Clare Island Survey — Gaelic Plant and Animal Names. 4 27 



they made a promise to him. and the storm went down, and he gave them the 

 bearings for Clare Island, for sorrow one of them knew where they were at 

 all, and they made off in the canoe and got safe home. And I can tell you 

 ne'er a one o' them four ever laid hands on a seal again." 



Along with this legend I was given a very complete version of the Legend 

 of the Seal "Wife, so well known in the Hebrides and in West Ireland. As 

 the Clare Island version appears to be fuller than any I have seen on record, 

 I venture to set it down here as closely as may be in the diction of the 

 narrator. 



" Three Clare Island men went out seal-hunting in a canoe one clay, and 

 when they'd got out to the island they were making for, one of them landed 

 in a cave to see would any seals be in in it, and the other three pulled away to 

 another cave to look for more seals. But by the time the canoe came 

 back to pick up the first man, the wind had rose up, and the sea was that 

 coarse they didn't dare venture in with the canoe to take him off. They 

 tied a balk of wood to a rope to see would it float in the way he'd catch 

 hold of it and let himself be dragged out through the waves. But sorrow 

 a bit of good it was : for the water was that cross and contrary the balk 

 wouldn't go in half far enough. So the end of it was the man in the cave 

 roared out : ' Go away home with yous before the storm gets real bad 

 and leave me here for the night. For it's not afeard I am at all to stay 

 here till yous come back for me.' 



"So away they went and left him there all alone by himself, and he climbed 

 up into a skelp [cleft] of the rocks the way the high tide couldn't catch 

 him. But it wasn't long he'd been there when a big herd of seals came 

 swimming and splashing into the cave and got up and lay down on the 

 round stones on the floor, and he could see them without they seeing him, 

 for it's well hid he was in in the skelp of the rock above them. And he 

 kept watching them; and when the night began to fall what does he see 

 but all the seals taking off their cuculs (Coc^tt) and hanging them up on 

 the rocks. And the minute they took off the cuculs they all turned into 

 men and women and began to talk to each other, the way you and me 

 is talking at this present. And when they got tired talking they all lay 

 down to sleep, the women seals lying up at the top of the cave by themselves 

 where the stones were dry, and the men seals lower down near the water. 



" And they slept there all night ; and as soon as the light of morning came 

 creeping into the cave, the canoe man rose up softly in the skelp he was hiding 

 in, and put down his hand and pulled up one of the women's cuculs and hid it 

 under him in the skelp. It wasn't long till all the men and women woke up 

 and went putting on their cuculs and swimming off into the sea as good seals 



D2 



