CHAPTER XI
He had received all that he could get from Finegas. His education was finished and the time had come to test it, and to try all else that he had of mind and body. He bade farewell to the gentle poet, and set out for Tara of the Kings.
It was Samhain-tide, and the feast of Tara was being held, at which all that was wise or skilful or well-born in Ireland were gathered together.
This is how Tara was when Tara was. There was the High King’s palace with its fortification; without it was another fortification enclosing the four minor palaces, each of which was maintained by one of the four provincial kings; without that again was the great banqueting hall, and around it and enclosing all of the sacred hill in its gigantic bound ran the main outer ramparts of Tara. From it, the centre of Ireland, four great roads went, north, south, east, and west, and along these roads, from the top and the bottom and the two sides of Ireland, there moved for weeks before Samhain an endless stream of passengers.
Here a gay band went carrying rich treasure to decorate the pavilion of a Munster lord. On another road a vat of seasoned yew, monstrous as a house on wheels and drawn by an hundred laborious oxen, came bumping and joggling the ale that thirsty Connaught princes would drink. On a road again the learned men of Leinster, each with an idea in his head that would discomfit a northern ollav and make a southern one gape and fidget, would be marching solemnly, each by a horse that was piled high on the back and widely at the sides with clean-peeled willow or oaken wands, that were carved from the top to the bottom with the ogham signs; the first lines of poems (for it was an offence against wisdom to commit more than initial lines to writing), the names and dates of kings, the procession of laws of Tara and of the sub-kingdoms, the names of places and their meanings. On the brown stallion ambling peacefully yonder there might go the warring of the gods for two or ten thousand years; this mare with the dainty pace and the vicious eye might be sidling under a load of oaken odes in honour of her owner’s family, with a few bundles of tales of wonder added in case they might be useful; and perhaps the restive piebald was backing the history of Ireland into a ditch.
On such a journey all people spoke together, for all were friends, and no person regarded the weapon in another man’s hand other than as an implement to poke a reluctant cow with, or to pacify with loud wallops some hoof-proud colt.
Into this teem and profusion of jolly humanity Fionn slipped, and if his mood had been as bellicose as a wounded boar he would yet have found no man to quarrel with, and if his eye had been as sharp as a jealous husband’s he would have found no eye to meet it with calculation or menace or fear; for the Peace of Ireland was in being, and for six weeks man was neighbour to man, and the nation was the guest of the High King. Fionn went in with the notables.
His arrival had been timed for the opening day and the great feast of welcome. He may have marvelled, looking on the bright city, with its pillars of gleaming bronze and the roofs that were painted in many colours, so that each house seemed to be covered by the spreading wings of some gigantic and gorgeous bird. And the palaces themselves, mellow with red oak, polished within and without by the wear and the care of a thousand years, and carved with the patient skill of unending generations of the most famous artists of the most artistic country of the western world, would have given him much to marvel at also. It must have seemed like a city of dream, a city to catch the heart, when, coming over the great plain, Fionn saw Tara of the Kings held on its hill as in a hand to gather all the gold of the falling sun, and to restore a brightness as mellow and tender as that universal largess.
In the great banqueting hall everything was in order for the feast. The nobles of Ireland with their winsome consorts, the learned and artistic professions represented by the pick of their time were in place. The Ard-Ri, Corm of the Hundred Battles, had taken his place on the raised dais which commanded the whole of that vast hall. At his Right hand his son Art, to be afterwards as famous as his famous father, took his seat, and on his left Goll mor mac Morna, chief of the Fianna of Ireland, had the seat of honour. As the High King took his place he could see every person who was noted in the land for any reason. He would know every one who was present, for the fame of all men is sealed at Tara, and behind his chair a herald stood to tell anything the king might not know or had forgotten.
Conn gave the signal and his guests seated themselves.
The time had come for the squires to take their stations behind their masters and mistresses. But, for the moment, the great room was seated, and the doors were held to allow a moment of respect to pass before the servers and squires came in.
Looking over his guests, Conn observed that a young man was yet standing.
“There is a gentleman,” he murmured, “for whom no seat has been found.”
We may be sure that the Master of the Banquet blushed at that.
“And,” the king continued, “I do not seem to know the young man.”
