The Walking Coffin

A good many years ago, a man who lived near Shanahoe was coming home from the fair. He had a good deal of drink taken. His way lay past an old ruined, roofless house in which no one had lived since the Famine. When he passed, he was surprised to see lights in the windows, and coming out of the door he saw two men carrying a coffin between them.

He went home, and with the thought of what he had seen the drink died in him, and he took a weakness and died. All the neighbours came to the wake, and there was much talk about the cause of his death. At last the brother got up and put on his hat. He walked down the road to the old ruined house, and three times he cried aloud to whoever would be in it to come out to him, and at the third shout the coffin came out out him, standing up.