turkeys about the house, and they used to be picking it up. At
Christmas they killed one of them; and when it was cut open, they found
a new heart growing in it with the dint of the dandelion.'

But an old man says there are no such healers now as there were in his
youth:--'The best herb-doctor I ever knew was Connolly up at Kilbecanty.
He knew every herb that grew in the earth. It is said he was away with
the fairies one time; and when I saw him he had the two thumbs turned
in; and it was said it was the sign they left on him. I had a lump on
the thigh one time, and my father went to him, and he gave him an herb
for it; but he told him not to come into the house by the door the wind
would be blowing in at. They thought it was the evil I had--that is
given by _them_ by a touch; and that is why he said about the wind; for
if it was the evil there would be a worm in it, and if it smelled the
herb that was brought in at the door, it might change to another place.
I don't know what the herb was; but I would have been dead if I had it
on another hour--it burned so much--and I had to get the lump lanced
after, for it wasn't the evil I had.

'Connolly cured many a one; Jack Hall, that fell into a pot of water
they were after boiling potatoes in, and had the skin scalded off him,
and that Dr. Lynch could do nothing for, he cured. He boiled down herbs
with a bit of lard, and after that was rubbed in three times, he was
well.

'And Cahill that was deaf, he cured with the _Riv mar seala_, that herb
in the potatoes that milk comes out of.'

Farrell says:--'The _Bainne bo blathan_ (primrose) is good for the
headache, if you put the leaves of it on your head. But as for the
_Lus-mor_, it's best not to have anything to do with that.' For the
_Lus-mor_ is good to bring back children that are 'away,' and belongs to
the class of herbs consecrated to the uses of magic, apart from any
natural healing power. The Druids are said to have taken their knowledge
of these properties from the magical teachers of the Chaldeans; but
anyhow the belief in them lives on in Ireland and in other Celtic
countries to this day.

A man from East Galway says: 'To bring anyone back from being with the
fairies, you should get the leaves of the _Lus-mor_, and give them to
him to drink. And if he only got a little touch from them, and had some
complaint in him at the same time, that makes him sick like, that will
bring him back. But if he is altogether in th