Nine headless bodies rose to sight,
And on the left, from grim repose,
Nine heads that had no bodies rose,..."
Ossin likewise tells, and how, overcome, they fell at last into a
deathlike trance and stupor, till the sunlight woke them lying on the
heathery hillside, the house utterly vanished away.
The scenes of all the happenings in the story are well known: the rath
of Badamar is near Caher on the Suir, in the midst of the Golden Vale, a
plain of wonderful richness and beauty, walled in by the red precipices
of the Galtee Mountains, and the Knock-Mealdown Hills. From the rath of
Badamar Find could watch the western mountains reddening and glowing in
front of the dawn, as the sun-rays shot level over the burnished plain.
Clocar is thirty miles westward over the Golden Vale, near where Croom
now stands; and here were run the races; here Find gained the gift of
the coal-black steed. It is some forty miles still westwards to the
Strand of Tralee; the last half of the way among hills carpeted with
heather; and the Strand itself, with the tide out, leaves a splendid
level of white sand as far as the eye can reach, tempting Find to try
his famous courser. The race carried them southwards some fifteen miles
to the beautiful waters of Lough Leane, with its overhanging wooded
hills, the Lake of Killarney, southward of which rises the huge red
mass of Mangerton, in the midst of a country everywhere rich in beauty.
The Hill of Barnec is close by, but the site of the magic dwelling, who
can tell? Perhaps Find; or Cailté, or golden-tongued Ossin himself.
There was abundant fighting in those days, for well within memory was
the time of Conn of the Five-score Fights, against whom Cumal had warred
because Conn lord of Connacht had raised Crimtan of the Yellow Hair to
the kingship of Leinster. Cumal fought at the Rath that bears his name,
now softened to Rathcool, twelve miles inward from the sea at Dublin,
with the hills rising up from the plain to the south of the Rath. Cumal
fought and fell, slain by Goll Mac Morna, and enmity long endured
between Find and Goll who slew his sire. But like valiant men they were
reconciled, and when Goll in his turn died, Find made a stirring poem on
Goll's mighty deeds.
Another fateful fight for Find was the battle of Kinvarra, among the
southern rocks of Galway Bay; for though he broke through the host of
his foeman Uincé, that chieftain himself escaped, and, riding swiftly
with a score of men, came to Find's own dwelling at Druim Dean on the
Red Hills of Leinster, and burned the dwelling, leaving it a smoldering
ruin. Find pursuing, overtook them, slaying them at the ford called to
this day Ath-uincé, the ford of Uincé. Returning homewards, Find found
his house desolate, and the song he sang still holds the memory of
his sorrow.
Two poems he made, on the Plain of Swans and on Roirend in Offaly, full
of vivid pictures and legends; and one of romantic tragedy, telling how
the two daughters of King Tuatal Tectmar were treacherously slain,
through the malice of the Leinster king. But of romances and songs of
fair women in the days of Find, the best is the Poem of Gael, who
composed it to win a princess for his bride.
Of fair Credé of the Yellow Hair it was said that there was scarce a gem
in all Erin that she had not got as a love-token, but that she would
give her heart to none. Credé had vowed that she would marry the man who
made the best verses on her home, a richly-adorned dwelling in the
south, under the twin cones of the Paps, and within sight of Lough Leane
and Killarney. Cael took up the challenge, and invoking the Genius that
dwelt in the sacred pyramid of Brugh on the Boyne he made these verses,
and came to recite them to yellow-haired Credé:
"It would be happy for me to be in her home,
Among her soft and downy couches,
Should Credé deign to hear me;
Happy for me would be my journey.
A bowl she has, whence berry-juice flows,
With which she colors her eyebrows black;
She has clear vessels of fermenting ale;
Cups she has, and beautiful goblets.
The color of her house is white like lime;
Within it are couches and green rushes;
Within it are silks and blue mantles;
Within it are red gold and crystal cups.
Of its sunny chamber the corner stones
Are all of silver and yellow gold,
Its roof in stripes of faultless order
Of wings of brown and crimson red.
Two doorposts of green I see,
Nor is the door devoid of beauty;
Of carved silver,--long has it been renowned,--
Is the lintel that is over the door.
Credé's chair is on your right hand,
The pleasantest of the pleasant it is;
All over a blaze of Alpine gold,
At the foot of her beautiful couch...
