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MAGUS

41 saw the suggestion of one tiny being, the rest having perchance gone off on dew-drops, pressed into their service, to their dwelling in the caves whose entrance overlooks the town. There was evidently something wrong. The house was haunted and the people about were indebted entirely to their numbers for keeping each other in countenance and courage. At the supreme moment, up came the good man of the house and his fugitive little daughter who had gone to meet him. The door was timidly opened for he thought there was surely something in all the stir. Imagine the disgust of the expectant crowd when a doll turned out to be a prolific fairy. It was handsomely dressed in green having been presented on St. Patrick’s Day, to the little girl. Still, there is always some water where the stirk is drowned and it is clear there must be something wrong with house – at least such is the opinion of the more credulous of the recently affrighted neighbours who are not likely soon to forget this fairy tale of fact. Changelings-murder [Back to Contents] Belfast Newsletter, 11 August, 1840 County of Armagh Assizes: Murder of a Child by his Father. John Blakely was arraigned for the murder of his son, Felix Blakely, a child of 6 or 7 years, at Armagh on the 1st of March by strangulation with his hands and other violence. The prisoner pleaded not guilty. The prisoner, being too poor to engage professional assistance, his Lordship assigned Mr Blacker as his Counsel. Ann Finlay deposed – ‘I know John Blakely and knew a woman named Mary Turley. She and prisoner lived together but she is now died. They had four or five children – one of them was named Felix; he was youngest but one. Mary Turley died in confinement of the second child after Felix. Only one of children is now alive – a little girl. I did not see Felix for two months before he was found dead. Before his death he and his father lived for a fortnight in William Rainey’s, Armagh. I sent the child home to his father at Rainey’s a fortnight before he (the father) said he took him to a lodging in the country. I sent the child home on a Sunday and saw it alive for the last time on the following Tuesday, at Rainey’s. The child had had the small-pox and afterwards a bowel complaint before I sent him away – he had not the recovered. He lost the sight of one of his eyes in the small-pox. On the right foot, the second toe decayed from the same disease. After the child’s death I saw his body in Armagh infirmary. After I heard the child was dead I went to prisoner, At James Mulholland’s, where he was working. I inquired of it was the dead body of Felix that had been brought in? He made no answer for about five or ten minutes. He then said “what could he do with it? (The

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