[23] Alluding to Fergus serving with Queen Mève.
[24] The Finnbheannach, pronounced "Fin-van-ach." Both the bulls were endowed with intelligence. One of the virtues of the Dun Bull was that neither Bocanachs nor Bananachs nor demons of the glens could come into one cantred to him. There emanated from him, too, when returning home every evening, a mysterious music, so that the men of the cantred where he was, required no other music. The war-goddess herself, the Mór-rigú, speaks to him.
[25] Every place in Ireland, says the saga, that is called Cluain-na-dtarbh, Magh-na-dtarbh, Bearna-na-dtarbh, Druim-na-dtarbh, Loch-na-dtarbh, i.e., the Bull's meadow, plain, gap, ridge, lake, etc., has its name from them!
[CHAPTER XXVII]
THE DEATH OF CUCHULAIN
Although Cuchulain won for himself in this war an imperishable fame, yet he was not destined to enjoy it long, for he perished before arriving at middle age.[1] The account of his death is preserved in the Book of Leinster, a manuscript of the middle of the twelfth century, which quotes incidentally from an Irish poet[2] of the seventh century, thus showing that Cuchulain was at this early age the hero of the poets. Unfortunately the opening of the story in the Book of Leinster is lost, but many modern extensions of the saga still exist, from one of which in my possession I shall supply what is missing.[3]
Cuchulain had three formidable enemies, who were bent upon his life, these were Lughaidh [Lewy] the son of the Momonian king Curigh,[4] whom Cuchulain had slain, Erc, the son of Cairbré Niafer king of all Ireland, who was slain in the battle of Rosnaree,[5] and the descendants of the wizard Calatin, who with his twenty sons and his son-in-law fell by Cuchulain in one of the combats at the Ford, during the raid of the Táin. His wife, however, brought into the world three posthumous children, daughters.[6] These unhappy creatures Mève mutilated by cutting off their right legs and left arms, so that they might be odious and horrible, and all the fitter for the dread profession she proposed for them—evil wizardry. She reared them carefully, and so soon as they were of a fitting age she sent them into the world to gain a knowledge of charms and spells, and druidism, and witchcraft, and incantations. In pursuit of this knowledge they roamed throughout the world, and at last returned to the queen as perfect adepts as might be.
Thereupon she convened a second muster of the men of the four provinces, and joined by Lewy the son of Curigh, and Erc the son of Cairbré Niafer, both of whose parents had fallen by Cuchulain, and having with her the odious but powerful children of Calatin, eager to avenge the death of their father and their family, she again marched upon Ulster during the sickness of their warriors, and began to plunder and to burn and to drive away a mighty prey. King Conor immediately surmised that it was against Cuchulain the expedition was prepared, and without a moment's delay he depatched Lavarcam his female messenger, to desire him instantly to leave his palace and his patrimony at Dundealgan[7] in the plain of Muirtheimhne, and come to himself at Emania, there to be under the King's immediate orders. This command he gave, thinking to rescue Cuchulain from the possible effects of his own valour and rashness, for there was scarcely a man of distinction in any of the four provinces of Erin some of whose relatives had not been slain by him.