The annalists of ancient Ireland treated the story of Finn and the Fianna, in its main outlines, as sober history. This it can hardly be. Ireland had no foreign invaders during the period when the Fianna are supposed to have flourished, and the tales do not throw a ray of light on the real history of the country; they are far more concerned with a Fairyland populated by supernatural beings, beautiful or terrible, than with any tract of real earth inhabited by real men and women. The modern critical reader of these tales will soon feel that it would be idle to seek for any basis of fact in this glittering mirage. But the mirage was created by poets and story-tellers of such rare gifts for this kind of literature that it took at once an extraordinary hold of the imagination of the Irish and Scottish Gael.
There is also a significant change of locale. The Conorian tales were the product of a literary movement having its sources among the bleak hills or on the stern rock-bound coasts of Ulster. In the Ossianic Cycle we find ourselves in the Midlands or South of Ireland. Much of the action takes place amid the soft witchery of the Killarney landscape, and the difference between the two regions is reflected in the ethical temper of the tales.
In the Ultonian Cycle it will have been noticed that however extravagantly the supernatural element may be employed, the final significance of almost every tale, the end to which all the supernatural machinery is worked, is something real and human, something that has to do with the virtues or vices, the passions or the duties of men and women. In the Ossianic Cycle, broadly speaking, this is not so. The nobler vein of literature seems to have been exhausted, and we have now beauty for the sake of beauty, romance for the sake of romance, horror or mystery for the sake of the excitement they arouse. The Ossianic tales are, at their best,
Lovely apparitions, sent
To be a moment's ornament.
They lack that something, found in the noblest art as in the noblest personalities, which has the power "to warn, to comfort, and command".
Finn, like most of the Irish heroes, had a partly Danaan ancestry. His mother, Murna of the White Neck, was grand-daughter of Nuada of the Silver Hand, who had wedded that Ethlinn, daughter of Balor the Fomorian, who bore the Sun-god Lugh to Kian. Cumhal son of Trenmor was Finn's father. He was chief of the Clan Bascna, who were contending with the Clan Morna for the leadership of the Fianna, and was overthrown and slain by these at the battle of Knock. {Now Castlenock, near Dublin - TWR}
Among the Clan Morna was a man named Lia, the lord of Luachar in Connacht, who was Treasurer of the Fianna, and who kept the Treasure Bag, a bag made of crane's skin and having in it magic weapons and jewels of great price that had come down from the days of the Danaans. And he became Treasurer to the Clan Morna, and still kept the bag at Rath Luachar.
Murna, after the defeat and death of Cumhal, took refuge in the forests of Slieve Bloom, {In the King's County. — TWR} and there she bore a man-child whom she named Demna. For fear that the Clan Morna would find him out and slay him, she gave him to be nurtured in the wildwood by two aged women, and she herself became wife to the king of Kerry. But Demna, when he grew up to be a lad, was called "Finn", or the Fair One, on account of the whiteness of his skin and his golden hair, and by this name he was always known thereafter.
His first deed was to slay Lia, who had the Treasure Bag of the Fianna, which he took from him. He then sought out his uncle Crimmal who, with a few other old men, survivors of the chiefs of Clan Bascna, had escaped the sword at Castlenock, and were living in much penury and affliction in the recesses of the forests of Connacht. These he furnished with a retinue and guard from among a body of youths who followed his fortunes, and gave them the Treasure Bag. He himself went to learn the accomplishments of poetry and science from an ancient sage and Druid named Finegas, who dwelt on the river Boyne.
Here, in a pool of this river, under boughs of hazel from which dropped the Nuts of Knowledge on the stream, lived Fintan the Salmon of Knowledge, which whoso ate of him would enjoy all the wisdom of the ages. Finegas had sought many a time to catch this salmon, but failed until Finn had come to be his pupil. Then one day he caught it, and gave it to Finn to cook, bidding him eat none of it himself, but to tell him when it was ready. When the lad brought the salmon, Finegas saw that his countenance was changed.
"Hast thou eaten of this salmon?" he asked.
"Nay", said Finn, "but when I turned it on the spit my thumb was burnt, and I put it to my mouth".
"Take the Salmon of Knowledge and eat it", then said Finegas, "for in thee the prophecy is come true. And now go hence, for I can teach thee no more".
After that Finn became as wise as he was strong and bold, and it is said that whenever he wished to divine what would befall, or what was happening at a distance, he had but to put his thumb in his mouth and bite it, and the knowledge he wished for would be his.
No long time after that came the period of the year when Tara was troubled by a goblin or demon that came at nightfall and blew fireballs against the royal city, setting it in flames, and none could do battle with him, for as he came he played on a harp music so sweet that each man who heard it was lapped in dreams, and forgot all else on earth for the sake of listening to that music. When this was told to Finn he went to the king and said:
"Shall I, if I slay the goblin, have my father's place as captain of the Fianna?"
"Yea, surely", said the king, and he bound himself to this by an oath.
Now there was among the men-at-arms an old follower of Finn's father, Cumhal, who possessed a magic spear with a head of bronze and rivets of Arabian gold. The head was kept laced up in a leathern case; and it had the property that when the naked blade was laid against the forehead of a man it would fill him with a strength and a battle-fury that would make him invincible in every combat. This spear the old man Fiacha gave to Finn, and taught him how to use it, and with it he awaited the coming of the goblin on the ramparts at Tara. As night fell and mists began to gather in the wide plain around the Hill, he saw a shadowy form coming swiftly towards him, and heard the notes of the magic harp. But laying the spear to his brow he shook off the spell, and the phantom fled before him to the Fairy Mound of Slieve Fuad, and there Finn overtook and slew him, and bore back his head to Tara.
Then Cormac the King set Finn before the Fianna, and bade them all either swear obedience to him as their captain or seek service elsewhere. And first of all Goll mac Morna swore service, and then all the rest followed, and Finn became Captain of the Fianna of Erin, and ruled them till he died.
