“I will not stay,” said the eldest son. “You are old and feeble: I am young and strong; let me go in place of you.”
The second son gave a like answer. The youngest had his father’s name, Conal, and the king said to him, “Stay here at home and care for the kingdom while I am gone, since your brothers will not obey me.”
“I will do what you bid me,” said Conal.
“Now I am going,” said the old king; “and if I and your brothers never return, be not bribed by the rich to injure the poor. Do justice to all, so that rich and poor may love you as they loved your father before you.”
He left young Conal twelve advisers, and said, “If we do not return in a day and a year, be sure that we are killed; you may then do as you like in the kingdom. If your twelve advisers tell you to marry a king’s daughter of wealth and high rank, it will be of help to you in defending the kingdom. You will be two powers instead of one.”
The day and the year passed, and no tidings came of Conal’s two brothers and father. At the end of the day and the year, the twelve told him they had chosen a king’s daughter for him, a very beautiful maiden. When the twelve spoke of marriage, Conal let three screeches out of him, that drove stones from the walls of old buildings for miles around the castle.
Now an old druid that his father had twenty years before heard the three screeches, and said, “Young Conal is in great trouble. I will go to him to know can I help him.”
The druid cleared a mountain at a leap, a valley at a hop, twelve miles at a running leap, so that he passed hills, dales, and valleys; and in the evening of the same day, he struck his back against the kitchen door of Conal’s castle just as the sun was setting.
When the druid came to the castle, young Conal was out in the garden thinking to himself, “My father and brothers are in Spain; perhaps they are killed.” The dew was beginning to fall, so he turned to go, and saw the old man at the door. The druid was the first to speak; but not knowing Conal, he said,—