The household which is in her house
To the happiest fate has been destined;
Grey and glossy are their garments;
Twisted and fair is their flowing hair.
Wounded men would sink in sleep,
Though ever so heavily teeming with blood,
With the warbling of the fairy birds
From the eaves of her sunny summer-room.
If I am blessed with the lady's grace,
Fair Credé for whom the cuckoo sings,
In songs of praise shall ever live,
If she but repay me for my gift....
There is a vat of royal bronze,
Whence flows the pleasant; nice of malt;
An apple-tree stands over the vat,
With abundance of weighty fruit.
When Credé's goblet is filled
With the ale of the noble vat,
There drop down into the cup forthwith
Four apples at the same time.
The four attendants that have been named,
Arise and go to the distributing,
They present to four of the guests around
A drink to each man and an apple.
She who possesses all these things,
With the strand and the stream that flow by them,
Credé of the three-pointed hill,
Is a spear-cast beyond the women of Erin.
Here is a poem for her,--no mean gift.
It is not a hasty, rash composition;
To Credé now it is here presented:
May my journey be brightness to her!"
[Illustration: Colleen Bawn Caves, Klllarney.]
Tradition says that the heart of the yellow-haired beauty was utterly
softened and won, so that she delayed not to make Cael master of the
dwelling he so well celebrated; master, perhaps, of all the jewels of
Erin that her suitors had given her. Yet their young love was not
destined to meet the storms and frosts of the years; for Cael the
gallant fell in battle, his melodious lips for ever stilled. Thus have
these two become immortal in song.
We have seen Cailté with Ossin following Find in his wild ride through
the mountains of Killarney, and to Cailté is attributed the saying that
echoes down the ages: "There are things that our poor wit knows nothing
off!" Cailté was a great lover of the supernatural, yet there was in him
also a vein of sentiment, shown in his poem on the death of
Clidna--"Clidna the fair-haired, long to be remembered," who was
tragically drowned at Glandore harbor in the south, and whose sad wraith
still moans upon the bar, in hours of fate for the people of Erin.
In a gayer vein is the poem of Fergus the Eloquent, who sang the legend
of Tipra Seangarmna, the Fountain of the Feale River, which flows
westward to the sea from the mountains north of Killarney. The river
rises among precipices, gloomy caverns and ravines, and passes through
vales full of mysterious echoes amid mist-shrouded hills. There, as
Fergus sings, were Ossin and his following hunting, when certain ominous
fair women lured them to a cave,--women who were but insubstantial
wraiths,--to hold them captive till the seasons ran full circle, summer
giving place again to winter and spring. But Ossin, being himself of
more than human wisdom, found a way to trick the spirits; for daily he
cut chips from his spear and sent them floating down the spring, till
Find at last saw them, and knew the tokens as Ossin's, and, coming,
delivered his son from durance among ghosts.
The great romantic theme of the time binds the name of Find, son of
Cumal, with that of Cormac, son of Art, and grandson of Conn of the
Five-score Battles. This Cormac was himself a notable man of wisdom, and
here are some of the Precepts he taught to Cairbré, his son:
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac," Cairbré asked him, "what is good for a
king?"
"This is plain," answered Cormac. "It is good for him to have patience
and not to dispute, self-government without anger, affability without
haughtiness, diligent attention to history, strict observance of
covenants and agreements, justice tempered by mercy in the execution of
the laws. It is good for him to make fertile land, to invite ships, to
import jewels of price from across the sea, to purchase and distribute
raiment, to keep vigorous swordsmen who may protect his territory, to
make war beyond his territory, to attend to the sick, to discipline his
soldiers. Let him enforce fear, let him perfect peace, let him give mead
and wine, let him pronounce just judgments of light, let him speak all
truth, for it is through the truth of a king that God gives
favorable seasons."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac," Cairbré again asked him, "what is good
for the welfare of a country?"
"This is plain," answered Cormac. "Frequent assemblies of wise and good
men to investigate its affairs, to abolish every evil and retain every
wholesome institution, to attend to the precepts of the seniors; let
every assembly be convened according to the law, let the law be in the
hands of the noblest, let the chieftains be upright and unwilling to
oppress the poor."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac," again asked Cairbré, "what are duties of
a prince in the banqueting-house?"