One day when Conan and certain others of the Fianna were hunting in the forest they came to a stately dùn, white-walled, with coloured thatching on the roof, and they entered it to seek hospitality. But when they were within they found no man, but a great empty hall with pillars of cedar-wood and silken hangings about it, like the hall of a wealthy lord. In the midst there was a table set forth with a sumptuous feast of boar's flesh and venison, and a great vat of yew-wood full of red wine, and cups of gold and silver. So they set themselves gaily to eat and drink, for they were hungry from the chase, and talk and laughter were loud across the board. But one of them ere long started to his feet with a cry of fear and wonder, and they all looked round, and saw before their eyes the tapestried walls changing to rough wooden beams, and the ceiling to foul sooty thatch like that of a herdsman's hut. So they knew they were being entrapped by some enchantment of the Fairy Folk, and all sprang to their feet and made for the doorway, that was no longer high and stately, but was shrinking to the size of a fox earth - all but Conan the Bald, who was gluttonously devouring the good things on the table, and heeded nothing else. Then they shouted to him, and as the last of them went out he strove to rise and follow, but found himself limed to the chair so that he could not stir. So two of the Fianna, seeing his plight, rushed back and seized his arms and tugged with all their might, and as they dragged him away they left the most part of his raiment and his skin sticking to the chair. Then, not knowing what else to do with him in his sore plight, they clapped upon his back the nearest thing they could find, which was the skin of a black sheep that they took from a peasant's flock hard by, and it grew there, and Conan wore it till his death.
Though Conan was a coward and rarely adventured himself in battle with the Fianna, it is told that once a good man fell by his hand. This was on the day of the great battle with the pirate horde on the Hill of Slaughter in Kerry. {The hill still bears the name, Knochanar. — TWR} For Liagan, one of the invaders, stood out before the hosts and challenged the bravest of the Fians to single combat, and the Fians in mockery thrust Conan forth to the fight. When he appeared Liagan laughed, for he had more strength than wit, and he said:
"Silly is thy visit, thou bald old man".
And as Conan still approached, Liagan lifted his hand fiercely, and Conan said:" Truly thou art in more peril from the man behind than from the man in front".
Liagan looked round; and in that instant Conan swept off his head, and then threw his sword and ran for shelter to the ranks of the laughing Fians. But Finn was very wroth because he had won the victory by a trick.
Then Finn sent to mac Luga and questioned him, but mac Luga could say nothing to the point as to why the Fianna would none of him. Then Finn taught him the things befitting a youth of noble birth and a captain of men, and they were these:
And the son of Luga, it is written, heeded these counsels, and gave up his bad ways, and he became one of the best of Finn's men.
It was said of him that "he gave away gold as if it were the leaves of the woodland, and silver as if it were the foam of the sea"; and that whatever he had bestowed upon any man, if he fell out with him afterwards, he was never known to bring it against him.
The poet Oisin once sang of him to St Patrick:
"These are the things that were dear to Finn -
The din of battle, the banquet's glee,
The bay of his hounds through the rough glen ringing,
And the blackbird singing in Letter Lee,
"The shingle grinding along the shore
When they dragged his war-boats down to sea,
The dawn wind whistling his spears among,
And the magic song of his minstrels three".
This was also told of Keelta after he had seen St Patrick and received the Faith. He chanced to be one day by Leyney, in Connacht, where the Fairy Folk of the Mound of Duma were wont to be sorely harassed and spoiled every year by pirates from oversea. They called Keelta to their aid, and by his counsel and valour the invaders were overcome and driven home; but Keelta was sorely wounded. The Keelta asked that Owen, the seer of the Fairy Folk, might foretell him how long he had to live, for he was already a very aged man. Owen said: "It will be seventeen years, O Keelta of fair fame, till thou fall by the pool of Tara, and grievous that will be to all the king's household".
"Even so did my chief and lord, my guardian and loving protector, Finn, foretell to me", said Keelta. "And now what fee will ye give me for my rescue of you from the worst affliction that ever befell you?"
"A great reward", said the Fairy Folk, "even youth; for by our art we shall change you into a young man again with all the strength and activity of your prime".
"Nay, God forbid", said Keelta, "that I should take upon me a shape of sorcery, or any other than that which my Maker, the true and glorious God, hath bestowed upon me".
And the Fairy Folk said: "It is the word of a true warrior and hero, and the thing that thou sayest is good".
So they healed his wounds and every bodily evil that he had, and he wished them blessing and victory, and went his way.
At last, as the chase went on down a valley-side, Finn saw the fawn stop and lie down, while the two hounds began to play round her, and to lick her face and limbs. So he gave commandment that none should hurt her, and she followed them to the Dùn of Allen, playing with the hounds as she went.
The same night Finn awoke and saw standing by his bed the fairest woman his eyes had ever beheld.
"I am Saba, O Finn", she said, "and I was the fawn ye chased today. Because I would not give my love to the Druid of the Fairy Folk, who is named the dark, he put that shape upon me by his sorceries, and I have borne it these three years. But a slave of his, pitying me, once revealed to me that if I could win to thy great Dùn of Allen, O Finn, I should be safe from all enchantments, and my natural shape would come to me again. But I feared to be torn in pieces by thy dogs, or wounded by thy hunters, till at last I let myself be overtaken by thee alone and by Bran and Skolawn, who have the nature of man and would do me no hurt".
"Have no fear, maiden", said Finn; "we, the Fianna, are free, and our guest-friends are free; there is none who shall put compulsion on you here",
So Saba dwelt with Finn, and he made her his wife; and so deep was his love for her that neither the battle nor the chase had any delight for him, and for months he never left her side. She also loved him as deeply, and their joy in each other was like that of the Immortals in the Land of Youth. But at last word came to Finn that the warships of the Northmen were in the Bay of Dublin, and he summoned his heroes to the fight; "For", said he to saba, "the men of Erin give us tribute and hospitality to defend them from the foreigner, and it were shame to take it from them and not to give that to which we, or our side, are pledged". And he called to mind that great saying of Goll mac Morna when they were once sore beset by a mighty host. "A man", said Goll, "lives after his life, but not after his honour".
