He ran to the mouth of the harbor, and, placing the point of his sword
on the brink of the shore, gave one leap out on board. The two uncles
were amazed when they saw what their nephew had done, and were full of
joy at having him with them. They turned the ship’s prow to the sea,
and the stern to land. They raised to the tops of the hard, tough,
stained masts the great sweeping sails, and took their capacious,
smoothly-polished vessel past harbors with gently sloping shores, and
there the ship left behind it pale-green wavelets. Then, with a mighty
wind, they went through great flashing, stern-dashing waves with such
force that not a nail in the ship was unheated, or a finger on a man
inactive; and so did the ship hurry forward that its stern rubbed its
prow, and it raised before it, by dint of sailing, a proud, haughty ridge
through the middle of the fair, red sea.
When the wind failed, they sat down with the oars of fragrant beech
or white ash, and with every stroke they sent the ship forward three
leagues on the sea, where fishes, seals, and monsters rose around them,
making music and sport, and giving courage to the men; and the three
never stopped nor cooled until they sailed into the kingdom of the
White Strand. Then they drew their vessel to a place where no wave was
striking, nor wind rocking it, nor the sun splitting it, nor even a crow
of the air dropping upon it; but a clean strand before it, and coarse
sand on which wavelets were breaking. They cast two anchors toward the
sea, and one toward land, and gave the vessel the fixing of a day and a
full year, though they might not be absent more than one hour.
On the following day they saw one wide forest as far as the eye could
reach; they knew not what manner of land was it.
“Would you go and inquire,” said Blaiman to the elder uncle, “what sort
of a country that is inside?” The uncle went in, very slowly, among the
trees, and at last, seeing flashes of light through the forest, rushed
back in terror, the eyes starting out of his head.
“What news have you?” asked Blaiman.
“I saw flashes of fire, and could not go farther,” said the elder king’s
son.
“Go you,” said Blaiman to the other, “and bring some account of the
country.”
He did not go much farther than the elder brother, then came back, and
said, “We may as well sail home again.”
“Well,” said Blaiman, “ye have provisions for a day and a year in this
vessel. I will go now, and do ye remain here; if I am not back before
the end of the day and the year, wait no longer.” He gave them good by,
then went on, and entered the forest. It was not long till he met with
the flashes. He did not mind them, but went forward; and when he had gone
a good distance, he found the trees farther apart and scattered. Leaving
the trees, he came out on a broad, open plain; in the middle of the plain
was a castle; in front of the castle twelve champions practising at feats
of arms; and it was the flashes from the blows of their swords that he
and his uncles had seen in the forest. So skilled were the champions that
not one of them could draw a drop of blood from another.
Blaiman was making toward them. By the side of the path there was a
small hut, and as he was passing the door, an old woman came out, and
hailed him. He turned, and she said, “A hundred thousand welcomes to you,
Blaiman, son of Apple, from Erin.”
“Well, good woman,” said Blaiman, “you have the advantage. You know me;
but I have no knowledge of you.”
“I know you well,” said she; “and it’s sorry I am that you are here. Do
you see those twelve men out there opposite? You are going to make for
them now; but rest on your legs, and let the beginning of another day
come to you.”
“Your advice may be good,” said Blaiman, and he went in. The old woman
prepared his supper as well as it was ever prepared at his grandfather’s
house at home, and prepared a bed for him as good as ever he had. He
slept enough, and he wanted it. When day overtook him on the morrow, he
rose, and washed his face and hands, and asked mercy and help from God,
and if he did not he let it alone; and the old woman prepared breakfast
in the best way she could, and it was not the wrong way. He went off then
in good courage to the castle of the king; and there was a pole of combat
in front of the castle which a man wanting combat would strike with his
sword. He struck the pole a blow that was heard throughout the whole
kingdom.
“Good, good!” said the king; “the like of that blow was not struck while
I am in this castle.”
He put his head through a window above, and saw Blaiman outside.
Around the rear of the castle was a high wall set with iron spikes.
Few were the spikes without heads on them; some heads were fresh, some
with part of the flesh on them, and some were only bare skulls. It was
a dreadful sight to see; and strong was the man that it would not put
fright on.
“What do you want?” asked the king of Blaiman.
“Your daughter to marry, or combat.”
