Editor’s Note: O’Donoghue was one of a number of Irish lords who were said to have gone and joined the fairies under the lakes of southern Ireland: in his case Lough Leane near Killarney. The best parallel is perhaps with King Arthur sleeping under the mountain as these lords are often said to be accompanied by knights. This account comes from the boatsman, one Edward Doolin.

Ten years ago [c. 1815] we went out about seven o’clock in the morning to make a long day on the lakes; the water was calm and the sun was shining bright and it was just nine o’clock when we saw O’Donoghue going from the ‘half-moon’ of Toomies round Rabbit Island. He was dressed in white with & cocked-hat and shoes with great buckles in them, and he walked very smart on the water spattering it up before him; James Curtin, who pulled the bow oar, saw him too, for as good as seven minutes, and he is alive and able to speak the truth as well as myself. We had two gentlemen in the boat at the time. One of them was a counsellor Moore from Dublin, and they made great wonder at the sight O’Donoghuje, when he finds poor travellers benighted who are coming for Killarney, takes them down into his palace below the lake, where he entertains them grandly without their paying any cost. The white horse that he sometimes tides, and whose image is in a rock upon the lake, is called Crebough. Crofton-Croker, II,