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Updated: May 31, 2025
It rained pretty steadily during the time I was in Belturbet, and the principal trading to be seen from my window was the sale of heather besoms. A woman and a young girl, barefooted and bareheaded, arrived at the corner with an ass-load of this merchandise. They were sold at one half-penny each.
There were a great many Indians lying by the door-steps, having disposed of their baskets, besoms, and raspberries, by the sale of which they make a scanty livelihood. The men, with their jet-black hair, rich complexions, and dark liquid brown eyes, were almost invariably handsome; and the women, whose beauty departs before they are twenty, were something in the "Meg Merrilies" style.
Certainly witches are constantly thought to ride through the air on broomsticks or other equally convenient vehicles; and if they do so, how can you get at them so effectually as by hurling lighted missiles, whether discs, torches, or besoms, after them as they flit past overhead in the gloom?
We have the same fathers who, before hard times came, were proud men, who would have thought 'beggar' the most opprobrious epithet you could have hit them with; but who now are made humble by the sight of wife and children almost starving, and who go before 'relief committees, and submit to be questioned about their wants with a patience and humility which it is painful, almost schocking, to witness, And some others of these fathers turn out in the morning with long besoms as street-sweepers, while others again go to breaking stones in the town's yard or open road-side, where they are unprotected from the keen east winds, which add a little more to the burden of misery which they have to bear just now.
In Bohemia they say that the corn will grow as high as they fling the blazing besoms into the air. Nor are such notions confined to Europe. In Corea, a few days before the New Year festival, the eunuchs of the palace swing burning torches, chanting invocations the while, and this is supposed to ensure bountiful crops for the next season.
"I'm sure when I heard they'd been forbid I felt as glad as if anybody had gied me sixpence," said an earnest voice that of Olly Dowden, a woman who lived by making heath brooms, or besoms. Her nature was to be civil to enemies as well as to friends, and grateful to all the world for letting her remain alive. "And now the maid have married him just the same," said Humphrey.
Then he said in her ear, "But kisses and sweet words would make me willing to save you." Morag, in a voice raised, called him by that evil name that he was known by to the servants and their gossips. But the servants, hearing that name said in the hearing of Breas, pretended to be scandalized. They went to Morag and struck her with the besoms they had for sweeping the floor.
He went out of the orchard disconsolate, thinking that when he was on his seven years' service with Mogue Princess Flame-of-Wine might forget him. As he walked on he passed the little house where the Spae-Woman had her besoms and heather-stalks. She ran to him when she saw him. "Have you heard that the King's Son has found what went before, and what comes after the Unique Tale?" said she.
In Bohemia they say that the corn will grow as high as they fling the blazing besoms into the air. Nor are such notions confined to Europe. In Corea, a few days before the New Year festival, the eunuchs of the palace swing burning torches, chanting invocations the while, and this is supposed to ensure bountiful crops for the next season.
The woman laughed aloud when she perceived the sledge. "What! do even the clergy ride on besoms nowadays?" she cried, with rough pleasantry, while a couple of serving-men, whose shirt-sleeves were tucked up to their elbows, drew the bridge up again behind the in-gliding sledge and then shut the groaning door.
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