THE LADY of GOLLERUS
by Unknown · from Irish Fairy Tales
Adapted Version
Dick is a fish man. He lives by the sea. He is often alone. He wishes for a friend.
Dick is a fish man. He lives by the sea. He is often alone. He wishes for a friend. He waits by the water. The sun comes up. It is a nice morning. He smokes his pipe. He feels very sad. He wants a wife. He wants his folk.
Dick sees a lady. She is by a big rock. Her hair is green. It shines in the sun. She combs her hair. She is very pretty. Her skin is white. Dick sees a small cap. It is near her. It is her special cap.
Dick knows she is a Merrow. Her cap helps her go home. It helps her go to the sea. Dick takes the cap. He takes it fast. He holds it tight. She cannot go home now. She cannot go back. He wants her to stay.
The Merrow sees her cap gone. She cries big tears. She is very sad. She is scared. Dick feels bad. He wants to help her. He sits by her. He holds her hand. Her hand is soft. He wants her to feel safe.
Dick likes the Merrow. He likes her green hair. He likes her soft voice. He asks her to stay. He asks her to be his wife. The Merrow says yes. She wants to be his wife. She will live with him.
Dick and Merrow marry. They live in a house. They are very happy. They have children. Merrow is a good mother. She is a good wife. She cares for them. Their life is good. They love their folk.
One day Dick goes away. He goes to town. Merrow stays at home. She cleans the house. She moves a fishing net. She looks behind it. She finds her cap. It is her special cap.
Merrow sees her cap. She thinks of her home. She thinks of her folk. They live in the sea. She misses them much. She feels very sad. She wants her old life. She wants her sea home.
Merrow loves her children. She loves Dick too. But she misses her home. She misses the sea. She feels a strong pull. She wants to go back. It makes her sad. She feels a deep longing.
She kisses her children. They sleep in their beds. She goes to the door. She goes to the strand. The sea is calm. The sun shines bright. The water calls her.
She hears a soft song. It comes from the sea. It calls her name. She puts on her cap. She jumps into the water. She goes home now. She is gone. She swims away fast.
Dick comes home later. His wife is not there. He asks his neighbors. They saw Merrow go. She had her special cap. Dick looks for the cap. He finds no cap. He knows she is gone. He feels very sad.
Dick waits for Merrow. He waits each day. But she does not come back. He is very sad. He loves her still. He thinks of her love. He thinks of his children. He thinks of her often. He misses her much.
Dick keeps her in his heart. He thinks of her love. He thinks of his children. He is sad, but his thoughts are good.
Original Story
THE LADY OF GOLLERUS
By Crofton Croker
n the shore of Smerwick harbour, one fine summer's morning, just at daybreak, stood Dick Fitzgerald 'shoghing the dudeen,' which may be translated, smoking his pipe. The sun was gradually rising behind the lofty Brandon, the dark sea was getting green in the light, and the mists clearing away out of the valleys went rolling and curling like the smoke from the corner of Dick's mouth.
''Tis just the pattern of a pretty morning,' said Dick, taking the pipe from between his lips, and looking towards the distant ocean, which lay as still and tranquil as a tomb of polished marble. 'Well, to be sure,' continued he, after a pause, ''tis mighty lonesome to be talking to one's self by way of company, and not to have another soul to answer one—nothing but the child of one's own voice, the echo! I know this, that if I had the luck, or may be the misfortune,' said Dick, with a melancholy smile, 'to have the woman, it would not be this way with me! and what in the wide world is a man without a wife? He's no more surely than a bottle without a drop of drink in it, or dancing without music, or the left leg of a scissors, or a fishing-line without a hook, or any other matter that is no ways complete. Is it not so?' said Dick Fitzgerald, casting his eyes towards a rock upon the strand, which, though it could not speak, stood up as firm and looked as bold as ever Kerry witness did.
But what was his astonishment at beholding, just at the foot of that rock, a beautiful young creature combing her hair, which was of a sea-green colour; and now the salt water shining on it appeared, in the morning light, like melted butter upon cabbage.
Dick guessed at once that she was a Merrow,[5] although he had never seen one before, for he spied the cohuleen driuth, or little enchanted cap, which the sea people use for diving down into the ocean, lying upon the strand near her; and he had heard that, if once he could possess himself of the cap she would lose the power of going away into the water: so he seized it with all speed, and she, hearing the noise, turned her head about as natural as any Christian.
When the Merrow saw that her little diving-cap was gone, the salt tears—doubly salt, no doubt, from her—came trickling down her cheeks, and she began a low mournful cry with just the tender voice of a new-born infant. Dick, although he knew well enough what she was crying for, determined to keep the cohuleen driuth, let her cry never so much, to see what luck would come out of it. Yet he could not help pitying her; and when the dumb thing looked up in his face, with her cheeks all moist with tears, 'twas enough to make any one feel, let alone Dick, who had ever and always, like most of his countrymen, a mighty tender heart of his own.