"A prince on the Day of Spirits should light his lamps and welcome his
guests with clapping of hands, offering comfortable seats; the
cup-bearers should be active in distributing meat and drink. Let there
be moderation of music, short stories, a welcoming countenance, a
greeting for the learned, pleasant conversation. These are the duties
of a prince and the arrangement of a banqueting-house."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac, for what qualifications is a king elected
over countries and tribes of people?"
"From the goodness of his shape and family, from his experience and
wisdom, from his prudence and magnanimity, from his eloquence and
bravery in battle, and from the number of his friends."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac, what was thy deportment when a youth?"
"I was cheerful at the banquet of the House of Mead, I was fierce in
battle, but vigilant and careful. I was kind to friends, a physician to
the sick, merciful to the weak, stern toward the headstrong. Though
possessed of knowledge, I loved silence. Though strong, I was not
overbearing. Though young, I mocked not the old. Though valiant, I was
not vain. When I spoke of one absent I praised and blamed him not, for
by conduct like this are we known to be courteous and refined."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac, what is good for me?"
"If thou attend to my command, thou wilt not scorn the old though thou
art young, nor the poor though thou art well clad, nor the lame though
thou art swift, nor the blind though thou seest, nor the weak though
thou art strong, nor the ignorant though thou art wise. Be not slothful,
be not passionate, be not greedy, be not idle, be not jealous; for he
who is so is hateful to God and man."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac, I would know how to hold myself with the
wise and the foolish, with friends and strangers, with old and young."
"Be not too knowing or simple, too proud or inactive, too humble or
haughty, talkative or too silent, timid or too severe. For if thou art
too knowing, thou wilt be mocked at and abused; if too simple, thou wilt
be deceived; if proud, thou wilt be shunned; if too humble, thou wilt
suffer; if talkative, thou wilt be thought foolish; if too severe, men
will speak ill of thee; if timid, thy rights will suffer."
"O grandson of Conn, O Cormac, how shall I discern the characters of
women?"
"I know them, but I cannot describe them. Their counsel is foolish, they
are forgetful of love, most headstrong in their desires, fond of folly,
prone to enter rashly into engagements, given to swearing, proud to be
asked in marriage, tenacious of enmity, cheerless at the banquet,
rejectors of reconciliation, prone to strife, of much garrulity. Until
evil be good, until hell be heaven, until the sun hide his light, until
the stars of heaven fall, women will remain as we have declared. Woe to
him, my son, who desires or serves a bad woman, woe to him who has a
bad wife."
Was there some thought of his daughter Grania in Cormac's mind, behind
these keen-edged; words?--of Grania, beloved of Diarmuid? When the
winters of the years were already white on Find, son of Cumal, when
Ossin his son had a son of his own, Oscur the valiant, the two old men,
Cormac the king and Find leader of the warriors, bethought them to make
a match between Find and Grania, one of the famous beauties of the olden
time. A banquet was set in the great House of Mead, and Find and his men
were there, Diarmuid son of Duibné being also there, best beloved among
Find's warriors. There was a custom, much in honor among the chieftains,
that a princess should send her goblet to the guests, offering it to
each with gentle courtesy. This grace fell to the lady Grania, whose
whole heart rose up against her grey-bearded lover, and was indeed set
on Diarmuid the son of Duibné. Grania compounded a dreamy draught to
mix with the mead, so that all the chieftains and warriors, with Cormac
and Find himself, even while praising the drink, fell straightway
a-nodding, and were soon in silent sleep, all except Ossin and Diarmuid,
whom Grania had bidden not to drink.
Then Grania, her voice all tremulous with tears, told to Ossin the fate
that awaited her, looking at him, but speaking for Diarmuid; bewailing
bitterly the misery of fair youth in the arms of withered eld, and at
last turning and openly begging Diarmuid to save her from her fate. To
carry away a king's daughter, betrothed to the leader of the warriors,
was a perilous thing, and Diarmuid's heart stood still at the thought of
it; yet Grania's tears prevailed, and they two fled forth that night to
the hills and forests. Dire and ruinous was the wrath of Cormac and of
Find when they awoke and found that these two were fled; and whatever
might was in the king's hand, whatever power in the hosts of Find, was
straightway turned against them in pursuit. Yet the two fled as the deer
might fly, visiting with their loves every wood and valley in Erin, till
the memory of them lingers throughout all the hills. Finally, after a
year's joyful and fearsome fleeing, the Fian warriors everywhere aiding
them for love of Diarmuid, swift death came upon Diarmuid, and Grania
was left desolate.