“’Tis combat you will get,” said the king; and the twelve champions of
valor were let out at him together. It was pitiful to see him; each one
of the twelve aiming a blow at him, he trying to defend himself, and he
all wounded and hacked by them. When the day was growing late, he began
to be angry; the noble blood swelled in his breast to be uppermost; and
he rose, with the activity of his limbs, out of the joints of his bones
over them, and with three sweeping blows took the twelve heads off the
champions. He left the place then, deeply wounded, and went back to the
old woman’s cabin; and if he did, it was a pleasure for the old woman to
see him. She put him into a caldron of venom, and then into a caldron of
cure. When he came out, he was perfectly healed; and the old woman said,—
“Victory and prosperity to you, my boy. I think you will do something
good; for the twelve were the strongest and ablest of all the king’s
forces. You have done more than any man that ever walked this way before.”
They made three parts of the night: the first part, they spent in eating
and drinking; the second, in telling tales and singing ballads; the
third, in rest and sound sleep.
He had a good sleep, and he needed it. Being anxious, he rose early; and
as early as he rose, breakfast was ready before him, prepared by the old
woman. He ate his breakfast, went to the king’s castle, and struck the
pole.
“What do you want?” asked the king, thrusting his head through the window.
“Seven hundred men at my right hand, seven hundred at my left, seven
hundred behind me, and as many as on the three sides out before me.”
They were sent to him four deep through four gates. He went through
them as a hawk through a flock of small birds on a March day, or as a
blackbird or a small boy from Iraghti Conor between two thickets. He made
lanes and roads through them, and slew them all. He made then a heap
of their heads, a heap of their bodies, and a heap of their weapons.
Trembling fear came on the king, and Blaiman went to the old woman’s
cabin.
“Victory and prosperity to you, my boy; you have all his forces stretched
now, unless he comes out against you himself; and I’m full sure that he
will not. He’ll give you the daughter.”
She had a good dinner before him. He had fought so well that there
was neither spot nor scar on his skin; for he had not let a man of the
forty-two hundred come within sword’s length of his body. He passed the
night as the previous night.
Next morning after breakfast, he went to the castle, and with one blow
made wood lice of the king’s pole of combat. The king went down to
Blaiman, took him under the arm, and, leading him up to the high chamber
where the daughter was, put her hand in his.
The king’s daughter kissed Blaiman, and embraced him, and gave him a ring
with her name and surname written inside on it. This was their marriage.
Next day Blaiman, thinking that his uncles had waited long enough, and
might go back to Erin, said to the king, “I will visit my uncles, and
then return hither.”
His wife, an only child, was heir to the kingdom, and he was to reign
with her.
“Oh,” said the king, “something else is troubling me now. There are three
giants, neighbors of mine, and they are great robbers. All my forces are
killed; and before one day passes the giants will be at me, and throw me
out of the kingdom.”
“Well,” said Blaiman, “I will not leave you till I settle the giants;
but now tell where they are to be found.”
“I will,” said the king; and he gave him all needful instruction. Blaiman
went first to the house of the youngest giant, where he struck the pole
of combat, and the sound was heard over all that giant’s kingdom.
“Good, good!” said the giant; “the like of that blow has never been
struck on that pole of combat before,” and out he came.
“A nerve burning of the heart to you, you miserable wretch!” said the
giant to Blaiman; “and great was your impudence to come to my castle at
all.”
“It is not caring to give you pleasure that I am,” said Blaiman, “but to
knock a tormenting satisfaction out of your ribs.”
“Is it hard, thorny wrestling that you want, or fighting with sharp gray
swords in the lower and upper ribs?” asked the giant.
“I will fight with sharp gray swords,” said Blaiman.
The giant went in, and fitted on his wide, roomy vest, his strong,
unbreakable helmet, his cross-worked coat-of-mail; then he took his
bossy, pale-red shield and his spear. Every hair on his head and in his
beard was so stiffly erect from anger and rage that a small apple or a
sloe, an iron apple or a smith’s anvil, might stand on each hair of them.
Blaiman fitted on his smooth, flowery stockings, and his two dry warm
boots of the hide of a small cow, that was the first calf of another cow
that never lay on any one of her sides. He fitted on his single-threaded
silken girdle which three craftsmen had made, underneath his
broad-pointed, sharp sword that would not leave a remnant uncut, or, if
it did, what it left at the first blow it took at the second. This sword
was to be unsheathed with the right hand, and sheathed with the left. He
gave the first blood of battle as a terrible oath that he himself was,
the choice champion of the Fenians, the feather of greatness, the slayer
of a champion of bravery; a man to compel justice and right, but not give
either justice or right; a man who had earned what he owned in the gap
of every danger, in the path of every hardship, who was sure to get what
belonged to him, or to know who detained it.