'Don't cry, my darling,' said Dick Fitzgerald; but the Merrow, like any bold child, only cried the more for that.
Dick sat himself down by her side, and took hold of her hand by way of comforting her. 'Twas in no particular an ugly hand, only there was a small web between the fingers, as there is in a duck's foot; but 'twas as thin and as white as the skin between egg and shell.
'What's your name, my darling?' says Dick, thinking to make her conversant with him; but he got no answer; and he was certain sure now, either that she could not speak, or did not understand him: he therefore squeezed her hand in his, as the only way he had of talking to her. It's the universal language; and there's not a woman in the world, be she fish or lady, that does not understand it.
The Merrow did not seem much displeased at this mode of conversation; and making an end of her whining all at once, 'Man,' says she, looking up in Dick Fitzgerald's face; 'man, will you eat me?'
'By all the red petticoats and check aprons between Dingle and Tralee,' cried Dick, jumping up in amazement, 'I'd as soon eat myself, my jewel! Is it I eat you, my pet? Now, 'twas some ugly ill-looking thief of a fish put that notion into your own pretty head, with the nice green hair down upon it, that is so cleanly combed out this morning!'
'Man,' said the Merrow, 'what will you do with me if you won't eat me?'
Dick's thoughts were running on a wife: he saw, at the first glimpse, that she was handsome; but since she spoke, and spoke too like any real woman, he was fairly in love with her. 'Twas the neat way she called him man that settled the matter entirely.
'Fish,' says Dick, trying to speak to her after her own short fashion; 'fish,' says he, 'here's my word, fresh and fasting, for you this blessed morning, that I'll make you Mistress Fitzgerald before all the world, and that's what I'll do.'
'Never say the word twice,' says she; 'I'm ready and willing to be yours, Mister Fitzgerald; but stop, if you please, till I twist up my hair.' It was some time before she had settled it entirely to her liking; for she guessed, I suppose, that she was going among strangers, where she would be looked at. When that was done, the Merrow put the comb in her pocket, and then bent down her head and whispered some words to the water that was close to the foot of the rock.
Dick saw the murmur of the words upon the top of the sea, going out towards the wide ocean, just like a breath of wind rippling along, and, says he, in the greatest wonder, 'Is it speaking you are, my darling, to the salt water?'
'It's nothing else,' says she, quite carelessly; 'I'm just sending word home to my father not to be waiting breakfast for me; just to keep him from being uneasy in his mind.'
'And who's your father, my duck?' said Dick.
'What!' said the Merrow, 'did you never hear of my father? he's the king of the waves to be sure!'
'And yourself, then, is a real king's daughter?' said Dick, opening his two eyes to take a full and true survey of his wife that was to be. 'Oh, I'm nothing else but a made man with you, and a king your father; to be sure he has all the money that's down at the bottom of the sea!'
'Money,' repeated the Merrow, 'what's money?'
''Tis no bad thing to have when one wants it,' replied Dick; 'and may be now the fishes have the understanding to bring up whatever you bid them?'
'Oh yes,' said the Merrow, 'they bring me what I want.'
'To speak the truth then,' said Dick, ''tis a straw bed I have at home before you, and that, I'm thinking, is no ways fitting for a king's daughter; so if 'twould not be displeasing to you, just to mention a nice feather bed, with a pair of new blankets—but what am I talking about? may be you have not such things as beds down under the water?'
'By all means,' said she, 'Mr. Fitzgerald—plenty of beds at your service. I've fourteen oyster-beds of my own, not to mention one just planting for the rearing of young ones.'
'You have?' says Dick, scratching his head and looking a little puzzled. ''Tis a feather bed I was speaking of; but, clearly, yours is the very cut of a decent plan to have bed and supper so handy to each other, that a person when they'd have the one need never ask for the other.'
However, bed or no bed, money or no money, Dick Fitzgerald determined to marry the Merrow, and the Merrow had given her consent. Away they went, therefore, across the strand, from Gollerus to Ballinrunnig, where Father Fitzgibbon happened to be that morning.
'There are two words to this bargain, Dick Fitzgerald,' said his Reverence, looking mighty glum. 'And is it a fishy woman you'd marry? The Lord preserve us! Send the scaly creature home to her own people; that's my advice to you, wherever she came from.'
Dick had the cohuleen driuth in his hand, and was about to give it back to the Merrow, who looked covetously at it, but he thought for a moment, and then says he, 'Please your Reverence, she's a king's daughter.'