But Angus the Ever-Young, guardian Genius of the pyramid-shrine of Brugh
by the Boyne, De Danaan dweller in the secret house, Angus of the
Immortals received the spirit of Diarmuid, opening for him the ways of
the hidden world.
But enmity grew between Find with his warriors and Cormac the king, till
at last a battle was fought where Find's men fell, and Cairbré, the
well-instructed son of Cormac also fell. Thus passed away the ruling
spirits of that age, the flowering time of the genius of Erin.
VIII.
THE MESSENGER OF THE NEW WAY.
A.D. 410-493.
The valor of Fergus and Cuculain, the rich imaginative life of Find and
Ossin, were the flower of heroic centuries. Strong men had fought for
generations before Concobar reigned at Emain of Maca. Poets had sung
their deeds of valor, and the loves of fair women, and the magical
beauty of the world, through hardly changing ages. The heroes of fame
were but the best fruit in the garden of the nation's life. So ripe was
that life, more than two thousand years ago, that it is hard to say what
they did not know, of the things which make for amenity and comity. The
colors of the picture are everywhere rich, yet perfectly harmonized.
The earliest forms of Irish writing seem to have come from the Baltic
runes, and these, in their turn, from an old Greek script of twenty-five
hundred years ago. The runes spread as far as the Orkneys, and there
they were well within the horizon of Ireland's knowledge. Nothing would
be more natural than the keeping of written records in Erin for three
or four hundred years before Cuculain's birth, nineteen hundred
years ago.
The arts of life were very perfect; the gold-work of that time is
unsurpassed--has never been surpassed. At a far earlier time there were
beautifully moulded and decorated gold-bronze spears, that show what
richness of feeling and imagination, what just taste and fine skill were
there. All our knowledge goes to show that the suitor of Credé has drawn
a true picture of her house and the generous social life belonging to
it. We know, too, that the great dining-hall of Tara has been faithfully
celebrated by the bards; the picture of the king in his scarlet cloak is
representative of the whole epoch.
The story of Credé also shows the freedom and honor accorded to women,
as does the queenship of Meave, with the record of her separate riches.
The tragedies of Deirdré and Grania would never have been remembered,
had not the freedom and high regard of women been universal. Such
decorative skill as is shown in the metal-work and pottery that have
come down to us must have borne fruit in every realm of social life, in
embroideries, tapestries, well-designed and beautifully adorned homes.
Music is everywhere spoken of in the old traditions, and the skill of
the poets we can judge for ourselves.
In all that concerns the natural man, therefore, a very high perfection
had been reached. A frame of life had grown habitual, which brought out
the finest vigor and strength and beauty. Romantic love added its riches
to valor, and dignity was given by the ever-present memory of the heroic
past, merging on the horizon with the divine dawn of the world. Manhood
and womanhood had come to perfect flower. The crown rested on the brow
of the nation's life.
When the life of the natural man is perfected, the time comes to strike
the note of the immortal, to open the door of our real and enduring
destiny. Sensual success, the ideal of unregenerate man, was perfectly
realized in Concobar and ten thousand like him. The destiny of
triumphant individual life, the strong man victorious over nature and
other men, was fulfilled. Individual prowess, individual accomplishment,
could go no further.
Nor should we overlook the dark shadows of the picture. Glory is to the
victor, but woe to the vanquished. The continual warfare between tribe
and tribe, between chief and chief, which made every valley a home of
warriors dominated by a rath-fortress, bore abundant fruits of evil.
Death in battle need not be reckoned, or may be counted as pure gain;
but the fate of the wounded, maimed and miserable, the destitution of
women and children left behind, the worse fate of the captives, sold as
they were into exile and slavery,--all these must be included in
the total.
Nor are these material losses the worst. The great evil of the epoch of
tribal war is its reaction on the human spirit. The continual struggle
of ambition draws forth egotism, the desire to dominate for mere
domination, the sense of separation and antagonism between man and man,
tribe and tribe, province and province.