Nor did his herald, nor did the unfortunate Master, nor did anybody; for the eyes of all were now turned where the king’s went.
“Give me my horn,” said the gracious monarch.
The horn of state was put to his hand.
“Young gentleman,” he called to the stranger, “I wish to drink to your health and to welcome you to Tara.”
The young man came forward then, greater-shouldered than any mighty man of that gathering, longer and cleaner limbed, with his fair curls dancing about his beardless face. The king put the great horn into his hand.
“Tell me your name,” he commanded gently.
“I am Fionn, the son of Uail, the son of Baiscne,” said the youth.
And at that saying a touch as of lightning went through the gathering so that each person quivered, and the son of the great, murdered captain looked by the king’s shoulder into the twinkling eye of Goll. But no word was uttered, no movement made except the movement and the utterance of the Ard-Ri’.
“You are the son of a friend,” said the great-hearted monarch. “You shall have the seat of a friend.”
He placed Fionn at the right hand of his own son Art.
CHAPTER XII
It is to be known that on the night of the Feast of Samhain the doors separating this world and the next one are opened, and the inhabitants of either world can leave their respective spheres and appear in the world of the other beings.
Now there was a grandson to the Dagda Mor, the Lord of the Underworld, and he was named Aillen mac Midna, out of Shi’ Finnachy, and this Aillen bore an implacable enmity to Tara and the Ard-Ri’.
As well as being monarch of Ireland her High King was chief of the people learned in magic, and it is possible that at some time Conn had adventured into Tir na n-Og, the Land of the Young, and had done some deed or misdeed in Aillen’s lordship or in his family. It must have been an ill deed in truth, for it was in a very rage of revenge that Aillen came yearly at the permitted time to ravage Tara.
Nine times he had come on this mission of revenge, but it is not to be supposed that he could actually destroy the holy city: the Ard-Ri’ and magicians could prevent that, but he could yet do a damage so considerable that it was worth Conn’s while to take special extra precautions against him, including the precaution of chance.
Therefore, when the feast was over and the banquet had commenced, the Hundred Fighter stood from his throne and looked over his assembled people.
The Chain of Silence was shaken by the attendant whose duty and honour was the Silver Chain, and at that delicate chime the halt went silent, and a general wonder ensued as to what matter the High King would submit to his people.
“Friends and heroes,” said Conn, “Aillen, the son of Midna, will come to-night from Slieve Fuaid with occult, terrible fire against our city. Is there among you one who loves Tara and the king, and who will undertake our defence against that being?”
He spoke in silence, and when he had finished he listened to the same silence, but it was now deep, ominous, agonized. Each man glanced uneasily on his neighbour and then stared at his wine-cup or his fingers. The hearts of young men went hot for a gallant moment and were chilled in the succeeding one, for they had all heard of Aillen out of Shl Finnachy in the north. The lesser gentlemen looked under their brows at the greater champions, and these peered furtively at the greatest of all. Art og mac Morna of the Hard Strokes fell to biting his fingers, Cona’n the Swearer and Garra mac Morna grumbled irritably to each other and at their neighbours, even Caelte, the son of Rona’n, looked down into his own lap, and Goll Mor sipped at his wine without any twinkle in his eye. A horrid embarrassment came into the great hall, and as the High King stood in that palpitating silence his noble face changed from kindly to grave and from that to a terrible sternness. In another moment, to the undying shame of every person present, he would have been compelled to lift his own challenge and declare himself the champion of Tara for that night, but the shame that was on the faces of his people would remain in the heart of their king. Goll’s merry mind would help him to forget, but even his heart would be wrung by a memory that he would not dare to face. It was at that terrible moment that Fionn stood up.
“What,” said he, “will be given to the man who undertakes this defence?”
“All that can be rightly asked will be royally bestowed,” was the king’s answer.
“Who are the sureties?” said Fionn.
“The kings of Ireland, and Red Cith with his magicians.”
“I will undertake the defence,” said Fionn. And on that, the kings and magicians who were present bound themselves to the fulfilment of the bargain.
Fionn marched from the banqueting hall, and as he went, all who were present of nobles and retainers and servants acclaimed him and wished him luck. But in their hearts they were bidding him good-bye, for all were assured that the lad was marching to a death so unescapeable that he might already be counted as a dead man.
