Chapter VII: Introduction

The version given in the following pages of the well-known tale of Deirdre has been translated from the Irish text of the Book of Leinster version as printed by Windisch in Irische Texte, vol. i. Readings from the two parallel texts of the Book of Lecan, and Egerton, 1782, have been used where the Leinster text is deficient or doubtful, but the older MS. has in the main been followed, the chief alterations being indicated in the notes. The only English translation hitherto given of this version is the unreliable one in Atlantis, vol. iii. There is a German translation in Thurneysen's Sagen aus dem alten Irland which may be consulted for literal renderings of most of the verse portions, which, however, are sometimes nearer the original than Thurneysen's renderings.

It was at first intended to place beside this version the much better known version of the tale given by the Glenn Masain manuscript and its variants; but, as this version is otherwise available in English,[FN#38] it has been thought better to omit most of it: a verse translation of Deirdre's final lament in this version has, however, been added for the purpose of comparing it with the corresponding lament in the Leinster text. These two poems are nearly of the same length, but have no other point in common; the lament in the Leinster version strikes the more personal note, and it has been suggested that it shows internal evidence that it must have been written by a woman. The idea of Deirdre as a seer, which is so prominent in the Glenn Masain version of the tale, does not appear in the older Leinster text; the supernatural Druidic mist, which even in the Glenn Masain version only appears in the late manuscript which continues the story after the fifteenth-century manuscript breaks off, does not appear in the Book of Leinster; and the later version introduces several literary artifices that do not appear in the earlier one. That portion of the Glenn Masain version immediately following after Deirdre's lament is given as an instance of one of these, the common artifice of increase of horror at a catastrophe by the introduction of irrelevant matter, the tragedy of Deirdre's death being immediately followed by a cheerful account of the relationships of the chief heroes of the Heroic Period; a still better example of this practice in the old Irish literature is the almost comic relief that is introduced at the most tragic part of the tale of the murder of the son of Ronan.

[FN#38] See Irische Texte, vol. ii., and the Celtic Review, vol. i. 1904-1905.

THE EXILE OF THE SONS OF USNACH

BOOK OF LEINSTER VERSION

In the house of Feidlimid,[FN#39] the son of Dall, even he who was the narrator of stories to Conor the king, the men of Ulster sat at their ale; and before the men, in order to attend upon them, stood the wife of Feidlimid, and she was great with child. Round about the board went drinking-horns, and portions of food; and the revellers shouted in their drunken mirth. And when the men desired to lay themselves down to sleep, the woman also went to her couch; and, as she passed through the midst of the house, the child cried out in her womb, so that its shriek was heard throughout the whole house, and throughout the outer court that lay about it. And upon that shriek, all the men sprang up; and, head closely packed by head, they thronged together in the house, whereupon Sencha, the son of Ailill, rebuked them: "Let none of you stir!" cried he, "and let the woman be brought before us, that we may learn what is the meaning of that cry." Then they brought the woman before them, and thus spoke to her Feidlimid, her spouse:

What is that, of all cries far the fiercest, In thy womb raging loudly and long? Through all ears with that clamour thou piercest; With that scream, from Bides swollen and strong: Of great woe, for that cry, is foreboding my heart; That is torn through with terror, and sore with the smart.

[FN#39] Pronounced Feylimid.

Then the woman turned her, and she approached Cathbad[FN#40] the Druid, for he was a man of knowledge, and thus she spoke to him:

[FN#40] Pronounced Cah-ba.

Give thou ear to me, Cathbad, thou fair one of face, Thou great crown of our honour, and royal in race; Let the man so exalted still higher be set, Let the Druid draw knowledge, that Druids can get. For I want words of wisdom, and none can I fetch; Nor to Felim a torch of sure knowledge can stretch: As no wit of a woman can wot what she bears, I know naught of that cry from within me that tears.

