"And you are the woman of Tusa hErin!"
"You know Tusa hErin?"
"I know every blade of grass in the glens."
"If you are ever near Tusa hErin, come and see me."
"I should like to."
"Will you really?"
"Yes."
She left him as abruptly as she spoke to him, going over to the ballad-monger. She left him a little dazed ... He was aware of vitality ... He was like a man on a wintry day who experiences a sudden shaft of warm sun, or somebody in quiet darkness whose eye is caught by the rising of the moon.
§ 6
As in a story from some old unsubtle book, in passing the gates of Tusa hErin, he had gone into another world, a grave and courteous world, not antique—that was not the word, but just older ... A change of tempo ... A change of atmosphere ... The Bois Dormant, the Sleeping Wood of the French fairy-tale?... Not that, for the Sleeping Wood should be a gray wood, a wood of twilight, with the birds a-drowse in their nests ... And here were clipped rich yew-trees, and turf firm as a putting-green's, and rows of dignified flowers, like pretty gracious ladies; and a little lake where a swan moved, as to music; and the sunshine was rich as wine here ... all golden and green ... But the atmosphere? He thought of the cave of Gearod Oge, the Wizard Earl in the Rath of Mullaghmast, and the story of it ... A farmer man had noticed a light from the old fort, and creeping in he had seen men in armor sleeping with their horses beside them ... And he examined the armor and the saddlery, and cautiously half drew a sword from its sheath ... And the soldier's head rose and: "Bhfuil an trath ann?" his voice cried ... "Has the time come?" "It is not, your Honor," the farmer said in terror, and shoved the sword back and fled ... An old man said for a surety that had the farmer drawn the blade from the scabbard, the Wizard Earl would have awakened, and Ireland been free ... There was great beauty and great Irishness to that story, but there was terror to it, and there was no terror on this sweet place ...