only about twenty yards, her small grey eyes vacantly set on mine; and her brows strenuously knit, but, as I thought, rather to shadow her sight from the sun, than with any expression of anger or agitation. Her look had no meaning in it; no passion, no subject. It communicated nothing with which my heart or thought held any sympathy; yet it was long, and deep, and unwincing. After standing for some time, as if spell-bound by her gaze, I felt conscious of becoming uneasy and superstitious in spite of myself; yet my sensation was rather caused by excitement than by fear, and saluting the strange visitant, I advanced towards her. She stood on a broad slab in the centre of the bed of the

stream, but which was now uncovered by the water. I had to step from stone to stone in my approach, and often wind round some unusually gigantic rock that impeded my direct course; one of them was, indeed, so large, that when I came up to it, my view of the old woman was completely impeded. This roused me more: I hastily turned the angle of the rock; looked again for her in the place she had stood but she was gene. My eye rapidly glanced round to detect the path she had taken. I could not see her.

Now I became more disturbed. I leaned my back against the rock, and for some moments gazed along the valley. In this situation, my eye was again challenged by her scarlet mantle glittering in the sunlight, at the distance of nearly a quarter of a mile from the spot where she first appeared. She was once more motionless, and evidently looked at me. I grew too nervous to remain stationary, and hurried after her up the stony bed of the stream.

A second time she disappeared; but when I gained her second resting-place, I saw her standing on the outline of the distant mountain, now dwindled almost to the size of a crow, yet, boldly relieved against the back-ground of white clouds, and still manifested to me by her bright red mantle. A noment, and she finally evaded my view, going off at the other side of the mountain. This was not to be borne: I followed, if not courageously, determinedly. By my watch, to which Í had the curiosity and presence of mind to refer, it took me a quarter of an hour to win the summit of the hill; and she, an aged woman, feeble and worn, had traversed the same space in much less time. When I stood on the ridge of the hill, and looked abroad over a widely-spreading country, unsheltered by forest, thicket, or any other hiding-place, I beheld her

not.

continued my walk, descending the breast of the mountain which faced the valley, but now avoiding the latter, and sauntering against the thready current of the stream, with no other feeling that I can recollect, but an impatience to ascertain its hidden source. It led me all round the base of the hill. I had a book in my pocket, with which I occasionally sat down, in an inviting solitude; when tired of it, I threw pebbles into the water, or traced outlines on the clouds; and the day insensibly lapsed, while I thus rioted in the utter listlessness of, perhaps, a diseased imagination.

Evening fell. I found myself, in its deepest shades, once more on the side of the mountain opposite that which turned towards the valley. I sat upon a small knoll, surrounded by curves and bumps, wild and picturesque in their solitude. Í was listening to the shrill call of the plover, which sounded far and faint along the dreary hills, when a vivid glow of lightning, followed by a clattering thundercrash, roused me from my reverie. I was glad to take shelter in one of the cabins, which I have described as rather numerously strewed in that direction.

The poor people received me with an Irish cead mille phalteagh—“ a hundred thousand welcomes"-and I soon sat in comfort by a blazing turf fire, with eggs, butter, and oaten bread, to serve my need as they might.

The family consisted of an old couple, joint proprietors of my house of refuge; a son and daughter, nearly full grown; and a pale, melancholy-looking girl of about twenty years of age, whom I afterwards understood to be niece to the old man, and since her father's death, under his protection. From my continued inquiries concerning my witch of the glen, our conversation turned on superstitions generally. With respect to the ancient lady herself, the first opinion seemed to be-"the Lord only knows what she was:"--but a neighbour coming in, and reporting the sudden illness of old Grace Morrissy, who inhabited a lone cabin on the edge of the hill, my anecdote instantly occurred to the auditory, one and all; and now, with alarmed and questioning eyes, fixed on each other, they concluded I had seen her "fetch:" and determined amongst themselves that she was to die before morning.

so good an opportunity of becoming acquainted with its exact nature and extent among the Irish peasantry. I asked questions, therefore, and gathered some-to me-valuable information.

In Ireland, a“ fetch" is the supernatural fac-simile of some individual, which comes to ensure to its original a happy longevity, or immediate dissolution; if seen in the morning the one event is predicted; if in the evening, the other.