And then said Cathbad:

'Tis a maid who screamed wildly so lately, Fair and curling shall locks round her flow, And her eyes be blue-centred and stately; And her cheeks, like the foxglove, shall glow. For the tint of her skin, we commend her, In its whiteness, like snow newly shed; And her teeth are all faultless in splendour And her lips, like to coral, are red: A fair woman is she, for whom heroes, that fight In their chariots for Ulster, to death shall be dight.

'Tis a woman that shriek who hath given, Golden-haired, with long tresses, and tall; For whose love many chiefs shall have striven, And great kings for her favours shall call. To the west she shall hasten, beguiling A great host, that from Ulster shall steal: Red as coral, her lips shall be smiling, As her teeth, white as pearls, they reveal: Aye, that woman is fair, and great queens shall be fain Of her form, that is faultless, unflawed by a stain.

Then Cathbad laid his hand upon the body of the woman; and the little child moved beneath his hand: "Aye, indeed," he said, "it is a woman child who is here: Deirdre shall be her name, and evil woe shall be upon her."

Now some days after that came the girl child into the world; and then thus sang Cathbad:

O Deirdre! of ruin great cause thou art; Though famous, and fair, and pale: Ere that Felim's hid daughter from life shall part, All Ulster her deeds shall wail.

Aye, mischief shall come, in the after-time, Thou fair shining maid, for thee; Hear ye this: Usna's sons, the three chiefs sublime, To banishment forced shall be.

While thou art in life, shall a fierce wild deed In Emain, though late, be done: Later yet, it shall mourn it refused to heed The guard of Rog's powerful son.

O lady of worth! It is to thee we owe That Fergus to exile flies; That a son of king Conor we hail in woe, When Fiachna[FN#41] is hurt, and dies.

O lady of worth! It is all thine the guilt! Gerrc, Illadan's son, is slain; And when Eogan mac Doorha's great life is spilt, Not less shall be found our pain.

Grim deed shalt thou do, and in wrath shalt rave Against glorious Ulster's king: In that spot shall men dig thee thy tiny grave; Of Deirdre they long shall sing.

[FN#41] Pronounced Feena.

"Let that maiden be slain!" cried out the young men of Ulster; but "Not so!" said Conor; "she shall in the morning be brought to me, and shall be reared according to my will, and she shall be my wife, and in my companionship shall she dwell."

The men of Ulster were not so hardy as to turn him from his purpose, and thus it was done. The maiden was reared in a house that belonged to Conor, and she grew up to be the fairest maid in all Ireland. She was brought up at a distance from the king's court; so that none of the men of Ulster might see her till the time came when she was to share the royal couch: none of mankind was permitted to enter the house where she was reared, save only her foster-father, and her foster-mother; and in addition to these Levorcham, to whom naught could any refuse, for she was a witch.

Now once it chanced upon a certain day in the time of winter that the foster-father of Deirdre had employed himself in skinning a calf upon the snow, in order to prepare a roast for her, and the blood of the calf lay upon the snow, and she saw a black raven who came down to drink it. And "Levorcham," said Deirdre, "that man only will I love, who hath the three colours that I see here, his hair as black as the raven, his cheeks red like the blood, and his body as white as the snow." "Dignity and good fortune to thee!" said Levorcham; "that man is not far away. Yonder is he in the burg which is nigh; and the name of him is Naisi, the son of Usnach." "I shall never be in good health again," said Deirdre, "until the time come when I may see him."

It befell that Naisi was upon a certain day alone upon the rampart of the burg of Emain, and he sent his warrior-cry with music abroad: well did the musical cry ring out that was raised by the sons of Usnach. Each cow and every beast that heard them, gave of milk two-thirds more than its wont; and each man by whom that cry was heard deemed it to be fully joyous, and a dear pleasure to him. Goodly moreover was the play that these men made with their weapons; if the whole province of Ulster had been assembled together against them in one place, and they three only had been able to set their backs against one another, the men of Ulster would not have borne away victory from those three: so well were they skilled in parry and defence. And they were swift of foot when they hunted the game, and with them it was the custom to chase the quarry to its death.