It is likely that Fionn looked for help to the people of the Shi’ themselves, for, through his mother, he belonged to the tribes of Dana, although, on the father’s side, his blood was well compounded with mortal clay. It may be, too, that he knew how events would turn, for he had eaten the Salmon of Knowledge. Yet it is not recorded that on this occasion he invoked any magical art as he did on other adventures.
Fionn’s way of discovering whatever was happening and hidden was always the same and is many times referred to. A shallow, oblong dish of pure, pale gold was brought to him. This dish was filled with clear water. Then Fionn would bend his head and stare into the water, and as he stared he would place his thumb in his mouth under his “Tooth of Knowledge,” his “wisdom tooth.”
Knowledge, may it be said, is higher than magic and is more to be sought. It is quite possible to see what is happening and yet not know what is forward, for while seeing is believing it does not follow that either seeing or believing is knowing. Many a person can see a thing and believe a thing and know just as little about it as the person who does neither. But Fionn would see and know, or he would under-stand a decent ratio of his visions. That he was versed in magic is true, for he was ever known as the Knowledgeable man, and later he had two magicians in his household named Dirim and mac-Reith to do the rough work of knowledge for their busy master.
It was not from the Shi’, however, that assistance came to Fionn.
CHAPTER XIII
He marched through the successive fortifications until he came to the outer, great wall, the boundary of the city, and when he had passed this he was on the wide plain of Tara.
Other than himself no person was abroad, for on the night of the Feast of Samhain none but a madman would quit the shelter of a house even if it were on fire; for whatever disasters might be within a house would be as nothing to the calamities without it.
The noise of the banquet was not now audible to Fionn—it is possible, however, that there was a shamefaced silence in the great hall—and the lights of the city were hidden by the successive great ramparts. The sky was over him; the earth under him; and than these there was nothing, or there was but the darkness and the wind.
But darkness was not a thing to terrify him, bred in the nightness of a wood and the very fosterling of gloom; nor could the wind afflict his ear or his heart. There was no note in its orchestra that he had not brooded on and become, which becoming is magic. The long-drawn moan of it; the thrilling whisper and hush; the shrill, sweet whistle, so thin it can scarcely be heard, and is taken more by the nerves than by the ear; the screech, sudden as a devil’s yell and loud as ten thunders; the cry as of one who flies with backward look to the shelter of leaves and darkness; and the sob as of one stricken with an age-long misery, only at times remembered, but remembered then with what a pang! His ear knew by what successions they arrived, and by what stages they grew and diminished. Listening in the dark to the bundle of noises which make a noise he could disentangle them and assign a place and a reason to each gradation of sound that formed the chorus: there was the patter of a rabbit, and there the scurrying of a hare; a bush rustled yonder, but that brief rustle was a bird; that pressure was a wolf, and this hesitation a fox; the scraping yonder was but a rough leaf against bark, and the scratching beyond it was a ferret’s claw.
Fear cannot be where knowledge is, and Fionn was not fearful.
His mind, quietly busy on all sides, picked up one sound and dwelt on it. “A man,” said Fionn, and he listened in that direction, back towards the city.
A man it was, almost as skilled in darkness as Fionn himself “This is no enemy,” Fionn thought; “his walking is open.”
“Who comes?” he called.
“A friend,” said the newcomer.
“Give a friend’s name,” said Fionn.
“Fiacuil mac Cona,” was the answer.
“Ah, my pulse and heart!” cried Fionn, and he strode a few paces to meet the great robber who had fostered him among the marshes.
“So you are not afraid,” he said joyfully.
“I am afraid in good truth,” Fiacuil whispered, “and the minute my business with you is finished I will trot back as quick as legs will carry me. May the gods protect my going as they protected my coming,” said the robber piously.
“Amen,” said Fionn, “and now, tell me what you have come for?”
“Have you any plan against this lord of the Shl?” Fiacuil whispered.
“I will attack him,” said Fionn.
“That is not a plan,” the other groaned, “we do not plan to deliver an attack but to win a victory.”
“Is this a very terrible person?” Fionn asked.
