1. Fifteen-syllable lines, with caesura at eighth syllable; every line ending in a trisyllabic word, rhyming (not always) with a word preceding the caesura. A dissyllable or trisyllable precedes the caesura. Rhythm of Tennyson's Locksley Hall, proceeding by stress only, independent of vowel-quantity or hiatus. In line seven, 'Keranus' must be pronounced in four syllables, Kiaranus. Refers to the wizard's prophecy, incident II.
2. Four lines, in Locksley Hall rhythm, with a dissyllabic rhyme running through the quatrain. Relates incident IX.
3. Four lines, twelve syllables trochaic, caesura at seventh syllable. Each line ends with a trisyllable or a tetrasyllable, with dissyllabic rhyme running through the quatrain. The rhythm is that of the following line (which is intentionally misquoted to serve the present purpose)—
"Gather roses while you may, time is still a-flying."
The incident is not recorded in the prose lives; but it appears in the Book of the Dun Cow, in the story of the Birth of Aed Slaine (son of King Diarmait, reigned A.D. 595-600). Diarmait, it appears, had two wives (for, notwithstanding his friendship to Ciaran, he was but a half-converted pagan), by name Mugain and Muireann. Muireann had the misfortune to be bald, and Mugain, who, as is usual in polygamous households, was filled with envy of her, bribed a female buffoon to remove her golden headgear in public at the great assembly of Tailltiu (Telltown, Co. Meath), so as to expose the poor queen's defect to the eyes of the mob. The messenger accomplished her purpose, but Muireann cried out, "God and Saint Ciaran help me in this need!" and forthwith a shower of glossy curling golden hair flowed from her head over her shoulders, before a single eye of the assembly had rested upon her. Compare Ciaran's own experience, incident XLVI.
4. Three lines in the same metre, but apparently with three instead of four lines in each rhyming stanza. Refers to incident XVIII.
5. Three lines in the same rhythm as extract 1, but with a different rhyme-scheme; apparently three lines from a quatrain rhyming abab. Refers to incident XLI.
6. Six lines in elegiac couplets. This probably refers to XLVI, but without their original context the lines must remain obscure. In any case the versifier has the story in a rather different form from the prose writers, and appears to regard it as an incident of the boyhood period.
7. Eight lines from the hymn of Colum Cille, already commented upon.