In aice oilean deimhin les an clairseach gan fuaim ag eitilt leis na paidreacha a duirt na daoine bochta.

Down by the river at the turn where it is really deep wide and slow moving in the spot where a feasach chriticiull was reported to have taken place some centuries ago, at the same time as the Lisbon Earthquake. It was about noon on all souls morning in the year of seventeen fifty five some of the local women were down by the Fergus washing the heavy clothes as it was a grand fine day and there would be good drying. Having the heavy clothes cleaned and cleared before the real cold of winter settled in was an annual ritual and the women liked the old custom where they could gather and chat without the hindrance or any form of supervision from the menfolk.Well they were beating out the clothes and scrubbing them on the multitude of flagstones that were specially there in the town’s washing area and gossiping in general about the happenings on Oiche Samhain where everyone with a bit of spirit had a deoch or two more than usual for the celebration .They were chuckling away in their devilment when they felt a trembling in the water which started to bubble and these were enormous bubbles and sometimes black evil smelling sulphurous smoke would puff from below the water from the deep part of the river .A grumbling rumbling sound the lowest bass sound that the oldest of the women had ever heard or herd of in their time was thumping out rhythmaticlly. Now the workhouse was on the other side of the river and strange things were happening there too .The parish priest had to call in the bishop to witness the dance of the deaf mutes who were uncontrollable ,there were nine deaf mutes men and women naked in a circle clapping their hands in unison ,laughing in the deepest guttural growls pointing at the wardens waving them away as insignificant house flies while their merriment was obviously uniquely felt and exclusively experienced by the deaf and simultaneously by the otters on the riverbank who they said howled like wolves in unison to the beat and guffaws of the dancing mutes. The otters were a mixed lot wolverines and gluttons they may have been , they were howling while encircled by a triple ring of swans with outstretched wings hissing outbreath sounds again in unison with the guffaw sounds of the dancing mutes . A powerful and significant spectacle it surely was with nine naked deaf and dumb mutes eighteen howling otters and twenty seven swans in three concentric circles all in a cacophony connection openly belittling the pitiful power of the petrified bishop who remained silent and gobsmacked for over a week they say.** TOMMY**