“Terrible indeed. No one can get near him or away from him. He comes out of the Shi’ playing sweet, low music on a timpan and a pipe, and all who hear this music fall asleep.”
“I will not fall asleep,” said Fionn.
“You will indeed, for everybody does.”
“What happens then?” Fionn asked.
“When all are asleep Aillen mac Midna blows a dart of fire out of his mouth, and everything that is touched by that fire is destroyed, and he can blow his fire to an incredible distance and to any direction.”
“You are very brave to come to help me,” Fionn murmured, “especially when you are not able to help me at all.”
“I can help,” Fiacuil replied, “but I must be paid.”
“What payment?”
“A third of all you earn and a seat at your council.”
“I grant that,” said Fionn, “and now, tell me your plan?”
“You remember my spear with the thirty rivets of Arabian gold in its socket?”
“The one,” Fionn queried, “that had its head wrapped in a blanket and was stuck in a bucket of water and was chained to a wall as well—the venomous Birgha?” “That one,” Fiacuil replied.
“It is Aillen mac Midna’s own spear,” he continued, “and it was taken out of his Shi’ by your father.”
“Well?” said Fionn, wondering nevertheless where Fiacuil got the spear, but too generous to ask.
“When you hear the great man of the Shi’ coming, take the wrappings off the head of the spear and bend your face over it; the heat of the spear, the stench of it, all its pernicious and acrid qualities will prevent you from going to sleep.”
“Are you sure of that?” said Fionn.
“You couldn’t go to sleep close to that stench; nobody could,” Fiacuil replied decidedly.
He continued: “Aillen mac Midna will be off his guard when he stops playing and begins to blow his fire; he will think everybody is asleep; then you can deliver the attack you were speaking of, and all good luck go with it.”
“I will give him back his spear,” said Fionn.
“Here it is,” said Fiacuil, taking the Birgha from under his cloak. “But be as careful of it, my pulse, be as frightened of it as you are of the man of Dana.”
“I will be frightened of nothing,” said Fionn, “and the only person I will be sorry for is that Aillen mac Midna, who is going to get his own spear back.”
“I will go away now,” his companion whispered, “for it is growing darker where you would have thought there was no more room for darkness, and there is an eerie feeling abroad which I do not like. That man from the Shi’ may come any minute, and if I catch one sound of his music I am done for.”
The robber went away and again Fionn was alone.
CHAPTER XIV
He listened to the retreating footsteps until they could be heard no more, and the one sound that came to his tense ears was the beating of his own heart.
Even the wind had ceased, and there seemed to be nothing in the world but the darkness and himself. In that gigantic blackness, in that unseen quietude and vacancy, the mind could cease to be personal to itself. It could be overwhelmed and merged in space, so that consciousness would be transferred or dissipated, and one might sleep standing; for the mind fears loneliness more than all else, and will escape to the moon rather than be driven inwards on its own being.
But Fionn was not lonely, and he was not afraid when the son of Midna came.
A long stretch of the silent night had gone by, minute following minute in a slow sequence, wherein as there was no change there was no time; wherein there was no past and no future, but a stupefying, endless present which is almost the annihilation of consciousness. A change came then, for the clouds had also been moving and the moon at last was sensed behind them—not as a radiance, but as a percolation of light, a gleam that was strained through matter after matter and was less than the very wraith or remembrance of itself; a thing seen so narrowly, so sparsely, that the eye could doubt if it was or was not seeing, and might conceive that its own memory was re-creating that which was still absent.
But Fionn’s eye was the eye of a wild creature that spies on darkness and moves there wittingly. He saw, then, not a thing but a movement; something that was darker than the darkness it loomed on; not a being but a presence, and, as it were, impending pressure. And in a little he heard the deliberate pace of that great being.
Fionn bent to his spear and unloosed its coverings.
Then from the darkness there came another sound; a low, sweet sound; thrillingly joyous, thrillingly low; so low the ear could scarcely note it, so sweet the ear wished to catch nothing else and would strive to hear it rather than all sounds that may be heard by man: the music of another world! the unearthly, dear melody of the Shi’! So sweet it was that the sense strained to it, and having reached must follow drowsily in its wake, and would merge in it, and could not return again to its own place until that strange harmony was finished and the ear restored to freedom.