Now when this Naisi found himself alone on the plain, Deirdre also soon escaped outside her house to him, and she ran past him, and at first he know not who she might be.

"Fair is the young heifer that springs past me!" he cried.

"Well may the young heifers be great," she said, "in a place where none may find a bull."

"Thou hast, as thy bull," said he, "the bull of the whole province of Ulster, even Conor the king of Ulster."

"I would choose between you two," she said, "and I would take for myself a younger bull, even such as thou art."

"Not so indeed," said Naisi, "for I fear the prophecy of Cathbad."

"Sayest thou this, as meaning to refuse me?" said she.

"Yea indeed," he said; and she sprang upon him, and she seized him by his two ears. "Two ears of shame and of mockery shalt thou have," she cried, "if thou take me not with thee." "Release me, O my wife!" said he.

"That will I."

Then Naisi raised his musical warrior-cry, and the men of Ulster heard it, and each of them one after another sprang up: and the sons of Usnach hurried out in order to hold back their brother.

"What is it," they said, "that thou dost? let it not be by any fault of thine that war is stirred up between us and the men of Ulster."

Then he told them all that had been done; and "There shall evil come on thee from this," said they; "moreover thou shalt lie under the reproach of shame so long as thou dost live; and we will go with her into another land, for there is no king in all Ireland who will refuse us welcome if we come to him."

Then they took counsel together, and that same night they departed, three times fifty warriors, and the same number of women, and dogs, and servants, and Deirdre went with them. And for a long time they wandered about Ireland, in homage to this man or that; and often Conor sought to slay them, either by ambuscade or by treachery; from round about Assaroe, near to Ballyshannon in the west, they journeyed, and they turned them back to Benn Etar, in the north-east, which men to-day call the Mountain of Howth. Nevertheless the men of Ulster drave them from the land, and they came to the land of Alba, and in its wildernesses they dwelled. And when the chase of the wild beasts of the mountains failed them, they made foray upon the cattle of the men of Alba, and took them for themselves; and the men of Alba gathered themselves together with intent to destroy them. Then they took shelter with the king of Alba, and the king took them into his following, and they served him in war. And they made for themselves houses of their own in the meadows by the king's burg: it was on account of Deirdre that these houses were made, for they feared that men might see her, and that on her account they might be slain.

Now one day the high-steward of the king went out in the early morning, and he made a cast about Naisi's house, and saw those two sleeping therein, and he hurried back to the king, and awaked him: "We have," said he, "up to this day found no wife for thee of like dignity to thyself. Naisi the son of Usnach hath a wife of worth sufficient for the emperor of the western world! Let Naisi be slain, and let his wife share thy couch."

"Not so!" said the king, "but do thou prepare thyself to go each day to her house, and woo her for me secretly."

Thus was it done; but Deirdre, whatsoever the steward told her, was accustomed straightway to recount it each even to her spouse; and since nothing was obtained from her, the sons of Usnach were sent into dangers, and into wars, and into strifes that thereby they might be overcome. Nevertheless they showed themselves to be stout in every strife, so that no advantage did the king gain from them by such attempts as these.

The men of Alba were gathered together to destroy the sons of Usnach, and this also was told to Deirdre. And she told her news to Naisi: "Depart hence!" said she, "for if ye depart not this night, upon the morrow ye shall he slain!" And they marched away that night, and they betook themselves to an island of the sea.

Now the news of what had passed was brought to the men of Ulster. "'Tis pity, O Conor!" said they, "that the sons of Usnach should die in the land of foes, for the sake of an evil woman. It is better that they should come under thy protection,[FN#42] and that the (fated) slaying should be done here, and that they should come into their own land, rather than that they should fall at the hands of foes." "Let them come to us then," said Conor, "and let men go as securities to them." The news was brought to them.

[FN#42] Literally, "It is better their protection, and their slaying, and coming for them to their own land, &c." If this reading is right (and three MSS. agree), the extended words of the text seem to give the intention: it is, however, possible that the reading should be, "It is better their protection than their slaying" (oldaas for ocus), which would make sense at once. The idea of the text seems to be that the sons of Usnach were, owing to Cathbad's prophecy, thought of as fated men; and it was only a question where they should be put to death.

