HOW SAINT MOLING GOT HIS NAME.
PREFACE.
There is hardly any Irish saint of whom more legends are related, at least in our literature, than of Saint Moling. He was both a poet and a prophet. Some stories bring him into contact with Gobán Saor, the great builder. He figures largely in the extraordinary tale of "Suibhne Geilt." See also the story of the "Death of Bearchán." The following legend was printed by my friend, Seán Tóibín, in the "Lochrann" a couple of years ago. I was sure it was taken from oral sources, but he has just told me to my surprise, that he was only retelling what he had read in Irish, not what he had HEARD or taken down orally. However, as the story had been set up in print, and as I have here no other story about St. Moling it may stay, only the reader must understand that it is not actual surviving folk-lore, but a retelling from an Irish MS.
THE STORY.
[He was first called Taircheal, and he was pupil to a cleric.] Taircheal went out one day, and he had two bags, one on his back and one in front of him. He took his master's stick, in his hand and off he set in this guise. He went round Luachair on pilgrimage, and he was there reciting his rosary when he saw coming towards him the Fuath[98] and his people; a black, dark, truly ugly band were they, and they had the form of demons. And they used never give quarter to anyone. And this was the number of those who were there, namely the Fuath himself, his wife, his gillie, his hound, and nine others.
Says the Fuath to his people, "Wait ye there and I'll go talk to yon man who is alone, and since I took up with a life of plundering and stealing I never felt a desire to protect any man except that one only." He gripped his sword and went over to meet Taircheal.
He said to Taircheal, "Whence have you come from, you eater of beastings?"
"Whence have you come from yourself, you black burnt gruagach[99]?" said the young man.
"I'll take your bags off you, and your head too, unless you listen to me," said the Fuath.
"By my father's hand you won't unless I wish it myself," said Taircheal.
"By the hand of him who taught me, but I'll ply my weapon on you," said the Fuath.
"I'd think it easier to put you down than boiled meat," said Taircheal.
"Listen or I'll stick this point in through the middle of your heart," said the Fuath.
"I swear," said the young man, "that I'll strike you on the head with this stick, it is the crozier of my master and tutor, and he promised that it should never be broken in single combat."
Then fear possessed the Fuath, and he called to his people to come and help him. The other Fuaths came. Then it was plain to Taircheal that he had no way of escape or of withdrawing.
"We'll kill you now, brown Taircheal," said the Fuath's hag, "I'll thrust you through with my knife, and you'll get death and violent dissolution."
"I ask a request of ye," said Taircheal.
"What is it?" said the Fuaths.
"Let me go to the other side of that ditch, and give three steps in the path of the King of Heaven and Earth," said he.
The Fuaths laughed. "That's all you want?" said they. "That's all," said he.
"Have it then," said the hag, "for you won't go from us, for we are as swift as the deer of the hill, and this hound of ours is as swift as the wind."
Then Taircheal walked to the ditch, and gave his three leaps. He went so far, of the first leap, that they thought he was no bigger [when he landed] than a crow on top of the hill. The second leap he gave they did not see him at all, and they did not see whether it was to heaven or earth he had gone. Of the third leap he landed upon the wall of his tutor's church.
"That way he's gone," said the Fuath's hag. Then they rose up and ran, both hound and person, so that their cry and yell was heard a mile overhead in the upper air. The hounds and populace of the village came out each one of them to protect the youth, for it was plain to them that he was being pursued by the Fuaths. But he leapt down off the wall and ran into the church, and began returning thanks to God in presence of his tutor.
"What angry madness is on you, son?" said the tutor.
"Nothing much, my tutor," said Taircheal, "it was the Fuaths who were hunting me;" and he told him the story how he had leaped [ling] from Luachair in his three leaps.
"Great is your leap [ling] my pupil," said the priest, "and it was for you that the angel Victor made the prophecy, and Moling [=my leap] of Luachair shall be your name henceforth from the leaps that you have leapt."