But Fionn had taken the covering from his spear, and with his brow pressed close to it he kept his mind and all his senses engaged on that sizzling, murderous point.
The music ceased and Aillen hissed a fierce blue flame from his mouth, and it was as though he hissed lightning.
Here it would seem that Fionn used magic, for spreading out his fringed mantle he caught the flame. Rather he stopped it, for it slid from the mantle and sped down into the earth to the depth of twenty-six spans; from which that slope is still called the Glen of the Mantle, and the rise on which Aillen stood is known as the Ard of Fire.
One can imagine the surprise of Aillen mac Midna, seeing his fire caught and quenched by an invisible hand. And one can imagine that at this check he might be frightened, for who would be more terrified than a magician who sees his magic fail, and who, knowing of power, will guess at powers of which he has no conception and may well dread.
Everything had been done by him as it should be done. His pipe had been played and his timpan, all who heard that music should be asleep, and yet his fire was caught in full course and was quenched.
Aillen, with all the terrific strength of which he was master, blew again, and the great jet of blue flame came roaring and whistling from him and was caught and disappeared.
Panic swirled into the man from Faery; he turned from that terrible spot and fled, not knowing what might be behind, but dreading it as he had never before dreaded anything, and the unknown pursued him; that terrible defence became offence and hung to his heel as a wolf pads by the flank of a bull.
And Aillen was not in his own world! He was in the world of men, where movement is not easy and the very air a burden. In his own sphere, in his own element, he might have outrun Fionn, but this was Fionn’s world, Fionn’s element, and the flying god was not gross enough to outstrip him. Yet what a race he gave, for it was but at the entrance to his own Shi’ that the pursuer got close enough. Fionn put a finger into the thong of the great spear, and at that cast night fell on Aillen mac Midna. His eyes went black, his mind whirled and ceased, there came nothingness where he had been, and as the Birgha whistled into his shoulder-blades he withered away, he tumbled emptily and was dead. Fionn took his lovely head from its shoulders and went back through the night to Tara.
Triumphant Fionn, who had dealt death to a god, and to whom death would be dealt, and who is now dead!
He reached the palace at sunrise.
On that morning all were astir early. They wished to see what destruction had been wrought by the great being, but it was young Fionn they saw and that redoubtable head swinging by its hair. “What is your demand?” said the Ard-Ri’. “The thing that it is right I should ask,” said Fionn: “the command of the Fianna of Ireland.”
“Make your choice,” said Conn to Goll Mor; “you will leave Ireland, or you will place your hand in the hand of this champion and be his man.”
Goll could do a thing that would be hard for another person, and he could do it so beautifully that he was not diminished by any action.
“Here is my hand,” said Goll.
And he twinkled at the stern, young eyes that gazed on him as he made his submission.
THE BIRTH OF BRAN
Original Size
CHAPTER I
There are people who do not like dogs a bit—they are usually women—but in this story there is a man who did not like dogs. In fact, he hated them. When he saw one he used to go black in the face, and he threw rocks at it until it got out of sight. But the Power that protects all creatures had put a squint into this man’s eye, so that he always threw crooked.
This gentleman’s name was Fergus Fionnliath, and his stronghold was near the harbour of Galway. Whenever a dog barked he would leap out of his seat, and he would throw everything that he owned out of the window in the direction of the bark. He gave prizes to servants who disliked dogs, and when he heard that a man had drowned a litter of pups he used to visit that person and try to marry his daughter.
Now Fionn, the son of Uail, was the reverse of Fergus Fionnliath in this matter, for he delighted in dogs, and he knew everything about them from the setting of the first little white tooth to the rocking of the last long yellow one. He knew the affections and antipathies which are proper in a dog; the degree of obedience to which dogs may be trained without losing their honourable qualities or becoming servile and suspicious; he knew the hopes that animate them, the apprehensions which tingle in their blood, and all that is to be demanded from, or forgiven in, a paw, an ear, a nose, an eye, or a tooth; and he understood these things because he loved dogs, for it is by love alone that we understand anything.