They rushed at each then like two bulls of the wilderness, or two wild
echoes of the cliff; they made soft ground of the hard, and hard ground
of the soft; they made low ground of high, and high ground of low. They
made whirling circles of the earth, and mill-wheels of the sky; and if
any one were to come from the lower to the upper world, it was to see
those two that he should come. They were this way at each other to the
height of the evening. Blaiman was growing hungry; and through dint of
anger he rose with the activity of his limbs, and with one stroke of his
sword cut off the giant’s head. There was a tree growing near. Blaiman
knocked off a tough, slender branch, put one end of it in through the
left ear and out through the right, then putting the head on the sword,
and the sword on his shoulder, went home to the king. Coming near the
castle with the giant’s head, he met a man tied in a tree whose name was
Hung Up Naked.
“Victory and prosperity to you, young champion,” said the man; “you have
done well hitherto; now loose me from this.”
“Are you long there?” asked Blaiman.
“I am seven years here,” answered the other.
“Many a man passed this way during that time. As no man of them loosed
you, I will not loose you.”
He went home then, and threw down the head by the side of the castle. The
head was so weighty that the castle shook to its deepest foundations. The
king came to the hall-door, shook Blaiman’s hand, and kissed him. They
spent that night as the previous night; and on the next day he went to
meet the second giant, came to his house, and struck the pole of combat.
The giant put out his head, and said, “You rascal, I lay a wager it was
you who killed my young brother yesterday; you’ll pay for it now, for I
think it is a sufficient length of life to get a glimpse of you, and I
know not what manner of death I should give you.”
“It is not to offer satisfaction that I am here,” said Blaiman, “but to
give you the same as your brother.”
“Is it any courage you have to fight me?” asked the giant.
“It is indeed,” said Blaiman; “’tis for that I am here.”
“What will you have?” asked the giant; “hard, thorny wrestling, or
fighting with sharp gray swords?”
“I prefer hard, thorny wrestling,” said Blaiman; “as I have practised it
on the lawns with noble children.”
They seized each other, and made soft places hard, and hard places soft;
they drew wells of spring water through the hard, stony ground in such
fashion that the place under them was a soft quagmire, in which the
giant, who was weighty, was sinking. He sank to his knees. Blaiman then
caught hold of him firmly, and forced him down to his hips.
“Am I to cut off your head now?” asked Blaiman.
“Do not do that,” said the giant. “Spare me, and I will give you my
treasure-room, and all that I have of gold and silver.”
“I will give you your own award,” said Blaiman. “If I were in your place,
and you in mine, would you let me go free?”
“I would not,” said the giant.
Blaiman drew his broad, shadowy sword made in Erin. It had edge, temper,
and endurance; and with one blow he took the two heads off the giant, and
carried the heads to the castle. He passed by Hung Up Naked, who asked
him to loose him; but he refused. When Blaiman threw the heads down, much
as the castle shook the first day, it shook more the second.
The king and his daughter were greatly rejoiced. They stifled him with
kisses, drowned him with tears, and dried him with stuffs of silk and
satin; they gave him the taste of every food and the odor of every
drink,—Greek honey and Lochlin beer in dry, warm cups, and the taste of
honey in every drop of the beer. I bailing it out, it would be a wonder
if I myself was not thirsty.
They passed that night as the night before. Next morning Blaiman was very
tired and weary after his two days’ fight, and the third giant’s land
was far distant.
“Have you a horse of any kind for me to ride?” asked he of the king.
“Be not troubled,” said the king. “There is a stallion in my stable that
has not been out for seven years, but fed on red wheat and pure spring
water; if you think you can ride that horse, you may take him.”
Blaiman went to the stable. When the horse saw the stranger, he bared
his teeth back to the ears, and made a drive at him to tear him asunder;
but Blaiman struck the horse with his fist on the ear, and stretched
him. The horse rose, but was quiet. Blaiman bridled and saddled him,
then drove out that slender, low-sided, bare-shouldered, long-flanked,
tame, meek-mannered steed, in which were twelve qualities combined:
three of a bull, three of a woman, three of a fox, and three of a hare.
