​P. 56, 76, 88, 97, 128
There were many dances. Sometimes in one evening there would be 3 or 4 on the Darkeytown Rd. & several on the Sloptown Rd.. Almost every family had a fiddler. One family, that of Big Dominic, had three in one family, & the mother "was a great one to dance a jig." The dances were square-dances & jigs & waltzes. Big Sal Dunlevy (Yankee Jim's wife), although she was a great big woman, was a notable dancer. Maria says she can still see Big Sal & Paddy Rua dancing the Highland Fling. It was their specialty, no one else could do it.
It was at the dances that the women did the "lilting." (Mel Big Owen also spoke of the women doing it at their work.) Both Maria & Mel spoke particularly of Rae Gilden's mother as the finest "lilter." She was Catherine O'Donnell, called "Ketcheline Og." She was a small, dark woman with a beautiful voice. Like many, she could neither read nor write. She was from Aranmore, but was not related to any other O'Donnells on the Island (this is from Maria; Lawrence agree that he never heard of her being related to anyone on the Island, & he isn't even sure her name was O'Donnell). She was one of those reputed to be "the heir of the O'Donnell castle in Donegal." When the fiddlers took a rest she would get up and begin her lilting. It was wordless, with a la-de-da effect, or else a string of extemporaneous words. Everyone speaks of her beautiful voice, clear & perfect. She could do this in any musical time, waltz, etc..., & would keep it up for an hour or an hour-&-a-half at a time. It was every bit as good to dance to as the music of the fiddlers. Nonie says Ketcheline Og was a cousin of Barney O'Donnell's. They hid him in her root house when the sheriff came to arrest him.