Seven days was Finn absent, and he drove the Northmen from the shores of Erin. But on the eighth day he returned, and when he entered his dùn he saw trouble in the eyes of his men, and of their fair women-folk, and Saba was not on the rampart expecting his return. So he bade them tell him what had chanced, and they said:
"Whilst thou, our father and lord, wert afar off smiting the foreigner, and Saba looking ever down the pass for thy return, we saw one day as it were the likeness of thee approaching, and Bran and Skolawn at thy heels. And we seemed also to hear the notes of the Fian hunting-call blown on the wind. Then Saba hastened to the great gate, and we could not stay her, so eager was she to rush to the phantom. But when she came near she halted and gave a loud and bitter cry, and the shape of thee smote her with a hazel wand, and lo, there was no woman there any more, but a deer. Then those hounds chased it, and ever as it strove to reach again the gate of the dùn, they turned it back. We all now seized what arms we could and ran out to drive away the enchanter, but when we reached the place there was nothing to be seen, only still we heard the rushing of flying feet and the baying of dogs, and one thought it came from here, and another from there, till at last the uproar died away and all was still. What we could do, O Finn, we did; Saba is gone".
Finn then struck his hand on his breast, but spoke no word, and he went to his own chamber. No man saw him for the rest of that day, nor for the day after. Then he came forth, and ordered the matters of the Fianna as of old, but for seven years thereafter he went searching for Saba through every remote glen and dark forest and cavern of Ireland, and he would take no hounds with him save Bran and Skolawn. But at last he renounced all hope of finding her again, and went hunting as of old.
One day as he was following the chase on Ben Bulban, in Sligo, he heard the musical bay of the dogs change of a sudden to a fierce growling and yelping, as though they were in combat with some beast, and running hastily up, he and his men beheld, under a great tree, a naked boy with long hair, and around him the hounds struggling to seize him, but Bran and Skolawn fighting with them and keeping them off. And the lad was tall and shapely, and as the heroes gathered round he gazed undauntedly on them, never heeding the rout of dogs at his feet. The Fians beat off the dogs and brought the lad home with them, and Finn was very silent and continually searched the lad's countenance with his eyes. In time the use of speech came to him, and the story that he told was this:
He had known no father, and no mother save a gentle hind, with whom he lived in a most green and pleasant valley shut in on every side by towering cliffs that could not be scaled or by deep chasms in the earth. In the summer he lived on fruits and suchlike, and in the winter store of provisions was laid for him in a cave. And there came to them sometimes a tall, dark-visaged man, who spoke to his mother, now tenderly, and now in loud menace, but she always shrank away in fear, and the man departed in anger. At last there came a day when the dark man spoke very long with his mother in all tones of entreaty and of tenderness and of rage, but she would still keep aloof and give no sign save of fear and abhorrence. Then at length the dark man drew near and smote her with a hazel wand; and with that he turned and went his way, but she this time followed him, still looking back at her son and piteously complaining. And he, when he strove to follow, found himself unable to move a limb; and crying out with rage and desolation he fell to the earth, and his senses left him. When he came to himself he was on the mountainside on Ben Bulban, where he remained some days, searching for that green and hidden valley, which he never found again. And after a while the dogs found him; but of the hind his mother and of the dark Druid there is no man knows the end.
Finn called his name Oisin (Little Fawn), and he became a warrior of fame, but far more famous for the songs and tales that he made; so that of all things to this day that are told of the Fianna of Erin men are wont to say: "Thus sang the bard Oisin, son of Finn".
Then Finn said: "What is thy land and race, maiden, and what dost thou seek from me?"
"My name", she said, is Niam of the Golden hair. I am the daughter of the King of the Land of Youth, and that which has brought me here is the love of thy son Oisin". Then she turned to Oisin, and spoke to him in the voice of one who has never asked anything but it was granted to her.
"Wilt thou go with me, Oisin, to my father's land?"
And Oisin said: "That will I, and to the world's end"; for the fairy spell had so wrought upon his heart that he cared no more for any earthly thing but to have the love of Niam of the Head of Gold.
Then the maiden spoke of the Land Oversea to which she had summoned her lover, and as she spoke a dreamy stillness fell on all things, nor did a horse shake his bit, nor a hound bay, nor the least breath of wind stir in the forest trees till she had made an end. And what she said seemed sweeter and more wonderful as she spoke it than anything they could afterwards remember to have heard, but so far as they could remember it, it was this:
Delightful is the land beyond all dreams,
Fairer than aught thine eyes have ever seen.
There all the year the fruit is on the tree,
And all the year the bloom is on the flower.
There with wild honey drip the forest trees;
The stores of wine and mead shall never fail.
Nor pain nor sickness knows the dweller there,
Death and decay come near him never more.
The feast shall cloy not, nor the chase shall tire,
Nor music cease for ever through the hall;
The gold and jewels of the Land of Youth
Outshine all splendours ever dreamed by man.
Thou shalt have horses of the fairy breed,
Thou shalt have hounds that can outrun the wind;
A hundred chiefs shall follow thee in war,
A hundred maidens sing thee to thy sleep.
A crown of sovranty thy brow shall wear,
And by thy side a magic blade shall hang,
And thou shalt be lord of all the Land of Youth,
And lord of Niam of the Head of Gold.
As the magic song ended the Fians beheld Oisin mount the fairy steed and hold the maiden in his arms, and ere they could stir or speak she turned her horse's head and shook the ringing bridle, and down the forest glade they fled, as a beam of light flies over the land when clouds drive across the sun: and never did the Fianna behold Oisin son of Finn on earth again.
Yet what befell him afterwards is known. As his birth was strange, so was his end, for he saw the wonders of the Land of Youth with mortal eyes and lived to tell them with mortal lips.
At length, coming from the forest path into the great clearing where the Hill of Allen was wont to rise, broad and green, with its rampart enclosing many white-walled dwellings, and the great hall towering high in the midst, he saw but grassy mounds overgrown with rank weeds and whin bushes, and among them pastured a peasant's kine. Then a strange horror fell upon him and he thought some enchantment from the land of Faëry held his eyes and mocked him with false visions. He threw his arms abroad and shouted the names of Finn and Oscar, but none replied, and he thought that perchance the hounds might hear him, so he cried upon Bran and Skolawn and strained his ears if they might catch the faintest rustle or whisper of the world from the sight of which his eyes were holden, but he heard only the sighing of the wind in the whins. Then he rode in terror from that place, setting his face towards the eastern sea, for he meant to traverse Ireland from side to side and end to end in search of some escape from his enchantment.
