Connachar came out in haste and cried with wrath, ‘Who is there on the floor of fight, slaughtering my men?’
‘We, the three sons of Ferchar Mae Ro.’
‘Well,’ said the king, ‘I will give a free bridge to your grandfather, a free bridge to your father, and a free bridge each to you three brothers, if you come over to my side tonight.’
‘Well, Connachar, we will not accept that offer from you nor thank you for it. Greater by far do we prefer to go home to our father and tell the deeds of heroism we have done, than accept anything on these terms from you. Naois, son of Uisnech, and Allen and Arden are as nearly related to yourself as they are to us, though you are so keen to shed their blood, and you would shed our blood also, Connachar.’ And the noble, manly, handsome youths with beauteous, brown locks returned inside. ‘We are now,’ said they, ‘going home to tell our father that you are now safe from the hands of the king.’ And the youths all fresh and tall and lithe and beautiful, went home to their father to tell that the sons of Uisnech were safe. This happened at the parting of the day and night[17] in the morning twilight time, and Naois said they must go away, leave that house, and return to Alba.
Naois and Deirdre, Allan and Arden started to return to Alba. Word came to the king that the company he was in pursuit of were gone. The king then sent for Duanan Gacha Druid, the best magician he had, and he spoke to him as follows. ‘Much wealth have I expended on you, Duanan Gacha Druid, to give schooling and learning and magic mystery to you, if these people get away from me today without care, without consideration or regard for me, without chance of overtaking them, and without power to stop them.’
‘Well, I will stop them,’ said the magician, ‘until the company you send in pursuit return.’ And the magician placed a wood before them through which no man could go, but the sons of Uisnech marched through the wood without halt or hesitation, and Deirdre held on to Naois’s hand.
‘What is the good of that? That will not do yet,’ said Connachar, ‘they are off without bending of their feet or stopping of their step, without heed or respect to me, and I am without power to keep up to them or opportunity to turn them back this night.’
‘I will try another plan on them,’ said the druid; and he placed before them a grey sea instead of a green plain. The three heroes stripped and tied their clothes behind their heads, and Naois placed Deirdre on the top of his shoulder.
‘Though that be good, O Duanan, it will not make the heroes return,’ said Connachar. ‘They are gone without regard for me, and without honour to me, and without power on my part to pursue them or to force them to return this night.’
‘We shall try another method on them, since yon one did not stop them,’ said the druid. And the druid froze the grey ridged sea into hard rocky knobs, the sharpness of sword being on the one edge and the poison power of adders on the other. Then Arden cried that he was getting tired, and nearly giving over.
‘Come you, Arden, and sit on my right shoulder,’ said Naois. Arden came and sat on Naois’s shoulder.
Arden was long in this posture when he died; but though he was dead Naois would not let him go. Allen then cried out that he was getting faint and nigh-well giving up[18]. When Naois heard his prayer, he gave forth the piercing sigh of death, and asked Allen to lay hold of him and he would bring him to land. Allen was not long when the weakness of death came on him and his hold failed. Naois looked around, and when he saw his two well-beloved brothers dead, he cared not whether he lived or died, and he gave forth the bitter sigh of death, and his heart burst.
‘They are gone,’ said Duanan Gacha Druid to the king, ‘and I have done what you desired me. The sons of Uisnech are dead and they will trouble you no more; and you have your wife hale and whole to yourself.’
‘Blessings for that upon you and may the good results accrue to me, Duanan. I count it no loss what I spent in the schooling and teaching of you. Now dry up the flood, and let me see if I can behold Deirdre,’ said Connachar.
And Duanan Gacha Druid dried up the flood from the plain and the three sons of Uisnech were lying together dead, without breath of life, side by side on the green meadow plain and Deirdre bending above showering down her tears.
Then Deirdre said this lament. ‘Fair one, loved one, flower of beauty; beloved upright and strong; beloved noble and modest warrior. Fair one, blue-eyed, beloved of thy wife; lovely to me at the trysting-place came thy clear voice through the woods of Ireland. I cannot eat or smile henceforth. Break not today, my heart: soon enough shall lie within my grave. Strong are the waves of sorrow, but stronger is sorrow’s self, Connachar.’
The people then gathered round the heroes’ bodies and asked Connachar what was to be done with the bodies. The order that he gave was that they should dig a pit and put the three brothers in it side by side.
Deirdre kept sitting on the brink of the grave, constantly asking the grave-diggers to dig the pit wide and free. When the bodies of the brothers were put in the grave, Deirdre said: ‘Come over hither, Naois, my love, Let Arden close to Allen lie;
If the dead had any sense to feel, Ye would have made a place for Deirdre.’
The men did as she told them. She jumped into the grave and lay down by Naois, and she was dead by his side.
The king ordered the body to be raised from out the grave and to be buried on the other side of the loch. It was done as the king bade, and the pit closed. Thereupon a fir shoot grew out of the grave of Deirdre and a fir shoot from the grave of Naois, and the two shoots united in a knot above the loch. The king ordered the shoots to be cut down, and this was done twice, until, at the third time, the wife whom the king had married caused him to stop this work of evil and his vengeance on the remains of the dead.
KIng O’Toole and His Goose
Och, I thought all the world, far and near, had heerd o’ King O’Toole – well, well, but the darkness of mankind is untellible! Well, sir, you must know, as you didn’t hear it afore, that there was a king, called King O’Toole, who was a fine old king in the old ancient times, long ago; and it was he that owned the churches in the early days. The king, you see, was the right sort; he was the real boy, and loved sport as he loved his life, and hunting in particular; and from the rising o’ the sun, up he got, and away he went over the mountains after the deer; and fine times they were.
Well, it was all mighty good, as long as the king had his health; but, you see, in course of time the king grew old, by raison[19] he was stiff in his limbs, and when he got stricken in years, his heart failed him, and he was lost entirely for want o’ diversion, because he couldn’t go a-hunting no longer; and, by dad, the poor king was obliged at last to get a goose to divert him. Oh, you may laugh, if you like, but it’s truth I’m telling you; and the way the goose diverted him was this-away: You see, the goose used to swim across the lake, and go diving for trout, and catch fish on a Friday for the king, and flew every other day round about the lake, diverting the poor king. All went on mighty well until, by dad, the goose got stricken in years like her master, and couldn’t divert him no longer, and then it was that the poor king was lost entirely. The king was walkin’ one mornin’ by the edge of the lake, lamentin’ his cruel fate[20], and thinking of drowning himself, that could get no diversion in life, when all of a sudden, turning round the corner, who should he meet but a mighty decent young man coming up to him.