JOURNAL OF THE COUNTY DONEGAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY O'GallaghE.rs, Commanders of Cavalry. O'Timoneys, Stockmen. Wards. Bards. 'l_fi:,ADITIONAL CHARACTERISTICS OF A "FIOR DALAOH." Eadan Fairsing, Cloigeann Clarach, CUL maith sinn, E.uile Duibha, Sro;1 leathan (no iolarach), Guailleacha direacha, Geaga beaga, Mo1 tflsach. Tal:anach teith le na ndaoine muinn,teara. Willie Reilly and His Colleen Bawn' WILLY REILLY: THE BALLAD AND 'DRE SOURCE BY MARCUS lVlACENE!RY. nl1/1 R. Calm 0 Lochlainn in \ff l compilation of Irish bJs Introduction to his Street Ballads, first published in 193,9, revised and reprinted, 1946, pointed o·ut that many of the ballads would prove to have a historical value. He went on to say, however. that "they soon became 1part of the lme of the count::vside. Thev were altered and resung in t_he more intimate circle by the fin:side or in the alr house." T~ the historian this cheerful comment is anything but re•assuring. The knowledge that any original narrative po2m has been suibiected to folk or other variations augucs nothing but trouble, not to say discouragement, f()r the historian, more especially if he cannot trace the succession of variac lectiones which lead .ba·ck to the original. Still more objectionable are the efforts of '"literary" hands to "imm'ove" or edit the artless diction or suo,uosedlv unintelligible narrative of the anonymous author. Throughout the ages historieal fact has suffered queer changes when ex'Posed to the metabolism of folklo,re but, in all its me1tamornhoses and anachronisms. the time'l:ess folk mind invariablv retained something of the essence of the fact. .Whatever remnants of organic folk imagination still remain have for the last hundred yea·rs tended to be overlaid bv a far more insidious 1process of invention. The "Ut.erary" romance, the "edify~ 21!1. ing" article, the "'Patriotic" reconstruction do violence to history and folklore alike. Folkloce abso11bs and transmutes the new t1ction as complacently as it did the old fact and the resultant mixcure presents rthe historian w:th a farrago still more impossible to resolve. These observations may be illustrated by an analysis of come of the fo:.dore, fiction and fact behind the currently acceptc d ve·rsion of the story of "Willy R£illy and his Colleen Ba1wn." The last ballad in l\fr. 0 Lochlainn's collection is entitled Erin's Lovely Home. It tells of a young man, the servant of a gentleman, who was a·ppa1·ently the 1pro,prietor of the 1place so ambiguously described as "Erin's '.ov2ly home." ·He served this gentleman in all honesty until, in the garden of the mansion, "al~ in the month of June." he was pe:-suaded by his employer's d:rnghtec to elop~ with her to Belfast, where she gave him £500 preparatory to their getting their passage overseas. Now to my great misfortune, I mean to let you hear, It wf>s in three d1ays after 1!11at her father did appear, · He brought me back to Omagh Ja.ii, in the 00<unty of Tyrone From that I was transported From Erin's lovely home. His true love comes to comfort him as he sets out to serve his seven years' sentence and says Cheer up my dearest Willie, for you I'll no·t disown,
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