When the people saw that the doom that had been wrought was not for them, they returned and found the old man prone on the ground with his face hidden in his arms. So they lifted him up, and asked who he was and what had befallen him. Oisin gazed round on them with dim eyes, and at last he said: "I was Oisin the son of Finn, and I pray ye tell me where he dwells, for his dùn on the Hill of Allen is now a desolation, and I have neither seen him nor heard his hunting-horn from the western to the eastern sea".
Then the men gazed strangely on each other and on Oisin, and the overseer asked: "Of what Finn dost thou speak, for there be many of that name in Erin?"
Oisin said: "Surely of Finn mac Cumhal mac Trenmòr, captain of the Fianna of Erin".
Then the overseer said: "Thou art daft, old man, and thou hast made us daft to take thee for a youth as we did a while agone. But we at least have now our wits again, and we know that Finn son of Cumhal and all his generation have been dead these three hundred years. At the battle of Gowra fell Oscar, son of Oisin, and Finn at the battle of Brea, as the historians tell us; and the lays of Oisin, whose death no man knows the manner of, are sung by our harpers at great men's feasts. But now that Talkenn, {"Talkenn", or "Adze-head", was a name given to St patrick by the Irish. Probably it referred to the shape of his tonsure. — TWR} Patrick, has come into Ireland, and has preached to us the One God and Christ His Son, by whose might these old days and ways are done away with; and Finn and his Fianna, with their feasting and hunting and songs of war and of love, have no such reverence among us as the monks and virgins of Holy Patrick, and the psalms and prayers that go up daily to cleanse us from sin and save us from the fire of judgment".
But Oisin replied, only half hearing and still less comprehending what was said to him: "If thy God have slain Finn and Oscar, I would say that God is a strong man".
Then they all cried out upon him, and some picked up stones, but the overseer bade them let him be until the Talkenn had spoken with him, and till he should order what was to be done.
Oisin and Patrick So they brought him to Patrick, who treated him gently and hospitably, and to Patrick he told the story of all that had befallen him. But Patrick bade his scribes write all carefully down, that the memory of the heroes whom Oisin had known, and of the joyous and free life they had led in the woods and glens and wild places of Erin, should never be forgotten among men.
This remarkable legend is known only in the modern Irish poem written by Michael Comyn about 1750, a poem which may be called the swan-song of Irish literature. Doubtless Comyn worked on earlier traditional material; but though the ancient Ossianic poems tell us of the prolongation of Oisin's life, so that he could meet St Patrick and tell him stories of the Fianna, the episodes of Niam's courtship and the sojourn in the Land of Youth are known to us at present only in the poem of Michael Comyn.
Finn, it is said, and Conan the Bald, with Finn's two favourite hounds, were watching the hunt from the very top of the Hill of Keshcorran and listening to the cries of the beaters and the notes of the horn and the baying of the dogs when, in moving about on the hill, they came upon the mouth of a great cavern, before which sat three hags of evil and revolting aspect. On three crooked sticks of holly they had twisted left-handwise hanks of yarn, and were spinning with these when Finn and his followers arrived. To view them more closely the warriors drew near, when they found themselves suddenly entangled in strands of the yarn which the hags had spun about the place like the web of a spider, and deadly faintness and trembling came over them, so that they were easily bound fast by the hags and carried into the dark recesses of the cave. Others of the party then arrived, looking for Finn. All suffered the same experience - they lost all their pith and valour at the touch of the bewitched yarn, and were bound and carried into the cave, until the whole party were laid in bonds, with the dogs baying and howling outside.
The witches now seized their sharp, wide-channelled, hard-tempered swords, and were about to fall on the captives and slay them, but first they looked round at the mouth of the cave to see if there was any straggler whom they had not yet laid hold of. At this moment Goll mac Morna, "the raging lion, the torch of onset, the great of soul" came up, and a desperate combat ensued, which ended by Goll cleaving two of the hags in twain, and then subduing and binding the third, whose name was Irnan. She, as he was bout to slay her, begged for mercy - "Surely it were better for thee to have the Fianna whole" - and he gave her her life if she would release the prisoners.
Into the cave they went, and one by one the captives were unbound, beginning with the poet Fergus Truelips and the "men of science", and they all sat down on the hill to recover themselves, while Fergus sang a chant of praise in honour of the rescuer, Goll; and Irnan disappeared.
Ere long a monster was seen approaching them, a "gnarled hag" with blazing, bloodshot eyes, a yawning mouth full of ragged fangs, nails like a wild beast's, and armed like a warrior. She laid Finn under geise to provide her with single combat from among his men until she should have her fill of it. It was no other than the third sister, Irnan, whom Goll had spared. Finn in vain begged Oisin, Oscar, Keelta, and the other prime warriors of the Fianna to meet her; they all pleaded inability after the ill-treatment and contumely they had received. At last, as Finn himself was about to do battle with her, Goll said: "O Finn, combat with a crone beseems thee not", and he drew sword for a second time with this horrible enemy. At last, after a desperate combat, he ran her through her shield and through her heart, so that the blade stuck out at the far side, and she fell dead. The Fianna then sacked the dùn of Conaran, and took possession of all the treasure in it, while Finn bestowed on Goll mac Morna his own daughter, Keva of the White Skin, and, leaving the dùn a heap of glowing embers, they returned to the Hill of Allen.
This introduction, it may be observed, bears strong signs of being a later addition to the original tale, made in a less understanding age or by a less thoughtful class into whose hands the legend had descended. The real meaning of the transformation which it narrates is probably much deeper.
The story goes on to say that not long after this the hounds of Finn, Bran and Skolawn, started a fawn near the Hill of Allen, and it ran northwards till the chase ended on top of Slievegallion, a mountain which, like Slievenamon {Pronounced "Sleeve-na-mon": accent on the last syllable. It means the Mountain of the [Fairy] Women. — TWR} in the south, was in ancient Ireland a veritable focus of Danaan magic and legendary lore. Finn followed the hounds alone till the fawn disappeared on the mountain-side. In searching for it, Finn at last came on the little lake which lies on top of the mountain, and saw by its brink a lady of wonderful beauty who sat there lamenting and weeping. Finn asked her the cause of her grief. She explained that a gold ring which she dearly loved had fallen from her finger into the lake, and she charged Finn by the bonds of geise that he should plunge in and find it for her.