'If she was the daughter of fifty kings,' said Father Fitzgibbon, 'I tell you, you can't marry her, she being a fish.'
'Please your Reverence,' said Dick again, in an undertone, 'she is as mild and as beautiful as the moon.'
'If she was as mild and as beautiful as the sun, moon, and stars, all put together, I tell you, Dick Fitzgerald,' said the Priest, stamping his right foot, 'you can't marry her, she being a fish.'
'But she has all the gold that's down in the sea only for the asking, and I'm a made man if I marry her; and,' said Dick, looking up slily, 'I can make it worth any one's while to do the job.'
'Oh! that alters the case entirely,' replied the Priest; 'why there's some reason now in what you say: why didn't you tell me this before? marry her by all means, if she was ten times a fish. Money, you know, is not to be refused in these bad times, and I may as well have the hansel of it as another, that may be would not take half the pains in counselling you that I have done.'
So Father Fitzgibbon married Dick Fitzgerald to the Merrow, and like any loving couple, they returned to Gollerus well pleased with each other. Everything prospered with Dick—he was at the sunny side of the world; the Merrow made the best of wives, and they lived together in the greatest contentment.
It was wonderful to see, considering where she had been brought up, how she would busy herself about the house, and how well she nursed the children; for, at the end of three years there were as many young Fitzgeralds—two boys and a girl.
In short, Dick was a happy man, and so he might have been to the end of his days if he had only had the sense to take care of what he had got; many another man, however, beside Dick, has not had wit enough to do that.
One day, when Dick was obliged to go to Tralee, he left the wife minding the children at home after him, and thinking she had plenty to do without disturbing his fishing-tackle.
Dick was no sooner gone than Mrs. Fitzgerald set about cleaning up the house, and chancing to pull down a fishing-net, what should she find behind it in a hole in the wall but her own cohuleen driuth. She took it out and looked at it, and then she thought of her father the king, and her mother the queen, and her brothers and sisters, and she felt a longing to go back to them.
She sat down on a little stool and thought over the happy days she had spent under the sea; then she looked at her children, and thought on the love and affection of poor Dick, and how it would break his heart to lose her. 'But,' says she, 'he won't lose me entirely, for I'll come back to him again, and who can blame me for going to see my father and my mother after being so long away from them?'
She got up and went towards the door, but came back again to look once more at the child that was sleeping in the cradle. She kissed it gently, and as she kissed it a tear trembled for an instant in her eye and then fell on its rosy cheek. She wiped away the tear, and turning to the eldest little girl, told her to take good care of her brothers, and to be a good child herself until she came back. The Merrow then went down to the strand. The sea was lying calm and smooth, just heaving and glittering in the sun, and she thought she heard a faint sweet singing, inviting her to come down. All her old ideas and feelings came flooding over her mind, Dick and her children were at the instant forgotten, and placing the cohuleen driuth on her head she plunged in.
Dick came home in the evening, and missing his wife he asked Kathleen, his little girl, what had become of her mother, but she could not tell him. He then inquired of the neighbours, and he learned that she was seen going towards the strand with a strange-looking thing like a cocked hat in her hand. He returned to his cabin to search for the cohuleen driuth. It was gone, and the truth now flashed upon him.
Year after year did Dick Fitzgerald wait expecting the return of his wife, but he never saw her more. Dick never married again, always thinking that the Merrow would sooner or later return to him, and nothing could ever persuade him but that her father the king kept her below by main force; 'for,' said Dick, 'she surely would not of herself give up her husband and her children.'
While she was with him she was so good a wife in every respect that to this day she is spoken of in the tradition of the country as the pattern for one, under the name of The Lady of Gollerus.
FOOTNOTES.
[5] Sea fairy.
Story DNA
Moral
null
Plot Summary
Lonely fisherman Dick Fitzgerald finds a Merrow (sea-fairy) on the shore and steals her magical cap, preventing her return to the sea. He convinces her to marry him, and they live a happy life, raising three children. Years later, the Merrow discovers her hidden cap, and a powerful longing for her underwater home overwhelms her. Despite her love for her human family, she returns to the sea, leaving Dick to mourn her loss and wait for her return, which never comes.
Themes
Emotional Arc
hope to contentment to sorrow
Writing Style
Narrative Elements
Cultural Context
The story reflects common Irish folklore themes of supernatural beings interacting with humans, often with bittersweet or tragic outcomes. The priest's role highlights the influence of the church in daily life.
Plot Beats (14)
- Dick Fitzgerald, a lonely fisherman, is smoking his pipe on the shore, wishing for a wife.
- He discovers a beautiful Merrow combing her sea-green hair and her magical cap (cohuleen driuth) nearby.
- Dick seizes the cap, knowing it will prevent her from returning to the sea.
