School: Clonard (roll number 16067)
- Location:
- Clonard, Co. Meath
- Teacher: Séamus Ó Fithcheallaigh
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0694, Page 205
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- Until recently, the young people in south Cork, believed in, and had a very wholesale dread of Jack-o-theLantern.
In wet weather, a pale light was seen in the bogs at night. Some times it quenched and started up again in a different part of the bog.
This was supposed to have been a Ghost called Jack. O-Lantern. When a human being was out at night and came within his radius, he quenched the light, surrounded the traveller with a mantle of darkness, and kept him walking backwards and forwards around the same place, all night. If the traveller happened to be in one of his own fields, he could not find the open gap to get out.
The only means, by which you could counteract this spirit was by turning your cap or your coat inside - out. At the present time the young people know, that the light at night, is phosphorous in rotten wood.
- Collector
- J. Fehily