Finn did so, and after diving into every recess of the lake he discovered the ring and, before leaving the water, gave it to the lady. She immediately plunged into the lake and disappeared. Finn then surmised that some enchantment was being wrought on him, and ere long he knew what it was, for on stepping forth on dry land he fell down from sheer weakness and arose again, a tottering and feeble old man, snowy-haired and withered, so that even his faithful hounds did not know him, but ran round the lake searching for their lost master.
Meantime Finn was missed from his palace on the Hill of Allen, and a party soon set out on the track on which he had been seen to chase the deer. They came to the lakeside on Slievegallion, and found there a wretched and palsied old man, whom they questioned, but who could do nothing but beat his breast and moan. At last, beckoning Keelta to come near, the aged man whispered faintly some words into his ear, and lo, it was Finn himself. When the Fianna had ceased from their cries of wonder and lamentation, Finn whispered to Keelta the tale of his enchantment, and told them that the author of it must be the daughter of Cullan the Smith, who dwelt in the Fairy mound of Slevegallion.
The Fianna, bearing Finn on a litter, immediately went to the Mound and began to dig fiercely. For three days and nights they dug at the Fairy mound, and at last penetrated to its inmost recesses, when a maiden suddenly stood before them holding a drinking-horn of red gold. It was given to Finn. He drank from it, and at once his beauty and form were restored to him, but his hair still remained white as silver. This too would have been restored by another draught, but Finn let it stay as it was, and silver-white his hair remained to the day of his death.
The tale has been made the subject of a very striking allegorical drama, "The Masque of Finn", by Mr Standish O'Grady who, rightly no doubt, interprets the story as symbolising the acquisition of wisdom and understanding through suffering. A leader of men must descend into the lake of tears and know feebleness and despair before his spirit can sway them to great ends.
There is an antique sepulchral monument on the mountain-top which the peasantry of the district still regard - or did in the days before Board schools - as the abode of the "Witch of the Lake"; and a mysterious beaten path, which was never worn by the passage of human feet, and which leads from the rock sepulchre to the lake side, is ascribed to the going to and fro of this supernatural being.
"O Well of the Strand of the Two Women, beautiful are thy cresses, luxuriant, branching; since thy produce is neglected on thee thy brooklime is not suffered to grow. Forth from thy banks thy trout are to be seen, thy wild swine in the wilderness; the deer of thy fair hunting crag-land, thy dappled and red-chested fawns! Thy mast all hanging on the branches of the trees; thy fish in estuaries of the rivers; lovely the colours of thy purling streams, O thou that art azure-hued, and again green with reflections of the surrounding copse-wood". {Tramslation by S H O'Grady. — TWR}
Keelta goes on with another tale of the Fianna, and Patrick, now fairly caught in the toils of the enchanter, cries: "Success and benediction attend thee, Keelta! This is to me a lightening of spirit and mind. And now tell us another tale."
So ends the exordium of the "Colloquy". As usual in the openings of Irish tales, nothing could be better contrived; the touch is so light, there is so happy a mingling of pathos, poetry, and humour, and so much dignity in the sketching of the human characters introduced. The rest of the piece consists in the exhibition of a vast amount of topographical and legendary lore by Keelta, attended by the invariable "Success and benediction attend thee!" of Patrick.
They move together, the warrior and the saint, on Patrick's journey to Tara, and whenever Patrick or some one else in the company sees a hill or a fort or a well, he asks Keelta what it is, and Keelta tells its name and a Fian legend to account for it, and so the story wanders on though a maze of legendary lore until they are met by a company from Tara, with the king at its head, who then takes up the rôle of questioner.
The "Colloquy", as we have it now, breaks off abruptly as the story how the Lia Fail was carried off from Ireland is about to be narrated. The interest of the "Colloquy" lies in the tales of Keelta and the lyrics introduced in the course of them. Of the tales there are about a hundred, telling of Fian raids and battles and love-makings and feastings, but the greater number of them have to do with the intercourse between the Fairy Folk and the Fianna. With these folk the Fianna have constant relations, both of love and of war. Some of the tales are of great elaboration, wrought out in the highest style of which the writer was capable. One of the best is that of the fairy Brugh, or mansion of Slievenamon, which Patrick and Keelta chance to pass by, and of which Keelta tells the following history:
After the Fian warriors have been entertained with the finest of viands and liquors, it is explained to them that their hosts are Donn, son of Midir the Proud, and his brother, and that they are at war with the rest of the Danaan folk, and have to do battle with them thrice yearly on the green before the Brugh. At first each of the twenty-eight had a thousand warriors under him. Now all are slain except those present, and the survivors have sent out one of their maidens in the shape of a fawn to entice the Fianna to their fairy palace and to gain their aid in the battle that must be delivered tomorrow.
We have, in fact, a variant of the well-known theme of the rescue of fairyland. Finn and his companions are always ready for a fray, and a desperate battle ensues which lasts from evening till morning, for the fairy host attack at night. The assailants are beaten off, losing over a thousand of their number; but Oscar, Dermot and mac Luga are sorely wounded. They are healed by magical herbs; and more fighting and other adventures follow until, after a year has passed, Finn compels the enemy to make peace and give hostages, when the Fianna return to earth and rejoin their fellows.
No sooner has Keelta finished his tale, standing on the very spot where they had found the fairy palace on the night of snow, than a young warrior is seen approaching them. He is thus described: "A shirt of royal satin was next his skin; over and outside it a tunic of the same fabric; and a fringed crimson mantle, confined with a bodkin of gold, upon his breast; in his hand a gold-hilted sword, and a golden helmet on his head". A delight in the colour and material splendour of life is a very marked feature in all this literature. This splendid figure turns out to be Donn mac Midir, one of the eight-and-twenty whom Finn had succoured, and he come to do homage for himself and his people to St Patrick, who accepts entertainment from him for the night; for in the "Colloquy" the relations between the Church and the Fairy World are very cordial.
Three young warriors, accompanied by a giant hound, come to take service with Finn. They make their agreement with him, saying what services they can render and what reward they expect, and they make it a condition that they shall camp apart from the rest of the host, and that when night has fallen no man shall come near them of see them.