Three of a bull,—a full eye, a thick neck, and a bold forehead; three of
a woman,—full hips, slender waist, and a mind for a burden; three of a
hare,—a swift run against a hill, a sharp turn about, and a high leap;
three of a fox,—a light, treacherous, proud gait, to take in the two
sides of the road by dint of study and acuteness, and to look only ahead.
He now went on, and could overtake the wind that was before him; and the
wind that was behind, carrying rough hailstones, could not overtake him.
Blaiman never stopped nor stayed till he arrived at the giant’s castle;
and this giant had three heads. He dismounted, and struck the pole a blow
that was heard throughout the kingdom. The giant looked out, and said,
“Oh, you villain! I’ll wager it was you that killed my two brothers. I
think it sufficient life to see you; and I don’t know yet what manner of
death will I put on you.”
“It is not to give satisfaction to you that I am here, you vile worm!”
said Blaiman. “Ugly is the smile of your laugh; and it must be that your
crying will be uglier still.”
“Is it hard, thorny wrestling that you want, or fighting with sharp gray
swords?” asked the giant.
“I will fight with sharp gray swords,” said Blaiman.
They rushed at each other then like two bulls of the wilderness. Toward
the end of the afternoon, the heavier blows were falling on Blaiman. Just
then a robin came on a bush in front of him, and said, “Oh, Blaiman, son
of Apple, from Erin, far away are you from the women who would lay you
out and weep over you! There would be no one to care for you unless I
were to put two green leaves on your eyes to protect them from the crows
of the air. Stand between the sun and the giant, and remember where men
draw blood from sheep in Erin.”
Blaiman followed the advice of the robin. The two combatants kept at each
other; but the giant was blinded by the sun, for he had to bend himself
often to look at his foe. One time, when he stretched forward, his helmet
was lifted a little, Blaiman got a glimpse of his neck, near the ear.
That instant he stabbed him. The giant was bleeding till he lost the
last of his blood. Then Blaiman cut the three heads off him, and carried
them home on the pommel of his saddle. When he was passing, Hung Up
Naked begged for release; but Blaiman refused and went on. Hung Up Naked
praised him for his deeds, and continued to praise. On second thought,
Blaiman turned back, and began to release Hung Up Naked; but if he did,
as fast as he loosened one bond, two squeezed on himself, in such fashion
that when he had Hung Up Naked unbound, he was himself doubly bound; he
had the binding of five men hard and tough on his body. Hung Up Naked was
free now; he mounted Blaiman’s steed, and rode to the king’s castle. He
threw down the giant’s heads, and never stopped nor stayed till he went
to where the king’s daughter was, put a finger under her girdle, bore
her out of the castle, and rode away swiftly.
Blaiman remained bound for two days to the tree. The king’s swine-herd
came the way, and saw Blaiman bound in the tree. “Ah, my boy,” said he,
“you are bound there, and Hung Up Naked is freed by you; and if you had
passed him as you did twice before, you need not be where you are now.”
“It cannot be helped,” said Blaiman; “I must suffer.”
“Oh, then,” said the swine-herd, “it is a pity to have you there and me
here; I will never leave you till I free you.”
Up went the swine-herd, and began to loosen Blaiman; and it happened to
him as to Blaiman himself: the bonds that had been on Blaiman were now on
the swine-herd.
“I have heard always that strength is more powerful than magic,” said
Blaiman. He went at the tree, and pulled it up by the roots; then, taking
his sword, he made small pieces of the tree, and freed the swine-herd.
Blaiman and the swine-herd then went to the castle. They found the king
sitting by the table, with his head on his hand, and a stream of tears
flowing from his eyes to the table, and from the table to the floor.
“What is your trouble?” asked Blaiman.
“Hung Up Naked came, and said that it was himself who killed the giant;
and he took my daughter.”
When he found that his wife was taken, and that he knew not where to look
for her, Blaiman was raging.
“Stay here to-night,” said the king.
Next morning the king brought a table-cloth, and said, “You may often
need food, and not know where to find it. Wherever you spread this, what
food you require will be on it.”
Although Blaiman, because of his troubles, had no care for anything, he
took the cloth with him. He was travelling all day, and at nightfall came
to a break in the mountain, a sheltered spot, and he saw remains of a
fire.
“I will go no farther to-night,” said he. After a time he pulled out the
table-cloth, and food for a king or a champion appeared on it quickly. He
was not long eating, when a little hound from the break in the mountain
came toward him, and stood at some distance, being afraid to come near.