But our real human life begins only when these evil tendencies are
abated; when we learn to watch the life of others as if it were our
own,--as being indeed a part of our own life,--and in every act and
motion of our minds do only that which shall be to the best advantage of
both ourselves and our neighbor. For only thus, only by the incessant
practice of this in imagination and act, can the door of our wider and
more humane consciousness be opened.
[Illustration: Ruins on Scattery Island.]
Nor is this all. There are in us vast unexplored tracts of power and
wisdom; tracts not properly belonging to our personal and material
selves, but rather to the impersonal and universal consciousness which
touches us from within, and which we call divine. Our personal fate is
closed by death; but we have a larger destiny which death does not
touch; a destiny enduring and immortal. The door to this larger destiny
can only be opened after we have laid down the weapons of egotism; after
we have become veritably humane. There must be a death to militant
self-assertion, a new birth to wide and universal purposes, before this
larger life can be understood and known.
With all the valor and rich life of the days of Cuculain and Ossin, the
destructive instinct of antagonism was very deeply rooted in all hearts;
it did endless harm to the larger interests of the land, and laid
Ireland open to attack from without. Because the genius of the race was
strong and highly developed, the harm went all the deeper; even now,
after centuries, it is not wholly gone.
The message of the humane and the divine, taught among the Galilean
hills and on the shores of Gennesaret, was after four centuries brought
to Ireland--a word of new life to the warriors and chieftains,
enkindling and transforming their heroic world. Britain had received
the message before, for Britain was a part of the dominion of Rome,
which already had its imperial converts. Roman life and culture and
knowledge of the Latin tongue had spread throughout the island up to the
northern barrier between the Forth and Clyde. Beyond this was a
wilderness of warring tribes.
Where the Clyde comes forth from the plain to the long estuary of the
sea, the Messenger of the Tidings was born. His father, Calpurn, was a
Roman patrician; from this his son, whose personal name was Succat, was
surnamed Patricius, a title raised by his greatness into a personal
name. His letters give us a vivid picture of his captivity, and the
stress of life which gradually aroused in him the inspiration of the
humane and divine ripened later into a full knowledge of his apostolate.
"I Patricius, a sinner," he writes, "and most unlearned of believers,
looked down upon by many, had for my father the deacon Calpurn, son of
the elder Potitus, of a place called Bannova in Tabernia, near to which
was his country home. There I was taken captive, when not quite sixteen.
I knew not the Eternal. Being led into captivity with thousands of
others, I was brought to Ireland,--a fate well deserved. For we had
turned from the Eternal, nor kept the laws of the Eternal. Nor had we
heeded the teachers who urged us to seek safety. Therefore the Eternal,
justly wroth, scattered us among unbelievers, to the uttermost parts of
the earth; here, where my poor worth is now seen among strangers, where
the Eternal liberated the power hid in my unenkindled heart, that even
though late I should recognize my error, and turn with all my heart to
the Eternal....
"I have long had it in mind to write, but until now have hesitated; for
I feared blame, because I had not studied law and the sacred
writings,--as have others who have never changed their language, but
gone on to perfection in it; but my speech is translated into another
language, and the roughness of my writing shows how little I have been
taught. As the Sage says, 'Show by thy speech thy wisdom and knowledge
and learning.' But what profits this excuse? since all can see how in my
old age I struggle after what I should have learned as a boy. For then
my sinfulness hindered me. I was but a beardless boy when I was taken
captive, not knowing what to do and what to avoid; therefore I am
ashamed to show my ignorance now? because I never learned to express
great matters succinctly and well;--great matters like the moving of the
soul and mind by the Divine Breath.... Nor, indeed, was I worthy that
the Master should so greatly favor me, after all my hard labor and heavy
toil, and the years of captivity amongst this people,--that the Master
should show me such graciousness as I never knew nor hoped for till I
came to Ireland.
"But daily herding cattle here, and aspiring many times a day, the fear
of the Eternal grew daily in me. A divine dread and aspiration grew in
me, so that I often prayed a hundred times a day, and as many times in
the night. I often remained in the woods and on the hills, rising to
pray while it was yet dark, in snow or frost or rain; yet I took no
harm. The Breath of the Divine burned within me, so that nothing
remained in me unenkindled.