Crossword-Solution: KEENERS 7 letters, 4 clues 🏆 scrabble score: 11

Now he was a gossip of mine; so hearing the cry of the keeners I went in to condole with him on his loss and found him in very ill plight, full of trouble and weary of soul and mind.

Sometimes corpses are waked in a bed, with their faces visible; when that is the case, white sheets, crosses, and sometimes flowers, are pinned up about the bed, except in the front; but when they're undher boord, a set of ould women sit smoking, and rocking themselves from side to side, quite sorrowful--these are keeners--friends or relations; and when every one connected with the dead comes in, they raise the keene, like a song of sorrow, wailing and clapping their hands.

When the widow's exclamations had ceased, or rather were lost in the loud cry of sorrow which were uttered by the keeners and friends of the deceased--they, too, standing somewhat apart from the rest, joined in it bitterly; and the solitary wail of Mrs.

The tossing boughs beyond the window, rain-spattered and somber, took on eerily the outline of dark-cloaked women keeners rocking and chanting the music of death.

The men might join in the chorus of woe if they wished, but the main part of the song was always given by the women, who were not unlike the "Keeners," heard in Ireland on similar occasions, even down to recent times.