"This is welcome news for us," they said; "we will indeed come, and let Fergus come as our surety, and Dubhtach, and Cormac the son of Conor." These then went to them, and they moved them to pass over the sea.

But at the contrivance of Conor, Fergus was pressed to join in an ale-feast, while the sons of Usnach were pledged to eat no food in Erin, until they had eaten the food of Conor. So Fergus tarried behind with Dubhtach and Cormac; and the sons of Usnach went on, accompanied by Fiacha, Fergus' son; until they came to the meadows around Emain.

Now at that time Eogan the son of Durthacht had come to Emain to make his peace with Conor, for they had for a long time been at enmity; and to him, and to the warmen of Conor, the charge was given that they should slay the sons of Usnach, in order that they should not come before the king. The sons of Usnach stood upon the level part of. the meadows, and the women sat upon the ramparts of Emain. And Eogan came with his warriors across the meadow, and the son of Fergus took his place by Naisi's side. And Eogan greeted them with a mighty thrust of his spear, and the spear brake Naisi's back in sunder, and passed through it. The son of Fergus made a spring, and he threw both arms around Naisi, and he brought him beneath himself to shelter him, while he threw himself down above him; and it was thus that Naisi was slain, through the body of the son of Fergus. Then there began a murder throughout the meadow, so that none escaped who did not fall by the points of the spears, or the edge of the sword, and Deirdre was brought to Conor to be in his power, and her arms were bound behind her back.

Now the sureties who had remained behind, heard what had been done, even Fergus and Dubhtach, and Cormac. And thereon they hastened forward, and they forthwith performed great deeds. Dubhtach slew, with the one thrust of his spear, Mane a son of Conor, and Fiachna the son of Feidelm, Conor's daughter; and Fergus struck down Traigthren, the son of Traiglethan, and his brother. And Conor was wrath at this, and he came to the fight with them; so that upon that day three hundred of the men of Ulster fell and Dubhtach slew the women of Ulster; and, ere the day dawned, Fergus set Emain on fire. Then they went away into exile, and betook them to the land of Connaught to find shelter with Ailill and Maev, for they knew that that royal pair would give them good entertainment. To the men of Ulster the exiles showed no love: three thousand stout men went with them; and for sixteen years never did they allow cries of lamentation and of fear among the Ulstermen to cease: each night their vengeful forays caused men to quake, and to wail.

Deirdre lived on for a year in the household of Conor; and during all that time she smiled no smile of laughter; she satisfied not herself with food or with sleep, and she raised not her head from her knee. And if any one brought before her people of mirth, she used to speak thus:

Though eager troops, and fair to see,[FN#43] May home return, though these ye wait: When Usna's sons came home to me, They came with more heroic state.

With hazel mead, my Naisi stood: And near our fire his bath I'd pour; On Aindle's stately back the wood; On Ardan's ox, or goodly boar.

Though sweet that goodly mead ye think That warlike Conor drinks in hall, I oft have known a sweeter drink, Where leaps in foam the waterfall:

Our board was spread beneath the tree, And Naisi raised the cooking flame: More sweet than honey-sauced to me Was meat, prepared from Naisi's game.

[FN#43] A literal rendering of this poem will be found in the notes, p. 187.

Though well your horns may music blow, Though sweet each month your pipes may sound, I fearless say, that well I know A sweeter strain I oft have found.

Though horns and pipes be sounding clear, Though Conor's mind in these rejoice, More magic strain, more sweet, more dear Was Usna's Children's noble voice.

Like sound of wave, rolled Naisi's bass; We'd hear him long, so sweet he sang: And Ardan's voice took middle place; And clearly Aindle's tenor rang.

Now Naisi lies within his tomb: A sorry guard his friends supplied; His kindred poured his cup of doom, That poisoned cup, by which he died.