Among the three hundred dogs which Fionn owned there were two to whom he gave an especial tenderness, and who were his daily and nightly companions. These two were Bran and Sceo’lan, but if a person were to guess for twenty years he would not find out why Fionn loved these two dogs and why he would never be separated from them.
Fionn’s mother, Muirne, went to wide Allen of Leinster to visit her son, and she brought her young sister Tuiren with her. The mother and aunt of the great captain were well treated among the Fianna, first, because they were parents to Fionn, and second, because they were beautiful and noble women.
No words can describe how delightful Muirne was—she took the branch; and as to Tuiren, a man could not look at her without becoming angry or dejected. Her face was fresh as a spring morning; her voice more cheerful than the cuckoo calling from the branch that is highest in the hedge; and her form swayed like a reed and flowed like a river, so that each person thought she would surely flow to him.
Original Size
Men who had wives of their own grew moody and downcast because they could not hope to marry her, while the bachelors of the Fianna stared at each other with truculent, bloodshot eyes, and then they gazed on Tuiren so gently that she may have imagined she was being beamed on by the mild eyes of the dawn.
It was to an Ulster gentleman, Iollan Eachtach, that she gave her love, and this chief stated his rights and qualities and asked for her in marriage.
Now Fionn did not dislike the man of Ulster, but either he did not know them well or else he knew them too well, for he made a curious stipulation before consenting to the marriage. He bound Iollan to return the lady if there should be occasion to think her unhappy, and Iollan agreed to do so. The sureties to this bargain were Caelte mac Ronan, Goll mac Morna, and Lugaidh. Lugaidh himself gave the bride away, but it was not a pleasant ceremony for him, because he also was in love with the lady, and he would have preferred keeping her to giving her away. When she had gone he made a poem about her, beginning:
And hundreds of sad people learned the poem by heart.
CHAPTER II
When Iollan and Tuiren were married they went to Ulster, and they lived together very happily. But the law of life is change; nothing continues in the same way for any length of time; happiness must become unhappiness, and will be succeeded again by the joy it had displaced. The past also must be reckoned with; it is seldom as far behind us as we could wish: it is more often in front, blocking the way, and the future trips over it just when we think that the road is clear and joy our own.
Iollan had a past. He was not ashamed of it; he merely thought it was finished, although in truth it was only beginning, for it is that perpetual beginning of the past that we call the future.
Before he joined the Fianna he had been in love with a lady of the Shi’, named Uct Dealv (Fair Breast), and they had been sweethearts for years. How often he had visited his sweetheart in Faery! With what eagerness and anticipation he had gone there; the lover’s whistle that he used to give was known to every person in that Shi’, and he had been discussed by more than one of the delicate sweet ladies of Faery. “That is your whistle, Fair Breast,” her sister of the Shi’ would say.
And Uct Dealv would reply: “Yes, that is my mortal, my lover, my pulse, and my one treasure.”
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She laid her spinning aside, or her embroidery if she was at that, or if she were baking a cake of fine wheaten bread mixed with honey she would leave the cake to bake itself and fly to Iollan. Then they went hand in hand in the country that smells of apple-blossom and honey, looking on heavy-boughed trees and on dancing and beaming clouds. Or they stood dreaming together, locked in a clasping of arms and eyes, gazing up and down on each other, Iollan staring down into sweet grey wells that peeped and flickered under thin brows, and Uct Dealv looking up into great black ones that went dreamy and went hot in endless alternation.
Then Iollan would go back to the world of men, and Uct Dealv would return to her occupations in the Land of the Ever Young.
“What did he say?” her sister of the Shi’ would ask.
“He said I was the Berry of the Mountain, the Star of Knowledge, and the Blossom of the Raspberry.”
“They always say the same thing,” her sister pouted.
“But they look other things,” Uct Dealv insisted. “They feel other things,” she murmured; and an endless conversation recommenced.
Then for some time Iollan did not come to Faery, and Uct Dealv marvelled at that, while her sister made an hundred surmises, each one worse than the last.
“He is not dead or he would be here,” she said. “He has forgotten you, my darling.”
News was brought to Tlr na n-Og of the marriage of Iollan and Tuiren, and when Uct Dealv heard that news her heart ceased to beat for a moment, and she closed her eyes.
