The Essential Celtic Folklore Collection. Lady Gregory

that follow me," she said, "to keep me from whoever would bring me away against their will, and against the will and the knowledge of Forgall, the dark king."

      "Who are the champions that follow you, maiden?" said Cuchulain.

      "It is not hard to tell you that," said Emer. "Two of the name of Lui; two Luaths; Luath and Lath Goible, sons of Tethra; Triath and Trescath; Brion and Bolor; Bas, son of Omnach, the eighth Condla, and Cond, son of Forgall. Every man of them has the strength of a hundred and the feats of nine. And it would be hard for me," she said, "to tell of all the many powers Forgall has himself. He is stronger than any labouring man, more learned than any Druid, more quick of mind than any poet. You will have more than your games to do when you fight against Forgall, for many have mid of his power and of the strength of his doings."

      "Why do you not count me as a strong man as good as those others?" said Cuchulain. "Why would I not indeed, if your doings had been spoken of like theirs?" she said. "I swear by the oath of my people," said Cuchulain, "I will make my doings be spoken of among the great doings of heroes in their strength." "What is your strength, then?" said Emer. "That is easily told; when my strength in fighting is weakest I defend twenty; a third part of my strength is enough for thirty; in my full strength I fight alone against forty; and a hundred are safe under my protection. For dread of me, fighting men avoid fords and battles; armies and armed men go backward from the fear of my face."

      "That is a good account for a young boy," said Emer, "but you have not reached yet to the strength of chariot chiefs." "But, indeed," said Cuchulain, "it is well I have been reared by Conchubar, my dear foster-father. It is not as a countryman strives to bring up his children, between the flags and the kneading trough, between the fire and the wall, on the floor of the one room, that Conchubar has brought me up; but it is among chariot chiefs and heroes, among jesters and Druids, among poets and learned men, among landowners and farmers of Ulster I have been reared, so that I have all their manners and their gifts."

      "Who are these men, then, that have brought you up to do the things you are boasting of?" said Emer.

      "That is easily told," he said. "Fair-speaking Sencha taught me wisdom and right judgment; Blai, lord of lands, my kinsman, took me to his house, so that I have entertained the men of Conchubar's province; Fergus brought me up to fights and to battles, so that I am able to use my strength. I stood by the knee of Amergin the poet, he was my tutor, so that I can stand up to any man, I can make praises for the doings of a king. Finchoem helped to rear me, so that Conall Cearnach is my foster-brother. Cathbad of the Gentle Face taught me, for the sake of Dechtire, so that I understand the arts of the Druids, and I have learned all the goodness of knowledge. All the men of Ulster have had a hand in bringing me up, chariot-drivers and chiefs of chariots, kings and chief poets, so that I am the darling of the whole army, so that I fight for the honour of all alike. And as to yourself, Emer," he said, "what way have you been reared in the Garden of Lugh?"

      "It is easy to tell you that," said Emer. "I was brought up," she said, "in ancient virtues, in lawful behaviour, in the keeping of chastity, in stateliness of form, in the rank of a queen, in all noble ways among the women of Ireland." "These are good virtues indeed," said Cuchulain. "And why, then, would it not be right for us two to become one? For up to this time," he said, "I have never found a young girl able to hold talk with me the way you have done." "Have you no wife already?" said Emer. "I have not, indeed." "I may not marry before my sister is married," she said then, "for she is older than myself." "Truly, it is not with your sister, but with yourself, I have fallen in love," said Cuchulain.

      While they were talking like this, Cuchulain saw the breasts of the maiden over the bosom of her dress, and he said: "Fair is this plain, the plain of the noble yoke." And Emer said, "No one comes to this plain who does not overcome as many as a hundred on each ford, from the ford at Ailbine to Banchuig Arcait."

      "Fair is the plain, the plain of the noble yoke," said Cuchulain. "No one comes to this plain," said she, "who does not go out in safety from Samhain to Oimell, and from Oimell to Beltaine, and again from Beltaine to Bron Trogain."

      "Everything you have commanded, so it will be done by me," said Cuchulain.

      "And the offer you have made me, it is accepted, it is taken, it is granted," said Emer.

      With that Cuchulain left the place, and they talked no more with one another on that day.

      When he was driving across the plain of Bregia, Laeg, his chariot-driver, asked him, "What, now, was the meaning of the words you and the maiden Emer were speaking together?" "Do you not know," said Cuchulain, "that I came to court Emer? And it is for this reason we put a cloak on our words, that the young girls with her might not understand what I had come for. For if Forgall knew it, he would not consent to it, but to you, Laeg," he said, "I will tell the meaning of our talk.

      "'Where did you come from,' said she. 'From Intide Emna,' said I, and I meant by that, from Emain Macha. For it took its name from Macha, daughter of Aed the Red, one of the three kings of Ireland. When he died Macha asked for the kingship, but the sons of Dithorba said they would not give kingship to a woman. So she fought against them and routed them, and they went as exiles to the wild places of Connaught. And after a while she went in search of them, and she took them by treachery, and brought them all in one chain to Ulster. The men of Ulster wanted to kill them, but she said, 'No, for that would be a disgrace on my good government But let them be my servants,' she said, 'and let them dig a rath for me, that shall be the chief seat of Ulster for ever.' Then she marked out the rath for them with the gold pin on her neck, and its name came from that; a brooch in the neck of Macha.

      "The man, in whose house we slept, is Ronca, the fisherman of Conchubar. 'A man that tends cattle,' I said. For he catches fish on his line under the sea, and the fish are the cattle of the sea, and the sea is the plain of Tethra, a king of the kings of the Fomor.

      " 'Our food was the ruin of a chariot,' I said. For a foal was cooked for us on the hearth, and it is the horse that holds up the chariot.

      " 'Between the two mountains of the wood,' I said. These are the two mountains between which we came, Slieve Fuad to the west, and Slieve Cuilinn to the east of us, and we were in Oircil between them, the wood that is between the two.

      " 'The road,' I said, 'from the Cover of the Sea.' That is from the plain of Muirthemne. And it is from this it got its name; there was at one time a magic sea on it, with a sea turtle in it that was used to suck men down, until the Dagda came with his club of anger and sang these words, so that it ebbed away on the moment:--

      'Silence on your hollow head;

      'Silence on your dark body;

      'Silence on your dark brow.'

      " 'Over the Great Secret of the men of Dea,' I said. That is a wonderful secret and a wonderful whisper, because it was there that the gathering to the battle of Magh Tuireadh was first whispered of by the Tuatha de Danaan.

      "Over the horses of Emain,' I said. When Ema Nemed, son of Nama, reigned over the Gael, he had his two horses reared for him in Sidhe Ercman of the Tuatha De Danaan, and when those horses were let loose from the Sidhe, a bright stream burst out after them, and the foam spread over the land for a great length of time, and was there to the end of a year, so that the water was called Uanib, that is, foam on the water, and it is Uanib to-day.

      " 'The Back of the Great Sow,' I said. That is Drimne Breg, the Ridge of Bregin. For the shape of a sow appeared to the sons of Miled on every hill and on every height in Ireland, when they came over the sea, and wanted to land by force, after a spell had been cast on it by the Tuatha de Danaan.

      " 'The Valley of the Great Dam,' I said, 'between the God and his Druid.' That is, between Angus Og of the Sidhe of the Brugh and his Druid, to the west of the Brugh, and between them was the one woman, the wife of the Smith. That is the way I went, between the hill of the Sidhe of the Brugh where Angus is, and the Sidhe of Bresal, the Druid.

      " 'Over the Marrow of the Woman,' I said. That is the Boinne, and it gets its name