Ah! Berthan dear! thy lands are fair; Thy men are proud, though hills be stern: Alas! to-day I rise not there To wait for Usna's sons' return.

That firm, just mind, so loved, alas! The dear shy youth, with touch of scorn, I loved with him through woods to pass, And girding in the early morn.

When bent on foes, they boded ill, Those dear grey eyes, that maids adored; When, spent with toil, his troops lay still, Through Irish woods his tenor soared.

For this it is, no more I sleep; No more my nails with pink I stain: No joy can break the watch I keep; For Usna's sons come not again.

For half the night no sleep I find; No couch can me to rest beguile: 'Mid crowds of thoughts still strays my mind; I find no time to eat or smile.

In eastern Emain's proud array No time to joy is left for me; For gorgeous house, and garments gay, Nor peace, nor joy, nor rest can be.

And when Conor sought to soothe her; thus Deirdre would answer him:

Ah Conor! what of thee! I naught can do! Lament and sorrow on my life have passed: The ill you fashioned lives my whole life through; A little time your love for me would last.

The man to me most fair beneath the sky, The man I loved, in death away you tore: The crime you did was great; for, till I die, That face I loved I never shall see more.

That he is gone is all my sorrow still; Before me looms the shape of Usna's son; Though o'er his body white is yon dark hill, There's much I'd lavish, if but him I won.

I see his cheeks, with meadow's blush they glow; Black as a beetle, runs his eyebrows' line; His lips are red; and, white as noble snow I see his teeth, like pearls they seem to shine.

Well have I known the splendid garb he bears, Oft among Alba's warriors seen of old: A crimson mantle, such as courtier wears, And edged with border wrought of ruddy gold.

Of silk his tunic; great its costly price; For full one hundred pearls thereon are sewn; Stitched with findruine,[FN#44] bright with strange device, Full fifty ounces weighed those threads alone.

Gold-hilted in his hand I see his sword; Two spears he holds, with spear-heads grim and green; Around his shield the yellow gold is poured, And in its midst a silver boss is seen.

Fair Fergus ruin on us all hath brought! We crossed the ocean, and to him gave heed: His honour by a cup of ale was bought; From him hath passed the fame of each high deed.

If Ulster on this plain were gathered here Before king Conor; and those troops he'd give, I'd lose them all, nor think the bargain dear, If I with Naisi, Usna's son, could live.

Break not, O king, my heart to-day in me; For soon, though young, I come my grave unto: My grief is stronger than the strength of sea; Thou, Conor, knowest well my word is true.

"Whom dost thou hate the most," said Conor, "of these whom thou now seest?"

"Thee thyself," she answered, "and with thee Eogan the son of Durthacht."

[FN#44] Pronounced find-roony; usually translated "white bronze."

"Then," said Conor, "thou shalt dwell with Eogan for a year;" and he gave Deirdre over into Eogan's hand.

Now upon the morrow they went away over the festal plain of Macha, and Deirdre sat behind Eogan in the chariot; and the two who were with her were the two men whom she would never willingly have seen together upon the earth, and as she looked upon them, "Ha, Deirdre," said Conor, "it is the same glance that a ewe gives when between two rams that thou sharest now between me and Eogan!" Now there was a great rock of stone in front of them, and Deirdre struck her head upon that stone, and she shattered her head, and so she died.

This then is the tale of the exile of the sons of Usnach, and of the Exile of Fergus, and of the death of Deirdre.

THE LAMENT OF DEIRDRE OVER THE SONS OF USNACH

ACCORDING TO THE GLENN MASAIN VERSION

ALSO THE CONCLUSION OF THE TALE FROM THE SAME VERSION

I grieved not, Usna's sons beside; But long, without them, lags the day: Their royal sire no guest denied; Three lions from Cave Hill were they.

Three dragons bred in Mona's fort Are dead: to them from life I go; Three chiefs who graced the Red Branch Court, Three rocks, who broke the rush of foe.

O loved by many a British maid! O swift as hawks round Gullion's peak! True sons of king, who warriors swayed, To whom bent chiefs in homage meek.