- The Merrow cries, and Dick, pitying her, tries to comfort her, leading to a strange conversation where she asks if he will eat her.
- Dick, smitten, proposes marriage, and the Merrow agrees after sending a message to her father, the King of the Waves.
- Father Fitzgibbon initially refuses to marry them because she is a 'fish,' but changes his mind when Dick mentions her potential wealth.
- Dick and the Merrow marry and live happily for three years, having two boys and a girl; she is an excellent wife and mother.
- One day, while Dick is away, the Merrow finds her hidden cohuleen driuth behind a fishing net.
- Seeing the cap, she is overcome with longing for her family and life under the sea.
- She struggles with the decision, torn between her love for her children and Dick, and her desire to return home.
- She kisses her sleeping child, tells her eldest daughter to care for her brothers, and goes to the strand.
- Hearing a faint singing from the sea, she puts on her cap and plunges into the water, forgetting her human life.
- Dick returns, learns his wife went to the strand with a 'cocked hat,' finds the cap missing, and realizes she has returned to the sea.
- Dick waits for her return for the rest of his life, never remarrying, believing she is held captive by her father, but she never reappears.
Characters
Dick Fitzgerald
A man of average height and build, with a generally kind and somewhat melancholic expression. His face is likely weathered from outdoor life by the sea, with a typical Irish complexion.
Attire: Simple, practical clothing suitable for a fisherman or peasant in 19th-century rural Ireland. Likely a homespun linen shirt, wool trousers, and a waistcoat, possibly a rough wool jacket. Earthy, muted tones.
Wants: To find a wife and companionship, to have a complete family, and to achieve financial stability.
Flaw: His sentimentality and perhaps a touch of naivety, as well as his failure to secure the *cohuleen driuth* properly, leading to his wife's departure.
Transforms from a lonely bachelor to a happily married man and father, only to return to loneliness after his wife's departure, remaining eternally hopeful for her return.
Tender-hearted, lonely, pragmatic, somewhat naive, deeply loving, persistent.
The Merrow (Lady of Gollerus)
A beautiful young woman with a slender, graceful build. Her skin is described as 'as thin and as white as the skin between egg and shell,' suggesting a delicate, pale complexion. She has small webs between her fingers, like a duck's foot, a subtle but distinguishing feature.
Attire: When first encountered, she is likely nude or minimally clothed, as she is a sea creature. Once she becomes Mrs. Fitzgerald, she would wear simple, clean, and well-kept peasant dresses typical of 19th-century rural Ireland, perhaps in blues, greens, or creams, reflecting her origins but adapted to human life.
Wants: Initially, to regain her *cohuleen driuth* and return home. After marrying, to be a good wife and mother. Ultimately, her deep-seated longing for her sea family and home drives her actions.
Flaw: Her inability to fully sever ties with her sea-world, specifically her deep longing for her family and the ocean, which leads to her departure.
Transforms from a wild sea creature into a devoted human wife and mother, only to revert to her original nature due to an irresistible call from her home, leaving her human family behind.
Initially innocent and childlike, then adaptable, loving, diligent, and ultimately driven by an irresistible longing for her original home and family.
Father Fitzgibbon
A stern-looking man, likely of average build, dressed in clerical attire. His posture would convey authority and a certain rigidity.
Attire: Traditional 19th-century Irish Catholic priest's attire: a black cassock, possibly with a white Roman collar.
Wants: To uphold religious doctrine, but also to benefit financially when the opportunity arises.
Flaw: Greed and a willingness to compromise his principles for money.
Initially refuses to marry Dick and the Merrow based on religious grounds, but quickly changes his stance when offered financial incentive, showing a pragmatic and somewhat corruptible nature.
Initially rigid, dogmatic, prejudiced, but ultimately pragmatic and susceptible to bribery.
Locations
Shore of Smerwick Harbour
A rugged, windswept coastline along Smerwick Harbour in County Kerry, Ireland. The ground is a mix of sand and rocks, with a prominent, firm rock standing on the strand. The sea is dark but gradually turns green as the sun rises, with mists clearing from the valleys. The air is fresh and cool at dawn.
Mood: solitary, tranquil, mysterious, expectant
Dick Fitzgerald encounters the Merrow for the first time and seizes her cohuleen driuth.
Dick Fitzgerald's Cabin at Gollerus
A simple, cozy Irish cottage, likely with whitewashed stone walls, a thatched roof, and a small, functional interior. The main room would contain a hearth, basic wooden furniture, and fishing tackle. There's a hidden nook or hole in the wall behind a fishing net.
Mood: humble, domestic, initially content, later sorrowful
The Merrow discovers her cohuleen driuth hidden behind a fishing net, leading to her departure.