“I care not for all this,” said haughty Meave; “not these the things I fear; for, after all, whatever you may say, Cuchulain, like another, is but one; he can be wounded like a common man, he will die like any other, he can be captured like any warrior. Besides, his age is but that of a grown-up girl; his deeds of manhood come not yet.”
“Not so indeed,” said Fergus and they all. “It would be strange if he to-day were not the equal of any grown-up man or many men; for even when he was in his fifth year, he surpassed all the chieftain’s sons of Emain Macha at their play; when he was but seven he took arms, and slew his man; when he was a stripling he went to perfect himself in feats of championship with Scáth, the woman-warrior of Alba; and now to-day when he is nearly seventeen years old, his strength must be equal to the strength of many men.”
“Tell us,” said Meave, “who is this warrior-lad; tell us also of his boyish feats and how the name of ‘Ulster’s Hound’ came to be his.”
“I will tell you,” said Fergus; “for Cuchulain is my own foster-son and Conor’s; though they say, and I myself believe it, that he is of the offspring of the gods, and that Lugh of the Long Arms, God of Light, is guardian to the boy. But Sualtach is his father, a warrior of Ulster, and the child was reared by the seaside northward on Murthemne’s plain, which is his own possession. At my knees he was brought up, and Amergin the poet was his tutor; the sister of King Conor nourished him with Conall the Victorious in her home. For at his birth Morann the judge prophesied of his future renown. ‘His praise,’ he said, ‘will be in all men’s mouths, his deeds will be recounted by kings and great men, warriors and charioteers, poets and sages. All men will love him; he will give combat for Ulster against her enemies; he will decide your quarrels; he will avenge your wrongs. Welcome the little stranger who is here.’”
And Meave and Ailill said, “That is a brave account to give of a young child; no wonder is it that Ulster prides herself in him; but tell us now, Fergus, for eager are we all to hear, the feats of Cuchulain as a little boy.”
Cuchulain sets out for Emain Macha
“I will tell you that,” said Fergus. “When he was yet a tiny boy, not much past four years old, some one in passing by Murthemne told him a long tale of the boy-corps of King Conor in Emain Macha; that the King had established it for all the sons of nobles and of chiefs, to train them up in strength and bravery. He told him that the King had set apart a playing-ground for the boys, close to his own fort, and there every day they practised games of skill, and feats of arms, and wrestled and threw each other. He told him, too, that the King took so much interest in the boy-corps, that scarce a day passed by that he did not spend some time in watching the pastimes of the lads, for he looked to them to be his future men-of-war and leaders of his hosts. He told the little boy that when they had proved themselves fit by skill and aptness for a higher grade, the King bestowed on them a set of war-gear suited to their age, small spears and javelins, a slender sword, and all equipment like a champion. Now when the boy heard this, a great longing arose within his little mind to see the boy-corps and join in their sports and practising for war. ‘I would wrestle, too,’ he said, ‘and I am sure that I could throw my fellow.’ But I and his guardians,” said Fergus, “objected that he was yet too young, and that when he was ten years old it would be soon enough to test his strength against the older boys. For to send a boy of four years old or five to take his part among lads of ten or twelve we thought not well, for we feared that harm would come to him, knowing that he must ever, since his babyhood, be in the midst of all that was going on. Therefore, we said, ‘Wait, my child, until some grown warrior can go with thee, to protect thee from the rough practice of the elder boys and bid them have a care for thee, or else till Conor the King, thy fosterer, himself calls thee hither under his proper charge.’ But the lad said to his mother, that it was too long to wait, and that even on this instant he would set off; ‘And all you have to do, mother, is to set me on my way, for I know not which way Emain lies.’ ‘A long and weary way for a young boy it is to Emain,’ said his mother, ‘for the range of the Slieve Fuad Mountains must be crossed.’ ‘Point me but out the general direction,’ he replied. ‘Over there, to the north-west, lies the palace of the king.’ ‘Let me but get my things, and I am off,’ he said.