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Irish folklore....

There was once a mischivious man named Jack. He pulled pranks on anybody at any time. One day the devil saw this man pulling pranks, and decided he liked him, and wanted to have a drink with Jack.

While they were drinking, Jack tells the devil that he does not have enough money to pay for their drinks, and convinces him to turn into a golden coin, so that he may pay. The devil does so, and Jack quickly grabs the devil and puts him into his pocket next to a silver cross.

Since the silver cross weekened the devil, he could not turn back into himself. For seven years Jack carried the devil in his pocket, untill one day Jack told the devil he will let him out, but only if he promises to never take him into Hell, and not bother Jack for ten years. The devil agrees, and is released.

Ten years later the devil comes back to Jack and wants to play a card game. Jack agrees and they start playing cards under a tall tree. Jack tells the devil that he doesn''''t have the full deck of cards, and that the rest of the cards are stuck in the tree. The devil climbs up to the top of the tree to get the cards, but Mischivious Jack carved a Cross into the tree, so that the devil may not come down.

After quarreling untill nightfall, Jack tells the devil that he will let him down, if the devil promises to never bother him again. The devil agrees, and Jack puts an X through the cross and lets the devil down. When Jack turned around to walk away, the devil cut his head off. Since God saw his mischivous acts, he would not allow Jack into Heaven, and the devil had a deal to never let Jack into Hell. The devil gave Jack a peice of cuccumber to use as a lantern(Which after the myth spread to Native Americans, changed to a pumpkin) to light his dark and lonely path on earth, for all eternity.

That''''s the story of Jack O'''' Lantern, and old Irish tale. The reason the cuccumber changes to pumpkins in North America, is because Native Americans used pumpkins for almost everything. They would use it''''s hard skins for food, carpeting, pie crusts, clothing, and lots more. They would use the insides of the pumpkins for food, and it wasn''''t untill the Europeans arrived in America that they used the insides of the pumpkins for pie. Native Americans would eat the seads, and plants seeds themselves to grow more pumpkins. When the story of Jack O'''' Lantern arrived in America, Native Americans didn''''t have that many cuccumbers, so instead they would use pumpkins, which is what later infulened the idea of putting pumpkisn on your lawn, not to scare evil spirits away, but to help light Jack''''s dark path, with his lonely single burning coal in his lonely lantern....

Your head looks like a cucumber too....

Really now.

I heard a diffrent but simmilar story about Jack, It was rather disturbing...