Tales of The Tinker No.2. Miles Muire and The Magic Purse.

It was on the Friday morning, when O'Donovan the surveyor had sat down on the low wall to watch the comings and goings on the strand, that he first saw the tinker, a tall and stately man who was accompanied by three women, some children - including a pair of fine, stalwart young sons - a donkey, some greyhounds and a goat. On enquiring from a local fisherman who the man was he was told that it was MacSweeney na Tuatha and his family, and that he was recognised by many of the older folk as being the senior of all the old Milesian chiefs in the district, from Fanad to Ballyshannon. 

Later that day, after the last of the western part of the strand had been surveyed, O'Donovan met MacSweeney, who was a travelling man, and the latter recited his pedigree all the way back to Sir Malmurry, the famous rebel who had escaped the English by jumping from a ship and swimming to the shore of Loch Swilly. O'Donovan was very much taken by this MacSweeney, and later wrote that he thought the MacSweeneys 'a fair race; generous, humane, manly and noble, and added that they were easily distinguishable from the other tribes by the peculiar cast of their physiognomy.'

Later, over a glass of porter in O'Donoghue's Pub, this MacSweeney told him the following story, and although it was only copied down with pen and paper much later that evening, under candle light in O'Donovan's room, you can be fairly certain that the details are all there and correct. For O'Donovan had a good faculty for the remembering of facts and small details. The entry he made in his journal that night, concerning the tinker's tale of a fairy woman and Miles Muire an 'Sparrain, an ancient chief of the Clan MacSweeney:

"Now the son of Anradhán was Aodh Alainn mac Anradhán, and a son of Aodh Alainn was Donnsléibhe, and Donnsléibhe's son was Sween, from whom the Clan MacSweeney derive their name. Sween was the most noble and the most distinguished of the twelve sons of Donnsléibhe. It was he who built Castle Sween in Scotland. A son of that Sween was Miles Mhuire an' Sparráin ' , or Maolmhuire 'of the Purse,' and that Maolmhuire is the ancestor of the three Clanna MacSweeney. He had a fairy lover, that is, a fairy woman was his wife, and it was she who bestowed on him the famous purse above mentioned. 

Of that purse this was a property: every time it would be opened a small penny and a shilling would be found within it. And for a long time Maolmhuire lived thus: but at length his kinsfolk wished to give him another wife, and the one they chose was Bean Midhe, daughter of Toirrdhealbhach Mór O Conchubhair. And a great fleet set out for Ireland, and they who brought it rested not until they reached Sligo. They spent two nights in the town, and they carried away the lady with them.

 

One night, after that, Maolmhuire was in Castle Sween, and the fairy woman afore-mentioned had promised to bring him her child, and had told him to remain awake to receive her, but when she came, there was no one awake in the house except the daughter of O Conchubhair. And she seated herself by the fire, and asked if Mac Sween was awake. O Conchubhair's daughter said he was not, and she offered clothes to her to put about the child. And she would not accept them, but said that sleep would bring destruction on Mac Sween, and on his children after him, and she departed in anger then, and has never since been seen. Neither has anyone ever seen her son, that is, Fearfeadha, except whenever he came to render help to Clann MacSweeney in battle or necessity. 

One day Maolmhuire was on the green at his house, and there came to him a trio of poets, and the only poem they offered him was of three verses, namely, a verse by each. And these are the three verses : 

Maolmhuire, son of Sween, 

for a purse we have come; 

what thou refusest to us 

thou wouldst bestow on a 

company of mimics.

Heir of Donnsléibhe's son, 

inheritor of generosity and noblesse. 

the blessing of every poet on thee; 

fail not to bestow on us. 

Why wouldst thou refuse us, 

yellow-haired descendant of Buirrche, 

for thou has ne'er refused any, 

O Maolmhuire, son of Sween. 

Then he gave to them the purse, and all say that they who had come there were the brothers of the fairy woman.

When Maolmhuire had completed the course of his life, he died, and his body was brought to the monastery of Columcille on Iona. Murchadh, his son, and all his people went with it, and when they arrived at the monastery, they could find no house in which to wake the body of Mac Sween that night except one unroofed building which was in the place. When Murchadh heard that, he gave orders that the building should be covered with splendid cloth, and said it would be improper to put any other protection over the body of Mac Sween. And his people did as he bade them, and when Mac Sween was buried on the following day, they wished to carry away the covering with them. But Murchadh forbade them to do that, and he bestowed all the drapery on the monks in honour of God and of Columcille." 

The tinker looked up now and quickly downed the last drop of porter from his tankard, stood up, stooping slightly so his head narrowly avoiding a knock from the roof beam of the pub, pulled his cap over the side of his fine head and said "If you are here tomorrow I'll tell you the story of the strange vision of O'Breslein's wife and the tale of the Yellow Knight".

And with that he turned and walked out of the place, several of the regulars calling out to him a greeting of farewell and so forth, which the tinker barely acknowledged, quietly closing the pub door behind him.