Finn asks the reason for this prohibition, and it is this: of the three warriors one has to die each night, and the other two must watch him; therefore they would not be disturbed. There is no explanation of this; the writer simply leaves us with the thrill of the mystery upon us.
The maiden explained that she had been betrothed against her will to a suitor named Aeda, son of a neighbouring king; and that hearing from a fisherman, who had been blown to her shores, of the power and nobleness of Finn, she had come to seek his protection. While she was speaking, suddenly the Fianna were aware of another giant form close at hand. It was a young man, smooth-featured and of surpassing beauty, who bore a red shield and a huge spear. Without a word he drew near, and before the wondering Fianna could accost him he thrust his spear through the body of the maiden and passed away. Finn, enraged at this violation of his protection, called on his chiefs to pursue and slay the murderer. Keelta and others chased him to the sea-shore, but he strode out to sea, and was met by a galley which bore him away to unknown regions. Returning, discomfited, to Finn, they found the girl dying. She distributed her gold and jewels among them, and the Fianna buried her under a great mound, and raised a pillar over her with her name in Ogham letters, in the place since called the Ridge of the Dead Woman.
In this tale we have, besides the element of mystery, that of beauty. It is an association of frequent occurrence in this period of Celtic literature; and to this, perhaps, is due the fact that although these tales seem to come from nowhere and lead to nowhither, but move in a dream-world where there is no chase but seems to end in fairyland and no combat that has any relation to earthly needs or objects, where all realities are apt to dissolve in a magic light and to change their shapes like morning mist, yet they linger in the memory with that haunting charm which has for many centuries kept them alive by the fireside of the Gaelic peasant.
What relation, then, do these dialogues bear to the Keelta-and-Patrick dialogues with which we make acquaintance in the "Colloquy"? The questions which really came first, where they respectively originated, and what current of thought or sentiment each represented, constitute, as Mr Alfred Nutt has pointed out, a literary problem of the greatest interest, and one which no critic has yet attempted to solve or, indeed, until quite lately, even to call attention to. For though these two attempts to represent, in imaginative and artistic form, the contact of paganism with Christianity are nearly identical in machinery and framework, save that one is in verse and the other in prose, yet they differ widely in their point of view.
In the Oisin dialogues {Examples of these have been published, with translations, in the "Transactions of the Ossianic Society". — TWR} there is a great deal of rough humour and of crude theology, resembling those of an English miracle-play rather than any Celtic product that I am acquainted with. St Patrick in these ballads, as Mr Nutt remarks, "is a sour and stupid fanatic, harping with wearisome monotony on the damnation of Finn and all his comrades; a hard taskmaster to the poor old blind giant to whom he grudges food, and upon whom he plays shabby tricks in order to terrify him into acceptance of Christianity". Now in the "Colloquy" there is not one word of all this. Keelta embraces Christianity with a wholehearted reverence, and salvation is not denied to the friends and companions of his youth. Patrick, indeed, assures Keelta of the salvation of several of them, including Finn himself. One of the Danaan folk, who has been bard to the Fianna, delighted Patrick with his minstrelsy. Brogan, the scribe whom St Patrick is employing to write down the Fian legends, says: "If music there is in heaven, why should there not be on earth? Wherefore is it not right to banish minstrelsy?"
Patrick made answer: "Neither say I any such thing"; and, in fact, the minstrel is promised heaven for his art.
Such are the pleasant relations that prevail in the "Colloquy" between the representatives of the two epochs. Keelta represents all that is courteous, dignified, generous, and valorous in paganism, and Patrick all that is benign and gracious in Christianity; and instead of the two epochs standing over against each other in violent antagonism, and separated by an impassable gulf, all the finest traits in each are seen to harmonise with and to supplement those of the other.
Dermot's father, Donn, gave the child to be nurtured by Angus Òg in his palace on the Boyne. His mother, who was unfaithful to Donn, bore another child to Roc, the steward of Angus. Donn, one day, when the steward's child ran between his knees to escape from some hounds that were fighting on the floor of the hall, gave him a squeeze with his two knees that killed him on the spot, and he then flung the body among the hounds on the floor. When the steward found his son dead, and discovered (with Finn's aid) the cause of it, he brought a Druid rod and smote the body with it, whereupon, in place of the dead child, there arose a huge boar without ears or tail, and to it he spake: "I charge you to bring Dermot O'Dyna to his death"; and the boar rushed out from the hall and roamed in the forests of Ben Bulben in Co Sligo till the time when his destiny should be fulfilled.
But Dermot grew up into a splendid youth, tireless in the chase, undaunted in war, beloved by all his comrades of the Fianna, whom he joined as soon as he was of age to do so.
When they sat down to dinner the wether got up and mounted on the table. One after another the Fianna strove to throw it off, but it shook them down on the floor. At last Goll succeeded in flinging it off the table, but him too it vanquished in the end, and put them all under its feet. Then the old man bade the cat lead the wether back and fasten it up, and it did so easily. The four champions, overcome with shame, were for leaving the house at once; but the old man explained that they had suffered no discredit - the wether they had been fighting with was the World, and the cat was the power that would destroy the world itself, namely, Death.
At night the four heroes went to rest in a large chamber, and the young maid came to sleep in the same room; and it is said that her beauty made a light on the walls of the room like a candle. One after another the Fianna went over to her couch, but she repelled them all. "I belonged to you once", she said to each, "and I never will again".
Last of all Dermot went.
"O Dermot", she said, "you also I belonged to once, and I never can again, for I am Youth; but come here and I will put a mark on you so that no woman can ever see you without loving you".
Then she touched his forehead, and left the Love Spot there; and that drew the love of women to him as long as he lived.
Finn and his companions, finding that Dermot did not return to them, found their way up the cliffs, and having traversed the forest, entered a great cavern which ultimately led them out to the same land as that in which Dermot had arrived. There too, they are informed, are the fourteen Fianna who had been carried off on the mare of the Hard Gilly. He, of course, was the king who needed their services, and who had taken this method of decoying some thirty of the flower of Irish fighting men to his side. Finn and his men go into battle with the best of goodwill, and scatter the enemy like chaff; Oscar slays the son of the rival king (who is called the King of "Greece"). Finn wins the love of his daughter, Tasha of the White Arms, and the story closes with a delightful mixture of gaiety and mystery.