“Oh,” said the hound, “have you crumbs or burned bread-crusts that you
would give me to take to my children, now dying of hunger? For three days
I have not been able to hunt food for them.”
“I have, of course,” said Blaiman. “Come, eat enough of what you like
best, and carry away what you can.”
“You have my dear love forever,” said the hound. “You are not like the
thief that was here three nights ago. When I asked him for help, he threw
a log of wood at me, and broke my shoulder-blade; and I have not been
able to find food for my little children since that night. Doleful and
sad was the lady who was with him; she ate no bite and drank no sup the
whole night, but was shedding tears. If ever you are in hardship, and
need my assistance, call for the Little Hound of Tranamee, and you will
have me to help you.”
“Stay with me,” said Blaiman, “a part of the night; I am lonely, and you
may take with you what food you can carry.”
The hound remained till he thought it time to go home; Blaiman gave him
what he could carry, and he was thankful.
Blaiman stayed there till daybreak, spread his cloth again, and ate what
he wanted. He was in very good courage from the tidings concerning his
wife. He journeyed swiftly all day, thinking he would reach the castle of
Hung Up Naked in the evening; but it was still far away.
He came in the evening to a place like that in which he had been the
night previous, and thought to himself, I will stay here to-night. He
spread his cloth, and had food for a king or a champion. He was not long
eating, when there came opposite him out a hawk, and asked, “Have you
crumbs or burned crusts to give me for my little children?”
“Oh,” said Blaiman, “come and eat your fill, and take away what you are
able to carry.”
The hawk ate his fill. “My love to you forever,” said the hawk; “this is
not how I was treated by the thief who was here three nights ago. When
I asked him for food, he flung a log of wood at me, and almost broke my
wing.”
“Give me your company a part of the night; I am lonely,” said Blaiman.
The hawk remained with him, and later on added, “The lady who went with
the thief was doleful and careworn; she ate nothing, but shed tears all
the time.” When going, and Blaiman had given him all the food he could
carry, the hawk said, “If ever you need my assistance, you have only to
call for the Hawk of Cold Cliff, and I will be with you.”
The hawk went away, very thankful; and Blaiman was glad that he had
tidings again of his wife. Not much of next day overtook him asleep. He
rose, ate his breakfast, and hastened forward. He was in such courage
that he passed a mountain at a leap, a valley at a step, and a broad
untilled field at a hop. He journeyed all day till he came to a break in
the mountain; there he stopped, and was not long eating from his cloth,
when an otter came down through the glen, stood before him, and asked,
“Will you give me crumbs or burned crusts for my little children?”
Blaiman gave him plenty to eat, and all he could carry home. “My love
to you forever,” said the otter. “When you need aid, call on the Otter
of Frothy Pool, and I will be with you. You are not like the thief who
was here three nights ago, having your wife with him. She was melting
all night with tears, and neither ate nor drank. You will reach the
castle of Hung Up Naked to-morrow at midday. It whirls around like a
millstone, continually, and no one can enter but himself; for the castle
is enchanted.”
The otter went home. Blaiman reached the castle at midday, and knew the
place well, from the words of the otter. He stood looking at the castle;
and when the window at which his wife was sitting came before him, she
saw him, and, opening the window, made a sign with her hand, and told him
to go. She thought that no one could get the upper hand of Hung Up Naked;
for the report had gone through the world that no man could kill him.
“I will not go,” said Blaiman. “I will not leave you where you are; and
now keep the window open.”
He stepped back some paces, and went in with one bound through the
window, when it came around the second time.
While Hung Up Naked was tied to the tree, the tributes of his kingdom
remained uncollected; and when he had the woman he wanted safe in his
castle, he went to collect the tributes. She had laid an injunction on
him to leave her in freedom for a day and a year. She knew when he would
be returning; and when that time was near she hid Blaiman.
“Good, good!” cried Hung Up Naked, when he came. “I smell on this little
sod of truth that a man from Erin is here.”
“How could a man from Erin be here?” asked Blaiman’s wife. “The only
person from Erin in this place is a robin. I threw a fork at him. There
is a drop of blood on the fork now; that is what you smell on the little
sod.”
“That may be,” said Hung Up Naked.
Blaiman and the wife were planning to destroy Hung Up Naked; but no one
had knowledge how to kill him. At last they made a plan to come at the
knowledge.
“It is a wonder,” said the woman to Hung Up Naked, “that a great man
like yourself should go travelling alone; my father always takes guards
with him.”