Research source

I am still near, Watching the smiles I prized on earth, Your converse mild, your blameless mirth.[64

Date of account: Late nineteenth-century compilation
Source: The Ghost World
Reference: The Ghost World · selected passage 94
Rights: public_domain
Language: English
Record updated: 2026-08-24

Record summary

Lady Wilde[157] has given a laughable specimen of the headless ghost as believed in by the Irish peasantry

Published source text

Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.

Source passage

Source text · mention only

Lady Wilde[157] has given a laughable specimen of the headless ghost as believed in by the Irish peasantry. One Denis Molony, a cow-jobber, was on his way to the great fair at Navan when he was overtaken by night. He laid down under a hedge, but 'at that moment a loud moaning and screaming came to his ear, and a woman rushed past him all in white, as if a winding sheet were round her, and her cries of despair were terrible to hear. Then, after her, a great black coach came thundering along the road, drawn by two black horses. But when Denis looked close at them he saw that the horses had no heads, and the coachman had no head; and out sprang two men from the coach, and they had no heads either; and they seized the woman and carried her by force into the carriage and drove off.'

Historical context

Contextual commentary · mention only

This material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.

Modern context

Contextual commentary · mention only

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