"What reward wilt thou have for they good services?" asks the fairy king of Finn.
"Thou wert once in service with me", replies Finn, "and I mind not that I gave thee any recompense. Let one service stand against the other."
"Never shall I agree to that", cries Conan the Bald. "Shall I have nought for being carried off on thy wild mare and haled oversea?"
"What wilt thou have?" asks the fairy king.
"None of thy gold or goods", replies Conan, "but mine honour hath suffered, and let mine honour be appeased. Set thirteen of thy fairest womenfolk on the wild mare, O King, and thine own wife clinging to her tail, and let them be transported into Erin in like manner as we were dragged here, and I shall deem the indignity we have suffered fitly atoned for."
On this the king smiled and, turning to Finn said: "O Finn, behold thy men".
Finn turned to look at them, but when he looked round again the scene had changed - the fairy king and his host and all the world of Faëry had disappeared, and he found himself with his companions and the fair-armed Tasha standing on the beach of the little bay in Kerry whence the Hard Gilly and the mare had taken the water and carried off his men. And then all started with cheerful hearts for the great standing camp of the Fianna on the Hill of Allen to celebrate the wedding feast of Finn and Tasha.
"A fair maiden is betrothed to a renowned and mighty suitor much older than herself. She turns from him to seek a younger lover, and fixes her attention on one of his followers, a gallant and beautiful youth whom she persuades, in spite of his reluctance, to fly with her. After evading pursuit they settle down for a while at a distance from the defrauded lover, who bides his time, till at last, under cover of a treacherous reconciliation, he procures the death of his younger rival and retakes possession of the lady."
Were a student of Gaelic legend asked to listen to the above synopsis, and to say to what Irish tale it referred, he would certainly reply that it must be either the tale of the Pursuit of Dermot and Grania, or that of the Fate of the Sons of Usna; but which of them it was it would be quite impossible for him to tell. Yet in tone and temper the two stories are as wide apart as the poles.
Grania, after going through all the company, asks: "Who is that man with the spot on his brow, with the sweet voice, with curling dusky hair and rudy cheek?"
"That is Dermot O'Dyna", replies the Druid, "the white-toothed, of the lightsome countenance, in all the world the best lover of women and maidens".
Grania now prepares a sleepy draught which she palces in a drinking-cup and passes round by her handmaid to the king, to Finn, and to all the company except the chiefs of the Fianna. When the draught has done its work she goes to Oisin. "Wilt thou receive courtship from me, Oisin?" she asks.
"That will I not", says Oisin, "nor from any woman that is betrothed to Finn".
Grania, who knew very well what Oisin's answer would be, now turns to her real mark, Dermot. He at first refuses to have anything to do with her. "I put thee under bonds [geise], O Dermot, that thou take me out of Tara tonight".
Evil are these bonds, Grania", says Dermot; "and wherefore hast thou put them on me before all the kings' sons that feast at this table?"
Grania then explains that she has loved Dermot ever since she saw him, years ago, from her sunny bower, take part in and win a great hurling match on the green at Tara. Dermot, still very reluctant, pleads the merits of Finn, and urges also that Finn has the keys of the royal fortress so that they cannot pass out at night. "There is a secret wicket-gate in my bower", says Grania.
"I am under geise not to pass through any wicket-gate", replies Dermot, still struggling against his destiny.
Grania will have none of these subterfuges - any Fian warrior, she has been told, can leap over a palisade with the aid of a spear as a jumping-pole; and she goes off to make ready for the elopement.
Dermot, in great perplexity, appeals to Oisin, Oscar, Keelta, and the others as to what he should do. They all bade him keep his geise - the bonds that Grania had laid on him to succour her - and he takes leave of them with tears.
Outside the wicket-gate he again begs Grania to return. "It is certain that I will not go back", says Grania, "nor part from thee till death part us."
"Then go forward, O Grania", says Dermot.
After they had gone a mile, "I am truly weary, O grandson of Dyna", says Grania.
"It is a good time to be weary", says Dermot, making a last effort to rid himself of the entanglement, "and return now to thy household again, for I pledge the word of a true warrior that I will never carry thee nor any other woman to all eternity."
"There is no need", replies Grania, and she directs him where to find horses and a chariot, and Dermot, now finally accepting the inevitable, yokes them, and they proceed on their way to the Ford of Luan on the Shannon. {Now Athlone (Atha Luain) — TWR}.
This hint that he was keeping at too respectful a distance was taken by Dermot. The die is now cast, and he will never again meet Finn and his old comrades except at the point of the spear.
The tale now loses much of the originality and charm of its opening scene, and recounts in a somewhat mechanical manner a number of episodes in which Dermot is attacked or besieged by the Fianna, and rescues himself and his lady by miracles of boldness or dexterity, or by the aid of the magical devices of his foster-father, Angus Òg. They are chased all over Ireland, and the dolmens in that country are popularly associated with them, being called in the traditions of the peasantry "Beds of Dermot and Grania".
Grania's character is drawn throughout with great consistency. She is not an heroic woman - hers are not the simple, ardent impulses and unwavering devotion of a Deirdre. The latter is far more primitive. Grania is a curiously modern and what would be called a "neurotic" type - wilful, restless, passionate, but full of feminine fascination.
But Grania is not satisfied until "the two best men that are in Erin, namely, Cormac, son of Art and Finn son of Cumhal", have been entertained in her house. "And how do we know", she adds, "but our daughter might then get a fitting husband?"
Dermot agrees with some misgiving; the king and Finn accept the invitation, and they and their retinues are feasted for a year at Rath Grania.
But three times the hound's voice awakens him, and on the morrow he goes forth armed with sword and sling, and followed by his own hound, to see what is afoot.
On the mountains of Ben Bulben in Sligo he comes across Finn with a hunting-party of the Fianna. They are not now hunting, however; they are being hunted; for they have roused up the enchanted boar without ears or tail, the Boar of Ben Bulben, which has slain thirty of them that morning. "And do thou come away", says Finn, knowing well that Dermot will never retreat from a danger, "for thou art under geise not to hunt pig."
"How is that?" says Dermot, and Finn then tells him the weird story of the death of the steward's son and his revivification in the form of this boar, with its mission of vengeance.