“Now!” said her sister of the Shi’. “That is how long the love of a mortal lasts,” she added, in the voice of sad triumph which is proper to sisters.
But on Uct Dealv there came a rage of jealousy and despair such as no person in the Shi’ had ever heard of, and from that moment she became capable of every ill deed; for there are two things not easily controlled, and they are hunger and jealousy. She determined that the woman who had supplanted her in Iollan’s affections should rue the day she did it. She pondered and brooded revenge in her heart, sitting in thoughtful solitude and bitter collectedness until at last she had a plan.
She understood the arts of magic and shape-changing, so she changed her shape into that of Fionn’s female runner, the best-known woman in Ireland; then she set out from Faery and appeared in the world. She travelled in the direction of Iollan’s stronghold.
Iollan knew the appearance of Fionn’s messenger, but he was surprised to see her.
She saluted him.
“Health and long life, my master.”.
“Health and good days,” he replied. “What brings you here, dear heart?”
“I come from Fionn.”
“And your message?” said he.
“The royal captain intends to visit you.”
“He will be welcome,” said Iollan. “We shall give him an Ulster feast.”
“The world knows what that is,” said the messenger courteously. “And now,” she continued, “I have messages for your queen.”
Tuiren then walked from the house with the messenger, but when they had gone a short distance Uct Dealv drew a hazel rod from beneath her cloak and struck it on the queen’s shoulder, and on the instant Tuiren’s figure trembled and quivered, and it began to whirl inwards and downwards, and she changed into the appearance of a hound.
It was sad to see the beautiful, slender dog standing shivering and astonished, and sad to see the lovely eyes that looked out pitifully in terror and amazement. But Uct Dealv did not feel sad. She clasped a chain about the hound’s neck, and they set off westward towards the house of Fergus Fionnliath, who was reputed to be the unfriendliest man in the world to a dog. It was because of his reputation that Uct Dealv was bringing the hound to him. She did not want a good home for this dog: she wanted the worst home that could be found in the world, and she thought that Fergus would revenge for her the rage and jealousy which she felt towards Tuiren.
CHAPTER III
As they paced along Uct Dealv railed bitterly against the hound, and shook and jerked her chain. Many a sharp cry the hound gave in that journey, many a mild lament.
“Ah, supplanter! Ah, taker of another girl’s sweetheart!” said Uct Dealv fiercely. “How would your lover take it if he could see you now? How would he look if he saw your pointy ears, your long thin snout, your shivering, skinny legs, and your long grey tail. He would not love you now, bad girl!”
“Have you heard of Fergus Fionnliath,” she said again, “the man who does not like dogs?”
Tuiren had indeed heard of him.
“It is to Fergus I shall bring you,” cried Uct Dealv. “He will throw stones at you. You have never had a stone thrown at you. Ah, bad girl! You do not know how a stone sounds as it nips the ear with a whirling buzz, nor how jagged and heavy it feels as it thumps against a skinny leg. Robber! Mortal! Bad girl! You have never been whipped, but you will be whipped now. You shall hear the song of a lash as it curls forward and bites inward and drags backward. You shall dig up old bones stealthily at night, and chew them against famine. You shall whine and squeal at the moon, and shiver in the cold, and you will never take another girl’s sweetheart again.”
And it was in those terms and in that tone that she spoke to Tuiren as they journeyed forward, so that the hound trembled and shrank, and whined pitifully and in despair.
They came to Fergus Fionnliath’s stronghold, and Uct Dealv demanded admittance.
“Leave that dog outside,” said the servant.
“I will not do so,” said the pretended messenger.
“You can come in without the dog, or you can stay out with the dog,” said the surly guardian.
“By my hand,” cried Uct Dealv, “I will come in with this dog, or your master shall answer for it to Fionn.”
At the name of Fionn the servant almost fell out of his standing. He flew to acquaint his master, and Fergus himself came to the great door of the stronghold.
“By my faith,” he cried in amazement, “it is a dog.”
“A dog it is,” growled the glum servant.
“Go you away,” said Fergus to Uct Dealv, “and when you have killed the dog come back to me and I will give you a present.”
“Life and health, my good master, from Fionn, the son of Uail, the son of Baiscne,” said she to Fergus.
