"It is from a hidden reptile," he answered.
"And what groan is that?" asked Fioneen of the third pupil.
"It is from a poisoned seed," he answered.
Then Fioneen set to work, and having cauterized the wounds with red
hot irons, the poisonous bodies were extracted from beneath the skin, and
the chief was healed.
In later times the Irish physicians were much celebrated for their
learning, and numerous Irish medical manuscripts are in existence, both in
Ireland and England, and are also scattered through the public libraries of
the continent. They are chiefly written in Latin, with a commentary in Irish,
and show a thorough knowledge on the part of the writers of the works of
Hippocrates, Galen, Aristotle, and others as celebrated. For after the
introduction of Christianity Latin was much cultivated in the Irish schools,
and the priests and physicians not only wrote, but could converse fluently
in Latin, which language became the chief medium of communication
between them and the learned men of the continent. But the most ancient
mode of procedure amongst the Irish ollamhs and adepts was of a medico-
religious character; consisting of herb cures, fairy cures, charms,
invocations, and certain magical ceremonies. A number of these cures have
been preserved traditionally by the people, and form a very interesting
study of early medical superstitions, as they have been handed down
through successive generations; for the profession of a physician was
hereditary in certain families, and the accumulated lore of centuries was
transmitted carefully from father to son by this custom and usage.
* * *Many of the ancient cures and charms are strange and mystic, and were
accompanied by singular mysterious forms, which no doubt in many cases
aided the cure; especially amongst a people so imaginative and susceptible
to spiritual influences as the Irish. Others show a fervent faith and have a
pathetic simplicity of expression, such as we find in "The Charm against
Sorrow," and others, from the original Irish, of equal pathos and tenderness,
to be quoted further on. The utterance evidently of a people of deep, almost
sublime, faith in the Divine power of the Ruler of the world, and of the ever-
present ministration of saints and angels to humanity.
Every act of the Irish peasant's life has always been connected with this
belief in unseen spiritual agencies. The people live in an atmosphere of the
supernatural, and nothing would induce them to slight an ancient form or
break through a traditional usage. They believe that the result would be
something awful; too terrible to be spoken of save in a whisper, should the
customs of their forefathers be lightly interfered with.
In the Western Islands especially, the old superstitions that have come
down from the ancient times are observed with this most solemn reverence,