No vassal look those champions wore; Full grief is mine that such should die! Those sons, whom Cathbad's daughter bore; Those props, who Cualgne's[FN#45] war held high.

[FN#45] Pronounced Kell-ny.

Three bears of might, to war they came; From Oona's walls, like lions, burst; Three hero-chiefs, who loved their fame; Three sons, on Ulster's bosom nursed.

Twas Aife[FN#46] reared them; 'neath her yoke A kingdom bowed, and tribute brought; They propped the war, when armies broke, Those foster-sons, whom Scathach[FN#47] taught.

The Three, who once from Bohvan's skill All feats have learned that heroes know; King Usna's glorious sons! 'tis ill That these afar from me should go.

That I should live, with Naisi dead, Let none such shame believe of me; When Ardan's life, when Ainnle's fled, But short my life I knew would be.

Great Ulster's king my hand had won; I left him, Naisi's love to find; Till Naisi's funeral rites be done, I wait a little while behind.

This widowed life no more I'll bear; The Three rejoiced, when toil they faced; Where'er 'twas found, the war they'd dare, And proffered fight with joy embraced.

A curse on Cathbad's wizard spell! 'Twas Naisi's death! and I the cause! None came to aid that king, who well To all the world might grant his laws.

[FN#46] Pronounced Eefa.

[FN#47] Pronounced Ska-ha.

O man, who diggest low the grave, And from my sight my love would hide, Make wide the tomb; its room I crave, I come to seek my hero's side.

Great load of hardship I'd endure with joy, If yet those heroes my companions were; No lack of house or fire could then annoy, No gloom I'd know with them, nor aught of care.

Ah! many a time each shield and guardian spear To make my couch have piled those noble Three: O labouring man, their grave who diggest here, Their hardened swords above well set should be.

The hounds of all the Three their masters lack, Their hawks no quarry leave, nor hear their call; The three are dead, who battle's line held back Who learned their skill in Conall Cernach's hall!

Their hounds I view; from out my heart that sight Hath struck a groan; behind their leashes trail, 'Twas mine to hold them once, and keep them tight;, Now slack they lie, and cause me thus to wail.

Oft in the desert I and they have strayed, Yet never lonely was that desert known For all the Three a grave to-day is made, And here I sit, and feel indeed alone.

I gazed on Naisi's grave, and now am blind, For naught remains to see; the worst is spent; My soul must leave me soon, no help I find, And they are gone, the folk of my lament.

'Twas guile that crushed them: they would save my life And died therefor; themselves three billows strong: Ere Usna's children fell in cruel strife, Would I had died, and earth had held me long!

To Red-Branch Hall we made our mournful way; Deceitful Fergus led; our lives he stole; A soft sweet speech indeed he'd learned to say, For me, for them was ruin near that goal.

All Ulster's pleasures now are nothing worth I shun them all, each chief, each ancient friend; Alone I sit, as left behind on earth, And soon my lonely life in death shall end.

I am Deirdre, the joyless, For short time alive, Though to end life be evil, 'Tis worse to survive.

And, after she had made this lament, Deirdre seated herself in the tomb, and she gave three kisses to Naisi before that he was laid in his grave; and with heaviness and grief Cuchulain went on to Dun Delga. And Cathbad the Druid laid a curse upon Emain Macha to take vengeance for that great evil, and he said that, since that treachery had been done, neither king Conor nor any other of his race should hold that burg.