“Life and health back to Fionn,” he replied. “Come into the house and give your message, but leave the dog outside, for I don’t like dogs.”
“The dog comes in,” the messenger replied.
“How is that?” cried Fergus angrily.
“Fionn sends you this hound to take care of until he comes for her,” said the messenger.
“I wonder at that,” Fergus growled, “for Fionn knows well that there is not a man in the world has less of a liking for dogs than I have.”
“However that may be, master, I have given Fionn’s message, and here at my heel is the dog. Do you take her or refuse her?”
“If I could refuse anything to Fionn it would be a dog,” said Fergus, “but I could not refuse anything to Fionn, so give me the hound.”
Uct Dealv put the chain in his hand.
“Ah, bad dog!” said she.
And then she went away well satisfied with her revenge, and returned to her own people in the Shi.
CHAPTER IV
On the following day Fergus called his servant.
“Has that dog stopped shivering yet?” he asked.
“It has not, sir,” said the servant.
“Bring the beast here,” said his master, “for whoever else is dissatisfied Fionn must be satisfied.”
The dog was brought, and he examined it with a jaundiced and bitter eye.
“It has the shivers indeed,” he said.
“The shivers it has,” said the servant.
“How do you cure the shivers?” his master demanded, for he thought that if the animal’s legs dropped off Fionn would not be satisfied.
“There is a way,” said the servant doubtfully.
“If there is a way, tell it to me,” cried his master angrily.
“If you were to take the beast up in your arms and hug it and kiss it, the shivers would stop,” said the man.
“Do you mean—?” his master thundered, and he stretched his hand for a club.
“I heard that,” said the servant humbly.
“Take that dog up,” Fergus commanded, “and hug it and kiss it, and if I find a single shiver left in the beast I’ll break your head.”
The man bent to the hound, but it snapped a piece out of his hand, and nearly bit his nose off as well.
“That dog doesn’t like me,” said the man.
“Nor do I,” roared Fergus; “get out of my sight.”
The man went away and Fergus was left alone with the hound, but the poor creature was so terrified that it began to tremble ten times worse than before.
“Its legs will drop off,” said Fergus. “Fionn will blame me,” he cried in despair.
He walked to the hound.
“If you snap at my nose, or if you put as much as the start of a tooth into the beginning of a finger!” he growled.
He picked up the dog, but it did not snap, it only trembled. He held it gingerly for a few moments.
“If it has to be hugged,” he said, “I’ll hug it. I’d do more than that for Fionn.”
He tucked and tightened the animal into his breast, and marched moodily up and down the room. The dog’s nose lay along his breast under his chin, and as he gave it dutiful hugs, one hug to every five paces, the dog put out its tongue and licked him timidly under the chin.
“Stop,” roared Fergus, “stop that forever,” and he grew very red in the face, and stared truculently down along his nose. A soft brown eye looked up at him and the shy tongue touched again on his chin.
“If it has to be kissed,” said Fergus gloomily, “I’ll kiss it; I’d do more than that for Fionn,” he groaned.
He bent his head, shut his eyes, and brought the dog’s jaw against his lips. And at that the dog gave little wriggles in his arms, and little barks, and little licks, so that he could scarcely hold her. He put the hound down at last.
“There is not a single shiver left in her,” he said.
And that was true.
Everywhere he walked the dog followed him, giving little prances and little pats against him, and keeping her eyes fixed on his with such eagerness and intelligence that he marvelled.
“That dog likes me,” he murmured in amazement.
“By my hand,” he cried next day, “I like that dog.”
The day after that he was calling her “My One Treasure, My Little Branch.” And within a week he could not bear her to be out of his sight for an instant.
He was tormented by the idea that some evil person might throw a stone at the hound, so he assembled his servants and retainers and addressed them.
He told them that the hound was the Queen of Creatures, the Pulse of his Heart, and the Apple of his Eye, and he warned them that the person who as much as looked sideways on her, or knocked one shiver out of her, would answer for the deed with pains and indignities. He recited a list of calamities which would befall such a miscreant, and these woes began with flaying and ended with dismemberment, and had inside bits of such complicated and ingenious torment that the blood of the men who heard it ran chill in their veins, and the women of the household fainted where they stood.