It seems that it is not the custom
for the men to go out fishing on the evening of a holy day, but one
night last December some men, who wished to begin fishing early the
next morning, rowed out to sleep in their hookers.
Towards morning a terrible storm rose, and several hookers with
their crews on board were blown from their moorings and wrecked. The
sea was so high that no attempt at rescue could be made, and the men
were drowned.
'Ah!' said the man who told me the story, 'I'm thinking it will be a
long time before men will go out again on a holy day. That storm was
the only storm that reached into the harbour the whole winter, and
I'm thinking there was something in it.'
Today when I went down to the slip I found a pig-jobber from
Kilronan with about twenty pigs that were to be shipped for the
English market.
When the steamer was getting near, the whole drove was moved down on
the slip and the curaghs were carried out close to the sea. Then
each beast was caught in its turn and thrown on its side, while its
legs were hitched together in a single knot, with a tag of rope
remaining, by which it could be carried.
Probably the pain inflicted was not great, yet the animals shut
their eyes and shrieked with almost human intonations, till the
suggestion of the noise became so intense that the men and women who
were merely looking on grew wild with excitement, and the pigs
waiting their turn foamed at the mouth and tore each other with
their teeth.
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