And as for Fergus, the son of Rossa the Red, he came to Emain Macha on the morrow after the sons of Usnach had been slain. And, when he found that they had been slain, and that his pledge had been dishonoured, he himself, and Cormac the Partner of Exile, king Conor's own son, also Dubhtach, the Beetle of Ulster, and the armies they had with them, gave battle to the household of Conor; and they slew Maine the son of Conor, and three hundred of Conor's people besides. And Emain Macha was destroyed, and burned by them, and Conor's women were slain, and they collected their adherents on every side; the number of their host was three thousand warriors. And they went away to the land of Connaught, even to Ailill the Great, who was the king of Connaught at that time, and to Maev of Croghan, and with them they found a welcome and support. Moreover Fergus and Cormac the Partner of Exile and their warriors, after that they had come to the land of Connaught, never let pass one single night wherein reavers went not forth from them to harry and burn the land of Ulster, so that the district which men to-day call the land of Cualgne was subdued by them; and from that in the after-time came between the two kingdoms much of trouble and theft; and in this fashion they spent seven years, or, as some say, ten years; nor was there any truce between them, no, not for one single hour.

And while those deeds were doing, Deirdre abode by Conor in his household for a whole year after the sons of Usnach had been slain. And, though it might have seemed but a small thing for her to raise her head, or to let laughter flow over her lips, yet she never did these things during all that time. And when Conor saw that neither sport nor kindness could hold her; and that neither jesting nor pleasing honour could raise her spirits, he sent word to Eogan the son of Durthacht, the lord of Fernmay;[FN#48] as some tell the story, it was this Eogan who had slain Naisi in Emain Macha. And after that Eogan had come to the place where Conor was, Conor gave command to Deirdre that, since he himself had failed to turn her heart from her grief, she must depart to Eogan, and spend another space of time with him. And with that she was placed behind Eogan in his chariot, and Conor went also in the chariot in order to deliver Deirdre into Eogan's hand. And as they went on their way, she cast a fierce glance at Eogan in front of her, and another at Conor behind her; for there was nothing in all the world that she hated more than those two men. And when Conor saw this, as he looked at her and at Eogan, he said: "Ah Deirdre! it is the glance of a ewe when set between two rams that thou castest on me and on Eogan!" And when Deirdre heard that, she sprang up, and she made a leap out of the chariot, and she struck her head against the stony rocks that were in front of her, and she shattered her head so that the brains leapt out, and thus came to Deirdre her death.

[FN#48] The Irish is Fernmag; written Fearnmhuidh in the late manuscript of this part of the tale.

This is the Tree of their race, and an account of the kinships of some of the Champions of the Red Branch, which is given here before we proceed to speak of the Deeds of Cuchulain:

'Twas Cathbad first won Magach's love, and arms around her threw; From Maelchro's loins, the Battle Chief, his princely source he drew; Two, more in love she knew, of these the wrath was long and dread, Fierce Rossa, named the Ruddy-Faced, and Carbre, thatched with red.

To all the three were children born, and all with beauty graced, To Cathbad, and to Carbre Red, and Rossa Ruddy-faced; A gracious three indeed were they to whom she gave her love, Fair Magach, brown the lashes were that slept her eyes above.

Three sons to Rossa Ruddy-faced as children Magach bore; To Carbre sons again she gave, the count of these was four; And three white shoots of grace were hers, on these no shame shall fall; To Cathbad children three she bare, and these were daughters all.

To Cathbad, who in wizard lore and all its arts had might, Three daughters lovely Magach bore, each clothed in beauty white; All maids who then for grace were famed in grace those maids surpassed, And Finuchoem,[FN#49] Ailbhe twain he named, and Deithchim named the last.

[FN#49] Pronounced Finn-hoom, Ail-vy, and Die-himm.

To Finnchoem, wizard Cathbad's child, was born a glorious son, And well she nursed him, Conall wild, who every field hath won; And Ailbhe glorious children bare in whom no fear had place, These Ardan, Ainnle, Naisi were, who came of Usnach's race.

A son to Deithchim fair was born, a bright-cheeked mother she; She bore but one: Cuchulain of Dun Delga's hold was he: Of those whom Cathbad's daughters reared the names full well ye know, And none of these a wound hath feared, or therefore shunned a foe.

The sons of Usnach, who like shields their friends protected well, By might of hosts on battle-field to death were borne, and fell; And each was white of skin, and each his friends in love would hold, Now naught remains for song to teach, the Third of Griefs is told.

THE COMBAT AT THE FORD