"By my word", quote Dermot, "it is to slay me that thou has made this hunt, O Finn; and if it be here that I am fated to die, I have no power now to shun it."
The beast then appears on the face of the mountain, and Dermot slips the hound at him, but the hound flies in terror. Dermot then slings a stone which strikes the boar fairly in the middle of his forehead but does not even scratch his skin. The beast is close on him now, and Dermot strikes him with his sword, but the weapon flies in two and not a bristle of the boar is cut. In the charge of the boar Dermot flies over him, and is carried for a space clinging to his back; but at last the boar shakes him off to the ground, and making "an eager, exceeding mighty spring" upon him, rips out his bowels, while at the same time, with the hilt of the sword still in his hand, Dermot dashes out the brains of the beast, and it falls dead beside him.
Dermot reminds Finn of how he once rescued him from deadly peril when attacked during a feast at the house of Derc, and begs him to heal him with a draught of water from his hands, for Finn had the magic gift of restoring any wounded man to health with a draught of well-water drawn in his two hands.
"Here is no well", says Finn.
"That is not true", says Dermot, "for nine paces from you is the best well of pure water in the world."
Finn, at last, on the entreaty of Oscar and the Fianna, and after the recital of many deeds done for his sake by Dermot in the old days, goes to the well, but ere he brings the water to Dermot's side he lets it fall through his fingers. A second time he goes, and a second time he lets the water fall, "having thought upon Grania", and Dermot gave a sigh of anguish on seeing it.
Oscar then declares that if Finn does not bring the water promptly either he or Finn will never leave the hill alive, and Finn goes once more to the well, but it is now too late; Dermot is dead before the healing draught can reach his lips. Then Finn takes the hound of Dermot, the chiefs of the Fianna lay their cloaks over the dead man, and they return to Rath Grania.
Grania, seeing the hound led by Finn, conjectures what has happened, and swoons upon the rampart of the Rath. Oisin, when she has revived, gives her the hound, against Finn's will, and the Fianna troop away, leaving her to her sorrow.
When the people og Grania's household go out to fetch in the body of Dermot they find there Angus Òg and his company of the People of Dana, who, after raising three bitter and terrible cries, bear away the body on a gilded bier, and Angus declares that though he cannot restore the dead to life, "I will send a soul into him so that he may talk with me each day."
Grania is at first enraged with Finn, and sends her sons abroad to learn feats of arms, so that they may take vengeance upon him when the time is ripe. But Finn, wily and far-seeing as he is portrayed in this tale, knows how to forestall this danger. When the tragedy on Ben Bulben has begun to grow a little faint in the shallow soul of Grania, he betakes himself to her, and though met at first with scorn and indignation, he woos her so sweetly and with such tenderness that at last he brings her to his will, and he bears her back as a bride to the Hill of Allen. When the Fianna see the pair coming towards them in this loving guise they burst into a shout of laughter and derision, "so that Grania bowed her head in shame".
"We trow, O Finn", cries Oisin, "that thou wilt keep Grania well from henceforth."
So Grania made peace with Finn and her sons, and dwelt with Finn as his wife until he died.
After the death of Cormac mac Art, his son Cairbry came to the High-Kingship of Ireland. He had a fair daughter named Sgeimh Solais (Light of Beauty), who was asked in marriage by a son of the King of the Decies. The marriage was arranged, and the Fianna claimed a ransom or tribute of twenty ingots of gold which, it is said, was customarily paid to them on these occasions. It would seem that the Fianna had now grown to be a distinct power within the State, and an oppressive one, exacting heavy tributes and burdensome privileges from kings and sub-kings all over Ireland. Cairbry resolved to break them; and he thought he had now a good opportunity to do so. He therefore refused payment of the ransom, and summoned all the provincial kings to help him against the Fianna, the main body of whom immediately went into rebellion for what they deemed their rights. The old feud between Clan Bascna and Clan Morna now broke out afresh, the latter standing by the High King, while Clan Bascna, aided by the King of Munster and his forces, who alone took their side, marched against Cairbry.
My son urged his course
Through the battalions of Tara
Like a hawk through a flock of birds
Or a rock descending a mountain-side.
I found my own son lying down
On his left elbow, his shield by his side;
His right hand clutched the sword,
The blood poured through his mail.
Oscar gazed up at me -
Woe to me was the sight!
He stretched out his two arms to me,
Endeavouring to rise to meet me.
I grasped the hand of my son
And sat down by his left side;
And since I sat by him there,
I have recked nought of the world.
When Finn (in the Scottish version) comes to bewail his grandson, he cries:
Woe, that it was not I who fell
In the fight of the bare sunny Gavra,
And you were east and west
Marching before the Fians, Oscar.
But Oscar replies;
Were it you that fell
In the fight of bare sunny Gavra,
One sigh, east or west,
Would not be heard for you from Oscar.
No man ever knew
A heart of flesh was in my breast,
But a heart of twisted horn
And a sheath of steel over it.
But the howling of dogs beside me,
And the wail of the old heroes,
And the weeping of the women by turns,
'Tis that vexes my heart.
Oscar dies, after thanking the gods for his father's safety, and Oisin and Keelta raise him on a bier of spears and carry him off under his banner, "The Terrible Sheaf", for burial on the field where he died, and where a great green burial mound is still associated with his name.
Finn takes no part in the battle. He is said to have come "in a ship" to view the field afterwards, and he wept over Oscar, a thing he had never done save once before, for his hound, Bran, whom he himself killed by accident. Possibly the reference to the ship is an indication that he had by this time passed away, and came to revisit the earth from the oversea kingdom of Death.
There is in this tale of the Battle of Gowra a melancholy grandeur which gives it a place apart in the Ossianic literature. It is a fitting dirge for a great legendary epoch. Campbell tells us that the Scottish crofters and shepherds were wont to put off their bonnets when they recited it. He adds a strange and thrilling piece of modern folk-lore bearing on it. Two men, it is said, were out at night, probably sheep-stealing or on some other predatory occupation, and telling Fian tales as they went, when they observed two giant and shadowy figures talking to each other across the glen. One of the apparitions said to the other: "Do you see that man down below? I was the second doorpost of battle on the day of Gowra, and that man knows all about it better than myself".