School: Cnoc na Manach, An Mhainistir Bhán, Cionn tSáile (roll number 1391)
- Location:
- Knocknamanagh, Co. Cork
- Teacher: Dáithí de Barra
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The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0321, Page 098
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- (continued from previous page)pretended to do likewise and allowed Johnny lift the whole heap of straw. This went on all day till dinner time but poor Johnny never knew they were letting him do all the work. At dinner he said "poor Johnny must be getting weak as he is sweating very hard". That evening these two mean fellows got a good thrashing from the other workmen for wronging Johnny.
He was a great singer and always sang a song about himself. He sometimes sat on a tomb in Tracton graveyard or on a lonely fence and sang this song.
The farmers allowed him sleep in the barn or outhouse but he always asked them to leave the door of this house open as he feared he may get a start in the middle of the night and begin running around the fields.
When he was dying he sang the last line of his song
"Bold Johnny Maher lies cold in his grave"
He then died and was buried at Carrigaline.
This song is as follows:
I
My name is John Maher I'm a man that loves pleasure
'Tis two dozen years since I first saw the light
And like Samson I'm strong and of real Irish measure,
I'm fully six feet and two inches in height.
II
When I came to my teens the Almighty thought proper
To show His example and power of man(continues on next page)- Collector
- Nora Barry
- Gender
- Female
- Address
- Tubbrid, Co. Cork
- Informant
- Cornelius O Reilly
- Gender
- Male
- Address
- Britfieldstown, Co. Cork
- Informant
- Patrick O Keefe
- Gender
- Male
- Age
- 68
- Address
- Granig, Co. Cork