“You did not go to the battle?” asked Conal of the guard.
“I did not.”
“Well for you that you did not. Now,” said Conal to the princess, “whomever of the maids you like best, the guard may marry, and they will care for this kingdom till we return.”
The guard and maid were married, and put in charge of the kingdom. The following morning young Conal got his steed ready and set out for home with the princess. As they were riding along near the foot of a mountain, Conal grew very sleepy, and said to the princess, “I’ll go down now and take a sleep.”
The place was lonely,—hardly two houses in twenty miles. The Yellow King’s daughter advised Conal: “Take me to some habitation and sleep there; this place is too wild.”
“I cannot wait,—I’m too drowsy and weary after the long battle; but if I might sleep a little, I could fight for seven days and seven nights again.” He dismounted, and she sat on a green mossy bank. Putting his head on her lap, he fell asleep, and his steed went away on the mountain side grazing.
Conal had slept for three days and two nights with his head in the lap of the Yellow King’s daughter, when on the evening of the third day the princess saw the largest man she had ever set eyes on, walking toward her through the sea and a basket on his back. The sea did not reach to his knees; a shield could not pass between his head and the sky. This was the High King of the World. This big man faced up to where Conal and his bride were; and, taking the tips of her fingers, he kissed her three times. “Bad luck to me,” said the King of the World, “if the young woman I am going for were beyond the ditch there I would not go to her. You are fairer and better than she.”
“Where were you going?” asked the princess. “Don’t mind me, but go on.”
“I was going for the Yellow King’s daughter, but will not go a step further now that I see you.”
“Go your way to her, for she is the finest princess on earth; I am a simple woman, and another man’s wife.”