The Essential Celtic Folklore Collection. Lady Gregory

about it in the popular mind an exacting and ancient tribunal, and began a play that had for spectators men and women that loved the high wasteful virtues. I do not think that their own mixed blood or the habit of their time need take all, or nearly all, credit or discredit for the impulse that made our modern gentlemen fight duels over pocket-handkerchiefs, and set out to play ball against the gates of Jerusalem for a wager, and scatter money before the public eye; and at last, after an epoch of such eloquence the world has hardly seen its like, lose their public spirit and their high heart and grow querulous and selfish as men do who have played life out not heartily but with noise and tumult. Had they understood the people and the game a little better, they might have created an aristocracy in an age that has lost the meaning of the word. When one reads of the Fianna, or of Cuchulain, or of some great hero, one remembers that the fine life is always a part played finely before fine spectators. There also one notices the hot cup and the cold cup of intoxication; and when the fine spectators have ended, surely the fine players grow weary, and aristocratic life is ended. When O'Connell covered with a dark glove the hand that had killed a man in the duelling field, he played his part; and when Alexander stayed his army marching to the conquest of the world that he might contemplate the beauty of a plane-tree, he played his part. When Osgar complained as he lay dying, of the keening of the women and the old fighting men, he too played his part; "No man ever knew any heart in me," he said, "but a heart of twisted horn, and it covered with iron; but the howling of the dogs beside me," he said, "and the keening of the old fighting men and the crying of the women one after another, those are the things that are vexing me." If we would create a great community--and what other game is so worth the labour?--we must recreate the old foundations of life, not as they existed in that splendid misunderstanding of the eighteenth century, but as they must always exist when the finest minds and Ned the beggar and Seaghan the fool think about the same thing, although they may not think the same thought about it.

      IX

      When I asked the little boy who had shown me the pathway up the Hill of Allen if he knew stories of Finn and Oisin, he said he did not, but that he had often heard his grandfather telling them to his mother in Irish. He did not know Irish, but he was learning it at school, and all the little boys he knew were learning it. In a little while he will know enough stories of Finn and Oisin to tell them to his children some day. It is the owners of the land whose children might never have known what would give them so much happiness. But now they can read this book to their children, and it will make Slieve-na-man, Allen, and Benbulben, the great mountain that showed itself before me every day through all my childhood and was yet unpeopled, and half the country-sides of south and west, as populous with memories as are Dundealgan and Emain Macha and Muirthemne; and after a while somebody may even take them to some famous place and say, "This land where your fathers lived proudly and finely should be dear and dear and again dear"; and perhaps when many names have grown musical to their ears, a more imaginative love will have taught them a better service.

      X

      I need say nothing about the translation and arrangement of this book except that it is worthy to be put beside "Cuchulain of Muirthemne." Such books should not be commended by written words but by spoken words, were that possible, for the written words commending a book, wherein something is done supremely well, remain, to sound in the ears of a later generation, like the foolish sound of church bells from the tower of a church when every pew is full.

      W.B. YEATS.

      CONTENTS

      PART I. THE GODS

      Book I. The Coming of the Tuatha de Danaan

      Chap. I. The Fight with the Firbolgs II. The Reign of Bres

      Book II. Lugh of the Long Hand

      Chap. I. The Coming of Lugh II. The Sons of Tuireann III. The Great Battle of Magh Tuireadh IV. The Hidden House of Lugh

      Book III. The Coming of the Gael

      Chap. I. The Landing II. The Battle of Tailltin

      Book IV. The Ever-Living Living Ones

      Chap. I. Bodb Dearg II. The Dagda III. Angus Og IV. The Morrigu V. Aine VI. Aoibhell VII. Midhir and Etain VIII. Manannan IX. Manannan at play X. His Call to Bran XI. His Three Calls to Cormac XII. Cliodna's Wave XIII. His Call to Connla XIV. Tadg in Manannan's Islands XV. Laegaire in the Happy Plain

      Book V. The Fate of The Children of Lir

      PART II. THE FIANNA

      Book I. Finn, Son of Cumhal

      Chap. I. The Coming of Finn II. Finn's Household III. Birth of Bran IV. Oisin's Mother V. The Best Men of the Fianna

      Book II. Finn's Helpers

      Chap. I. The Lad of the Skins II. Black, Brown, and Grey III. The Hound IV. Red Ridge

      Book III. The Battle of the White Strand

      Chap. I. The Enemies of Ireland II. Cael and Credhe III. Conn Crither IV. Glas, Son of Dremen V. The Help of the Men of Dea VI. The March of the Fianna VII. The First Fighters VIII. The King of Ulster's Son IX. The High King's Son X. The King of Lochlann and his Sons XI. Labran's Journey XII. The Great Fight XIII. Credhe's Lament

      Book IV. Huntings and Enchantments

      Chap. I. The King of Britain's Son II. The Cave of Ceiscoran III. Donn, Son of Midhir IV. The Hospitality of Cuanna's House V. Cat-Heads and Dog-Heads VI. Lomna's Head VII. Ilbrec of Ess Ruadh VIII. The Cave of Cruachan IX. The Wedding at Ceann Slieve X. The Shadowy One XI. Finn's Madness XII. The Red Woman XIII. Finn and the Phantoms XIV. The Pigs of Angus XV. The Hunt of Slieve Cuilinn

      Book V. Oisin's Children

      Book VI. Diarmuid

      Chap. I. Birth of Diarmuid II. How Diarmuid got his Love-Spot III. The Daughter of King Under-Wave IV. The Hard Servant V. The House of the Quicken Trees

      Book VII. Diarmuid and Grania

      Chap. I. The Flight from Teamhair II. The Pursuit III. The Green Champions IV. The Wood of Dubhros V. The Quarrel VI. The Wanderers VII. Fighting and Peace VIII. The Boar of Beinn Gulbain

      Book VIII. Cnoc-an-Air

      Chap. I. Tailc, Son of Treon II. Meargach's Wife III. Ailne's Revenge

      Book IX. The Wearing Away of the Fianna

      Chap. I. The Quarrel with the Sons of Morna II. Death of Goll III. The Battle of Gabhra

      Book X. The End of the Fianna

      Chap. I. Death of Bran II. The Call of Oisin III. The Last of the Great Men

      Book XI. Oisin and Patrick

      Chap. I. Oisin's Story II. Oisin in Patrick's House III. The Arguments IV. Oisin's Laments

      GODS AND FIGHTING MEN.

      PART ONE: THE GODS.

      BOOK ONE: THE COMING OF THE TUATHA DE DANAAN.

      CHAPTER I. THE FIGHT WITH THE FIRBOLGS

      It was in a mist the Tuatha de Danaan, the people of the gods of Dana, or as some called them, the Men of Dea, came through the air and the high air to Ireland.

      It was from the north they came; and in the place they came from they had four cities, where they fought their battle for learning: great Falias, and shining Gorias, and Finias, and rich Murias that lay to the south. And in those cities they had four wise men to teach their young men skill and knowledge and perfect wisdom: Senias in Murias; and Arias, the fair-haired poet, in Finias; and Urias of the noble nature in Gorias; and Morias in Falias itself. And they brought from those four cities their four treasures: a Stone of Virtue from Falias, that was called the Lia Fail, the Stone of Destiny; and from Gorias they brought a Sword; and from Finias a Spear of Victory; and from Murias the fourth