"To fetch thy children, Lir," said they.
"Have they not reached you with Oifa?" said Lir.
[Illustration: CHILDREN OF LIR]
"They have not," said the messengers; "and Oifa said it was you would
not let the children go with her."
Then was Lir melancholy and sad at heart, hearing these things, for he
knew that Oifa had done wrong upon his children, and he set out towards
the Lake of the Red Eye. And when the children of Lir saw him coming
Fingula sang the lay:
"Welcome the cavalcade of steeds
Approaching the Lake of the Red Eye,
A company dread and magical
Surely seek after us.
"Let us move to the shore, O Aod,
Fiachra and comely Conn,
No host under heaven can those horsemen be
But King Lir with his mighty household."
Now as she said this King Lir had come to the shores of the lake and
heard the swans speaking with human voices. And he spake to the swans
and asked them who they were. Fingula answered and said: "We are thy own
children, ruined by thy wife, sister of our own mother, through her ill
mind and her jealousy." "For how long is the spell to be upon you?" said
Lir. "None can relieve us till the woman from the south and the man from
the north come together, till Lairgnen of Connaught wed Deoch of
Munster."
Then Lir and his people raised their shouts of grief, crying, and
lamentation, and they stayed by the shore of the lake listening to the
wild music of the swans until the swans flew away, and King Lir went on
to the Hall of Dearg the king. He told Dearg the king what Oifa had done
to his children. And Dearg put his power upon Oifa and bade her say
what shape on earth she would think the worst of all. She said it would
be in the form of an air-demon. "It is into that form I shall put you,"
said Dearg the king, and he struck her with a Druid's wand of spells and
wizardry and put her into the form of an air-demon. And she flew away at
once, and she is still an air-demon, and shall be so for ever.
But the children of Lir continued to delight the Milesian clans with the
very sweet fairy music of their songs, so that no delight was ever heard
in Erin to compare with their music until the time came appointed for
the leaving the Lake of the Red Eye.
Then Fingula sang this parting lay:
"Farewell to thee, Dearg the king,
Master of all Druid's lore!
Farewell to thee, our father dear,
Lir of the Hill of the White Field!
"We go to pass the appointed time
Away and apart from the haunts of men
In the current of the Moyle,
Our garb shall be bitter and briny,
"Until Deoch come to Lairgnen.
So come, ye brothers of once ruddy cheeks;
Let us depart from this Lake of the Red Eye,
Let us separate in sorrow from the tribe that has loved us."
And after they took to flight, flying highly, lightly, aerially till
they reached the Moyle, between Erin and Albain.
The men of Erin were grieved at their leaving, and it was proclaimed
throughout Erin that henceforth no swan should be killed. Then they
stayed all solitary, all alone, filled with cold and grief and regret,
until a thick tempest came upon them and Fingula said: "Brothers, let
us appoint a place to meet again if the power of the winds separate us."
And they said: "Let us appoint to meet, O sister, at the Rock of the
Seals." Then the waves rose up and the thunder roared, the lightnings
flashed, the sweeping tempest passed over the sea, so that the children
of Lir were scattered from each other over the great sea. There came,
however, a placid calm after the great tempest and Fingula found herself
alone, and she said this lay:
"Woe upon me that I am alive!
My wings are frozen to my sides.
O beloved three, O beloved three,
Who hid under the shelter of my feathers,
Until the dead come back to the living
I and the three shall never meet again!"
And she flew to the Lake of the Seals and soon saw Conn coming towards
her with heavy step and drenched feathers, and Fiachra also, cold and
wet and faint, and no word could they tell, so cold and faint were they:
but she nestled them under her wings and said: "If Aod could come to us
now our happiness would be complete." But soon they saw Aod coming
towards them with dry head and preened feathers: Fingula put him under
the feathers of her breast, and Fiachra under her right wing, and Conn
under her left: and they made this lay:
"Bad was our stepmother with us,
She played her magic on us,
Sending us north on the sea
In the shapes of magical swans.
