Irony of the end
At the end, Joseph decides to make a final sacrifice to the moss-covered stone in the pine groove. His entire land is dead and he and his horse are the only living things left. The little stream near the stone has died as well, there is no more water coming from it to keep the moss on the stone alive. Joseph gets on top of the stone and cuts his veins to bleed out over the moss. As he is dying, rain starts dripping over him and he realizes that this is what he had to do all along, the he is the land. On the other side of the valley of Our Lady, Father Angelo has finished his prayer for the rain to fall and feels satisfied when it does start to fall. Ironically, Father Angelo thinks how Joseph Wayne must be very happy at the moment and with that the novel ends.
Irony of Elizabeth's death
While being in her pregnant state, Elizabeth gets drawn to the pine trees where the moss-covered stone is located. The reason she is drawn is because they remind her of home. She finds the path to the moss-covered stone and is struck by the beauty of the place. The place at first feels comforting but suddenly darkness gathers and the place and the stone start to look ominous and threatening. Terrified, Elizabeth runs away from the place and after she calms down concludes she felt that way because of her state. After birth and recovery from it, Elizabeth tells Joseph that she wants to go back to that place because she keeps having dreams about it and is determined that if she goes and convinces herself that she only imagined the place to be threatening she will stop thinking about it. Ironically, it is the place of her last breath; place of her death.
Benjy's irony
Benjy is described by bringing happiness and pain to everyone who knew him. He is a man who lied, stole, cheated, broke everyone's trust and imposed upon kindness. Ironically, Benjy is the man who was loved the most by everyone and everyone made excuses for him and guarded him. Benjy's cheating and lying nature brought him to his death and no one was really surprised by it.
