daughter, Rosemary. She made severalappearances with her father in concertsand on television. Perhaps it was herclose association with talented artistesin the top echelon that gave her afeeling of being overshadowed in thetraditional scene and caused her to seeka career in a more creative <strong>for</strong>m of art.It was towards this end that she joinedthe Grafton Academy in Dublin tostudy dress designing and graduatedwith honours.When Hugh and his wife, May, returnedto Donegal in 1964 he irrunediatelylaunched himself into the revival of tra- .ditional music, then initiated by <strong>Comhaltas</strong>Ceolt6iri. He joined the CrossroadsBranch and was elected chairman.One of his ftrst acts was to take a youngmusician, Frank Kelly, under his wing.History was repeating itself. His protegewent on to become All-Ireland. champion.Hugh has spent a lifetime promotingtraditional music, fostering a love of aculture that bonds exiles together inevery country in the world. Today, atthe venerable age of eighty he is still,thankfully, very much to the <strong>for</strong>e.BOGBUTIEREamonn b hArgainHaving spent some time working Inthe bog in Lixnaw during the year, itbrought to mind the various fmdingsthat were made and more than likely arestill being made in the bogs that are soplentiful around this country of ours.But I suppose one rarely fmds anythingstranger than a substance which isknown as "bog butter".While we cannot claim it as altogetherof Milesian origin, it is to a certainextent "ours" as the preponderatingnumber of fmds recorded are obtainedin this country. The National Museumin Dublin showed me a fme specimen ofthis ancient butter which was discoveredduring the past century by people engagedin turf-cutting. The bog butterwas dug out of banks that appearedcomposed of firm bog from considerabledepths beneath the present surfaceof the ground, such as ten, ftfteen oreven eighteen feet deep.Needless to say, this practice has passedinto oblivion and cannot be rememberedeven by the people of two generationsago. It is interesting that such acustom was~ alSo carried cmf in placeslike Scotland and Iceland. The Icelandiccustom may date from those ageswhen Irish missionary priests and wanderinglaymen kept in close contact betweenboth countries; they were regularlyexchanging ideas and no doubt discussedtheir ideas on butter and butterpreservation.The custom of burying butter in bogsis of considerable interest, though it hasnever received the study that the questionsraised deserve. The two main problemsassociated with "bog-butter" arethose of dating and origin. Interestinglyenough, the main belt of fmds lies aiongthe bogs of the south-ern midlands, witha secondary group in the west. Onlycomparatively few fmds have beenreported from the north and none fromDonegal. The period of origin of the. custom is so far u.nknown but the know-ledge of butter-making must go back along way. in man's economy; or it maybe assumed that the making of cheesewas also known at an early period. Asa reason <strong>for</strong> the practice, varioustheories may be suggested, namely thatit was buried <strong>for</strong> preservation until theannual periods of shortage, in otherwords, that it was the· old equivalent ofmodern cold stora'ge . It may have beenburied in order to acquire a taste, or itmay have been' an offering, possibly to"Goibniu", the patron saint of "buttermaking".The idea that butter wasburied to acquire a taste, is a goodone. When the butter was made it hada garlic taste which :was caused by thewild garlic which was eaten by the cattle.Burying it in the bog gave it a sweettaste.As late as this century, the practiceof throwing butter into a lake in thanksgiving<strong>for</strong> healing the cows or horses arestill being done in parts of the country,so the idea that the custom had a semireligioussigniftcanceis also woirqlooking at.We will never know when the custombegan, unless someone fmds a specimenwith a date on it. One fmd had such adate. The fmd was made in TirnakillBog, in County Galway, and it wasdated 1798, and another finding wasdated 1680.The speciments of Irish bog buttercan be divided into two differentclasses, dependent on the manner inwhich it was packed by its owners. Onevariety is contained in hollow vessels ofwood, while the second variety is madeup into various- shaped masses of12irregular <strong>for</strong>m. These are usu<strong>all</strong>y surroundedby a layer of moss and sometimeswith linen cloth. They usu<strong>all</strong>ymeasure 15 inches in length and 10inches in breadth and height, while thelatter might weigh 30 lbs to 40 lbs.Of course , the methods of buttermakingwere much different in thosedays. It was a woman'sjob to make thebutter and they used a bag made fromthe skin of a cow. This bag, which Ihave failed to fmd a name <strong>for</strong>, was sewntogether and the milk was then pouredin. It was then kneaded, shaken andtossed around until the liquid becamesolid. After being put into the ferkinsor casks, it was boiled and only thenwas it ready <strong>for</strong> insertion into the bog.When it was taken from the bog in sixmonths to a year or whenever it was required<strong>for</strong> eating, it was cut into bricklikeshapes with two wooden spatulas.The spatUlas had the seal of a cross onthem to vanish any unwanted spiritsthat might have possessed the butterduring its term in the bog. People usedto believe in those times that the evilspirits used to take the goodness fromthe butter and the crosses in the spatulaswas a kind of protection from them.This pise6g goes back to the fourteenthcentury and a prayer was often said tothe a<strong>for</strong>ementioned "Goibniu", whdwas said to be the patron saint ofbutter-making.In the library of the Royal IrishAcademy in Dublin, there is a paper bythe late Sir William Wilde. In it, hementions that Sir William Petty, in hisenumeration of different articles offood used by the Irish, describes"Butter made rancid by keeping inbogs" and refers also to the " IrishH~dibras" where we read of "Butter toeat with their hog, was seven yearsburied in a bog".