"Our bath upon the shore's ridge
Is the foam of the brine-crested tide,
Our share of the ale feast
Is the brine of the blue-crested sea."
One day they saw a splendid cavalcade of pure white steeds coming
towards them, and when they came near they were the two sons of Dearg
the king who had been seeking for them to give them news of Dearg the
king and Lir their father. "They are well," they said, "and live
together happy in all except that ye are not with them, and for not
knowing where ye have gone since the day ye left the Lake of the Red
Eye." "Happy are not we," said Fingula, and she sang this song:
"Happy this night the household of Lir,
Abundant their meat and their wine.
But the children of Lir--what is their lot?
For bed-clothes we have our feathers,
And as for our food and our wine--
The white sand and the bitter brine,
Fiachra's bed and Conn's place
Under the cover of my wings on the Moyle,
Aod has the shelter of my breast,
And so side by side we rest."
So the sons of Dearg the king came to the Hall of Lir and told the king
the condition of his children.
Then the time came for the children of Lir to fulfil their lot, and they
flew in the current of the Moyle to the Bay of Erris, and remained there
till the time of their fate, and then they flew to the Hill of the White
Field and found all desolate and empty, with nothing but unroofed green
raths and forests of nettles--no house, no fire, no dwelling-place. The
four came close together, and they raised three shouts of lamentation
aloud, and Fingula sang this lay:
"Uchone! it is bitterness to my heart
To see my father's place forlorn--
No hounds, no packs of dogs,
No women, and no valiant kings.
"No drinking-horns, no cups of wood,
No drinking in its lightsome halls.
Uchone! I see the state of this house
That its lord our father lives no more.
"Much have we suffered in our wandering years,
By winds buffeted, by cold frozen;
Now has come the greatest of our pain--
There lives no man who knoweth us in the house
where we were born."
So the children of Lir flew away to the Glory Isle of Brandan the saint,
and they settled upon the Lake of the Birds until the holy Patrick came
to Erin and the holy Mac Howg came to Glory Isle.
And the first night he came to the island the children of Lir heard the
voice of his bell ringing for matins, so that they started and leaped
about in terror at hearing it; and her brothers left Fingula alone.
"What is it, beloved brothers?" said she. "We know not what faint,
fearful voice it is we have heard." Then Fingula recited this lay:
"Listen to the Cleric's bell,
Poise your wings and raise
Thanks to God for his coming,
Be grateful that you hear him.
"He shall free you from pain,
And bring you from the rocks and stones.
Ye comely children of Lir
Listen to the bell of the Cleric."
And Mac Howg came down to the brink of the shore and said to them: "Are
ye the children of Lir?" "We are indeed," said they. "Thanks be to God!"
said the saint; "it is for your sakes I have come to this Isle beyond
every other island in Erin. Come ye to land now and put your trust in
me." So they came to land, and he made for them chains of bright white
silver, and put a chain between Aod and Fingula and a chain between Conn
and Fiachra.
It happened at this time that Lairgnen was prince of Connaught and he
was to wed Deoch the daughter of the king of Munster. She had heard the
account of the birds and she became filled with love and affection for
them, and she said she would not wed till she had the wondrous birds of
Glory Isle. Lairgnen sent for them to the Saint Mac Howg. But the Saint
would not give them, and both Lairgnen and Deoch went to Glory Isle. And
Lairgnen went to seize the birds from the altar: but as soon as he had
laid hands on them their feathery coats fell off, and the three sons of
Lir became three withered bony old men, and Fingula, a lean withered old
woman without blood or flesh. Lairgnen started at this and left the
place hastily, but Fingula chanted this lay:
"Come and baptise us, O Cleric,
Clear away our stains!
This day I see our grave--
Fiachra and Conn on each side,
And in my lap, between my two arms,
Place Aod, my beauteous brother."
After this lay, the children of Lir were baptised. And they died, and
were buried as Fingula had said, Fiachra and Conn on either side, and
Aod before her face. A cairn was raised for them, and on it their names
were written in runes. And that is the fate of the children of Lir.