During the course of my questions, and of the tales and remarks to which they gave rise, I could observe that the pale, silent girl, listened to all that was said with a deep, assenting interest: or, sighing profoundly, contributed only a few melancholy words of confirmation. Once, when she sighed, the old man remarked "No blame to you, Moggy mavourneen, fur it's you that lives to know it well, God help you, this blessed night." To these words she replied with another long-drawn aspiration, a look upwards, and an agitation of feature, which roused my curiosity, if not my sympathy, in no ordinary degree. I hazarded queries, shaped with as much delicacy as I could, and soon learned that she had seen, before his death, the "fetch" of her beloved father. The poor girl was prevailed on to tell her own story; in substance as follows:

Her father had, for some days, been ill of a fever. On a particular evening, during his illness, she had to visit the house of an acquaintance at a little distance, and for this purpose, chose a short cut across some fields. Scarcely arrived at the stile that led from the first into the secord field, she happened to look back, and beheld the figure of her father rapidly advancing in her footsteps. The girl's fear was, at first, only human; she imagined that, in a paroxysm, her father had broken from those who watched his fever. ish bed; but as she gazed, a consciousness crept through her, and the action of the vision served to heighten her dread. It shook its head and hand at her in an unnatural manner, as if commanding her to hasten on. She did so. On gaining the second stile, at the limit of the second field, she again summoned courage to look behind, and again saw the apparition standing on the first stile she had crossed, and repeating its terrible gesticulations. Now she ran wildly to the cottage of her friend, and only gained the threshold when she fainted. Having recovered,

and related what she saw, a strong party accompanied her by a winding way, back to her father's house, for they dared not take that one by which she had come. When they arrived, the old man was a corpse; and as her mother had watched the death-struggle during the girl's short absence, there could be no question of his not having left his bed in the interim.

The man who had come into us, and whom my humble host called "gossip," now took up the conversation, and related, with mystery and pathos, the appearance to himself of the "fetch" of an only child. He was a widower, though a young man, and he wept during the recital. I took a note of his simple narrative, nearly in his own words; and a rhyming friend has since translated them into metre.

The mother died when the child was born,
And left me her bady to keep;
I rocked its cradle the night and morn,
Or, silent, hung o'er it to weep

'Twas a sickly child through its infancy,
Its cheeks were so ashy pale;
Till it broke from my arms to walk in glee,
Out in the sharp fresh gale.

And then my little girl grew strong,

Aud laughed the hours away; Or sung me the merry lark's mountain song, Which he taught her at break of day. When she wreathed her hair in thicket bowers,

I

With the hedge-rose and hare-bell, blue; called her my May, in her crown of flowers, And her smile so soft and new.

And the rose, I thought, never shamed her

cheek,

Our young readers are required to observe that these "Tales of the O'Hara Family" are merely tales, invented to amuse the mind, or create wonder. Yet things of this sort are still believed by ignorant people, and in the dark ages they were credited, or affected to be credited, by those who ought to have known better. Mr. Brand has heaped together a great many of these superstitions.

Besides general notices of death, certain families were reputed to have particular warnings; some by the appearance of a bird, and others by the figure of a tall woman in white, who shrieked about the house. This in Ireland is called the banshee, or "the shrieking woman.”

In some of the great families an admonishing demon or genius was supposed to be a visiter. The family of Rothmurchas is alleged to have had the bodack au dun, "the ghost of the hill;" and the Kinchardines the spectre of the bloody hand." Gartinberg-house was said to have been haunted by Bodach Gartin, and Tulloch Gorms by Maug Monlack, or "the girl with the hairy left hand."

The highlanders, like the Irish, imagined their deaths to have been foretold by the cries of the benshi, or "the fairies' wife," along the paths that their funerals were to take.

James Mackie, by trade a wright, was asked by a neighbour for what purpose he had some fine deal in his barn. is timber for my coffin," quoth James. "Sure," replies the neighbour, “ you mean not to make your own coffin. You have neither resolution nor ability for the task." "Hout away man," says James, "if I were once begun, I'll soon ca't by hand." The hand, but not the heart, failed him, and he left the task of making it to a younger operator.

This anecdote brought to Mr. Brand's remembrance what certainly happened in a village in the county of Durham, where it is the etiquette for a person not to go out of the house till the burial of a near relation. An honest simple countryman, whose wife lay a corpse in his house, was seen walking slowly up the village: a neighbour ran to him, and asked "Where in heaven, John, are you going?" the joiner's shop," said poor John," to see them make my wife's coffin; it will be a little diversion for me."