THE GILLESPIE LEGENDJ oe McGarrigleIf Hugh Gillespie's fiddle playing is out of this world it could well be because heheard fairy music when he was a young boy tending sheep on his uncle's farm in aremote countryside near Brockagh. "I could hear the most beautiful fiddlingcoming from a wee knowe and I listened spellbound. Then I crawled over to seewho was playing and there was nobody there", he told me. When Hugh ran homeand told his uncle of his experience he was told "it was the fairies you heard andyou have been touched by it" . Well whatever the source of Hugh's great talent hecertainly has the power to hold an audience spellbound when he per<strong>for</strong>ms.Perhaps per<strong>for</strong>m is not the rightword to use in this context <strong>for</strong> HughGillespie when he is playing is tot<strong>all</strong>yunaware of those around him; he iscompletely engulfed in a world wherehis music is an expression of his culture,his sensitivity, his absolute involvement ·with an inborn tradition. It must havebeen these qualities that attracted thegreat Michael Coleman to him early intheir acquaintance and made him decideto take Hugh under his wing.Hugh Gillespie was born in Drennanin B<strong>all</strong>ybofey, 80 years ago . When hewas only three years old he was takenon an outing to see his grandfather,Hugh McElwee who lived in Brockagh.That visit was to be a long one <strong>for</strong> Hugh<strong>for</strong> he was to stay there, go to school inthe district, and live with his grandfatheruntil he emigrated to the Statesalmost twenty years later. He got hisfust lesson on the fiddle when he wasonly seven years old "my cousin EddieMcMonagle who was working in Scotlandbrought home a fiddle with himwhen he came on holidays and it wasmy plaything from that moment".He obviously treated it as more thanjust a plaything <strong>for</strong> in a short time hewas actu<strong>all</strong>y playing <strong>for</strong> dancers incountry house "big nights". "I mustadmit that I only had two or three tunesand I kept playing these <strong>all</strong> night" . Ijust changed the tempo to suit thedance", he explained.In his early years life was uneventfulin the remote mountain area in whichhe lived : Sheep farming, attendingfairs, and following the usual pattern ofrural life in those days. His fringe involvementwith politics while he wasstill at school was perhaps the onlybreak in this pattern. Being c<strong>all</strong>ed onto deliver important messages to "boys"on the run gave him an importance thathis other schoolmates did not enjoy,and there was a certain spice of adventurein it too. When he grew older hebecame much more involved in the fight<strong>for</strong> independence when he became amember of the I.R.A.He rec<strong>all</strong>s with some humour anoccasion when he was delivering arms toa local unit and he had to pass througha village where there was often a spotcheckby the Tans ~ He sought the helpof a local fish pedlar and they loadedthe arms ID boxes and placed a layer offish over them. They then wentthrough the village c<strong>all</strong>ing out "FreshFish" , presumably offering their wares<strong>for</strong> sale. In this way they were able topass the road block because the fishdealer was a well known character.In 1928 Hugh set sail <strong>for</strong> America.He sailed on the Athenia from Moville.HUGH GILLESPIE as he looked when he wasentertaining in the U.S.A.On board he met a man from Derry whohad been a member of a flying columnand often stayed in Hugh's area. Theybecame companions on the trip. Whenthe ship put into Hailfax to take on suppliesHugh and his travelling companiondecided to slip ashore <strong>for</strong> a drink. Theyslipped over the side on a rope ladderdown to the quayside. When they madeenquiries as to the nearest saloon theywere directed to a sheebeen. The drinkwas cheap and the crack was good andso time slipped by. It was several hourslater when they returned to the ship.They found that it was much easier toget off the ship undetected than getaboard again. They were refused permissionto board and it was only aftermuch haggling and pleading that theywere eventu<strong>all</strong>y <strong>all</strong>owed to embark.Hugh's arrival in the States coincidedwith the approach of what was to be thecountry's greatest ever economic upheaval.In a matter of months wouldcome the W<strong>all</strong> Street crash that broughtfinancial empires crumbling down andthrew millions onto the breadline. Despitethis Hugh with the help of rela-10