Margaret Barry and a Bicycle
From the telling of Matthew Edwards
One evening on the Dublin Underground Railway Margaret Barry boarded the train at Tone
Station with her banjo, and began busking in the writer's and artist's carriage. She
sang her version of Galway Bay:
"She could drink her sixty pints of Irish Guinness
And stagger from the pub and never sway.
If the sea was beer instead of salty water,
She would live and swim and die in Galway Bay."
Then she accompanied the two Behan boys, Brendan and Dominic, while they sang
The Twang Man. This was followed by an earnest discussion of the meaning
of "billy-in-the-bowl", which only ended when two Gardaí entered the carriage,
pushing three bicycles in front of them.
"Oi, where's the third policeman then?" called out little Dominic, and back at the
bar a very intoxicated Flann O'Brien fumbled for his ticket to jot down a new idea.
One of the Gardaí spoke to Margaret Barry, and was pointing out to her that the
Regulations of the Railway specifically prohibited the public performance of music
and other conduct noxious to the national decency. He was interrupted by Seamus
Ennis who had been sitting in a corner of the carriage with a notebook in his hand,
while his other hand explored the charms of a young maiden from Bantry who had
asked him about traditional customs.
"Its all right, officer," said Seamus, "I'm collecting material here for the Irish
Folklore Commission, and Miss Barry and the boys here are giving me some songs
for the national treasury."
The Garda muttered something to the effect that he was damned if the Twang
Man was any sort of national treasure, but sensing that the mood of the crowd was
against him, he decided to withdraw.
Margaret struck up again with The Blarney Stone:
"It was on the road to Bandon
One morning in July..."
when, piiiing!, suddenly one of her banjo strings snapped. Nobody had any spare
wire, and it seemed that the performance was over. However little Dominic ran
across to the spare bicycle, and with his penknife cut off a length of brake cable,
which he handed to Margaret. She fitted it neatly to her instrument, tuned it, and
then charmed the whole of the carriage, including the Gardaí, by singing
A Bicycle Made For Two.
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