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Besides shoemaking, leprechauns are great tinkers (partly because in the old days their boots were said to be made of metal) and have proved themselves perfectly equal to much modern technology. Until twenty or thirty years ago many a tractor in the west of Ireland owed its survival more to the tinkering of leprechauns than the care of the local garage, which it would not have seen for years.
Leprechauns are generally classed among the solitary faeries of Ireland as opposed to the far more common trooping faeries. People usually tell of meeting single leprechauns so it is clear they enjoy their own company, but they also have their sociable moments. When it comes to adopting human households, they are far less domesticated than, say, the brownies of Scotland or the kobolds of Germany, but they have been known to attach themselves to human families and even move abroad with them. That is how there come to be leprechauns in places like North America and Australia.
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Everyone has heard that where a rainbow touches the ground you will find buried treasure. Not many people believe this any more, and science suggests there is no such spot anyway - where a rainbow appears to touch the ground is completely dependent on where you are standing. Leprechauns don't dispute this but say it is missing the point. Which is that in chasing rainbows what matters as much as anything is knowing when you are in the right spot from which to view the rainbow. It depends as much on knowing where you are coming from as where you are going, which requires a particular kind of instinct.
Not many humans have it, so for most of us chasing rainbows is a pretty pointless occupation; but leprechauns, being that much more in tune with the hidden currents of destiny and time and all that kind of thing, are quite often successful.
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 Here we have a news crier at one of the big leprechaun festivals. Their two greatest fairs are held on May Eve and Halloween, which divide the year for them into its warm and cool halves. They are times when leprechauns (and the rest of the fairy folk) move home to make the best of the weather. On May Eve they gather at special places around Ireland for dancing and singing and no end of other entertainments. The greatest feast of all is the Beltane Fair of Uisnech in County Westmeath. Here leprechauns come from all corners of Ireland to exchange songs and riddles and stories. It is a great melting pot and all the usual rivalries are suspended. It is a time for settling disputes and making new friends.
Halloween marks the start of winter. It is also a celebration of the harvest and all that kind of thing but the mood is more sombre and reflective than May Eve. Halloween is also a time of mischief because, as everyone knows, on that night the gates between this and the otherworld are thrown open and all kinds of bogles walk abroad. Leprechauns themselves are not much bothered by the likes of the banshee, the morrigan and the rest because they know how to avoid them. And besides, it is a night when they are licensed to behave as wildly as they like themselves, so in a sense they are part of the mayhem and may well be the ones playing tricks on you.
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A TRUE TALE About two centuries ago Molly Cogan of Kilmallock told the famous folklorist Thomas Crofton Croker about a leprechaun her grandfather had met, and even caught.
It happened like this: one night as he went to the stable to tend his old mare, Grandpa Cogan heard something 'hammering, hammering, hammering just for all the world like a shoemaker making a shoe, and whistling all the time the prettiest tune he ever heard his whole life before.'
He guessed what might be making the sound and. remembering tales of leprechauns and their gold, he crept in. He looked around but 'never a bit of the little man could he see anywhere, but he heard him hammering and whistling and so he looked and looked, till at last did he see the little fellow. 'And where was he, do you think, but in the girth under the mare, and there he was with his little bit an apron on him, and a hammer in his hand, and he was so busy with his work, and he was hammering and whistling so loud, that he never minded my grandfather till he caught the leprechaun fast in his hand.
'"Faith I have you now," says he. "And I'll never let you go till I get your purse, that's what I won't. So give it here to me at once now."
'"Stop, stop!" cries the leprechaun. "Stop till I get it for you!"
'So my grandfather, like a fool you see, opened his hand a bit and the little fellow jumped away laughing. And he never saw him any more, and never a bit of the purse did he get, only the leprechaun left his little shoe that he was making, and my grandfather was mad enough angry with himself for letting him go, but he had the shoe all his life. And my own mother told me she often saw it, and had it in her hand, and 'twas the prettiest little shoe she ever saw.' |
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TOM PEARCE AND THE LEPRECHAUN
 One cold winter evening as Tom Pearce was heading for home, he heard a curious tapping sound close by, and a cheerful whistling coming from under the hedge. As quiet as a mouse he crept up and what should he find but a little leprechaun no taller than his knee, sat cross-legged on a pile of stones and tapping away at a tiny shoe. Such a racket was the little fellow making that he never heard Tom arrive. So Tom quickly reached out and caught him fast.
'Let me go! Let me go!' shrieked the leprechaun. 'What have I done to have you grab me so rudely?'
'Nothing yet' replied Tom, 'but it's a lot I'm hoping you'll be able to do for me before I let you go. Now let's be having your magic purse that never runs short of gold.' 'Damn me, I must be getting careless,' grumbled the leprechaun. 'That's the third time this week I've been caught and they all want the same thing, me magic purse, me magic purse. I have no purse! It's been robbed from me already.'
'All right then' said Tom, who had been taught not to be too soft with a leprechaun, 'then tell me where there's some treasure buried nearby.'
'Hasn't that also been taken already?' cried the leprechaun. 'I've been caught so often by lummocks like you that there's no treasure left in the county.'
'What about the three wishes then?' asked Tom.
The leprechaun looked cross. 'So you know about the wishes then?' he asked sulkily.
'I know all about leprechauns, me little feller. Why do you think I'm only blinking the one eye at a time. Don't I know that if I take both eyes off you for a second you'll just vanish.'
'All right then,' said the leprechaun at last. You can have the three wishes. But if you want my advice you'll think carefully before making them. It's not as simple as you think, wishing for anything in the world.'
So Tom looked thoughtfully up at the sky where the stars were just beginning to twinkle and the moon was rising out of the clouds. And of course when he looked back he held nothing in his hand but the stump of a gorse bush. | |
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allo allo,
I'm a fine leppy,
Glad to see thee make us famous aaaghhain,
But take care when you next step in a daisy chain,
An' count your blessings when out in the woods, mudd an' rain,
An' woe to them that curse at the mudd an' the rain,
For their seeds be barren with sun woorship alone,
Your secret friend, your familiar leprychaun,
Hiding in your shadow,
Know thee are not alone!
Sean of the Clay Castle |
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