"To

swarths, and in other places "fetches." In Cumberland, wraiths are called Their business was to appear at the moment preceding the death of the person whose figure they assumed. "Sometimes," says Brand," there is a greater interval between the appearance and the death."

According to Dr. Jamieson, the appearance of the wraith was not to be taken as indicating immediate death," although, in all cases, it was viewed as a premonition of the disembodied state." The season of the day wherein it was seen, was understood to presage the time of the person's departure. If early in the morning, it was a token of long life and even old age; if in the evening, it indicated that death was at hand.

A worthy old lady of exceeding veracity, frequently acquainted the editor of the Every-Day Book with her supposed superhuman sights. They were habitual to her. One of these was of an absent daughter, whom she expected on a visit, but who had not arrived, when she left her chamber to go to a lower part of the house. She was surprised on meeting her on the stairs, for she had not heard the street door opened. She expressed her surprise, the daughter smiled and stood aside to let her mother pass, who naturally as she descended, reached

out her hand to rest it on her daughter's arm as assistance to her step; but the old lady mistook and fell to the bottom of the stairs. In fact her daughter was not there, but at her own home. The old lady lived some years after this, and her daughter survived her; though, according to her mother's imagination and belief, she ought to have died in a month

or two.

In 1823, the editor of this work being mentally disordered from too close application, left home in the afternoon to consult a medical friend, and obtain relief under his extreme depression. In Fleet-street, on the opposite side of the way to where he was walking, he saw a pair of legs devoid of body, which he was persuaded were his own legs, though not at all like them. A few days afterwards when worse in health, he went to the same friend for a similar purpose, and on his way saw himself on precisely the same spot as he had imagined he had seen his legs, but with this difference that the person was entire, and thoroughly a likeness as to feature, form, and dress. The appearance seemed as real as his own existence. The illusion was an effect of disordered imagination.

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR. Mean Temperature . . . 64. 20.

July 26.

ST. ANN.

She was the mother of the Virgin Mary, and is a saint of great magnitude in the Romish church. Her name is in the church of England calendar, and the almanacs.

There are curious particulars concerning Ann and her husband St. Joachim, in vol. i. col. 1008.

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR. Mean Temperature . . . 63. 67.

July 27.

FALL OF NANNEU OAK.

This is a remarkable incident in the annals of events relating to the memorials of past times.

THE HAUNTED OAK OF NANNEU,

Near Dolgelly, in Merionethshire. On the twenty-seventh of July, 1813, sir Richard Colt Hoare, bart., the elegant editor of "Giraldus Cambrensis," was at Nanneu," the ancient seat of the ancient family of the Nanneus," and now the seat of sir Robert Williams Vaughan, bart. During that day he took a sketch of a venerable oak at that place, within the trunk of which, according to Welsh tradition, the body of Howel Sele, a powerful chieftain residing at Nanneu, was immured by order of his rival Owen Glyndwr. In the night after the sketch was taken, this aged tree fell to the ground. An excellent etching of the venerable baronet's drawing by Mr. George Cuitt of Chester, perpetuates the portrait of this celebrated oak in its last moments. The engraving on the next page is a mere extract from this masterly etching. It stood alone, a wither'd oak Its shadow fled, its branches broke; Its riven trunk was knotted round, Its gnarled roots o'erspread the ground Honours that were from tempests won, In generations long since gone, A scanty foliage yet was seen, Wreathing its hoary brows with green, Like to a crown of victory

On some old warrior's forehead grey,
And, as it stood, it seem'd to speak
To winter winds in murmurs weak,
Of times that long had passed it by
And left it desolate, to sigh

Of what it was, and seem'd to wail,
A shadeless spectre, shapeless, pale.
Mrs. Radcliffe.*

The charm which compels entrance to Mr. Cuitt's print within every portfolio of taste, is the management of his point in the representation of the beautiful wood and mountain scenery around the tree, to which the editor of the Every-Day Book would excite curiosity in those who happen to be strangers to the etching. But this gentleman's fascinating style is independent of the immediate object on which he has exercised it, namely, "the spirit's Blasted Tree," an oak of so great fame, that sir Walter Scott celebrates its awful distinction among the descendants of our aboriginal ancestors, by the lines of "Marmion," affixed to the annexed representation.

See this lady's "Posthumous Works,” vol. iv. Stonehenge stanza 53, from whence these lines are capriciously altered.