In translating these poems I have chosen to do so in the speech of
the thatched houses where I have heard and gathered them. _An
Craoibhin_ had already used this Gaelic construction, these
Elizabethan phrases, in translating the _Love Songs of Connacht_,
as I have used it even in my creative work. Synge had not yet used
it when he found in my _Cuchulain of Muirthemne_ "the dialect
he had been trying to master," and of which he afterwards made such
splendid use. Most of the translations in this book have already been
printed in _Cuchulain of Muirthemne_, _Gods and Fighting Men_,
_Saints and Wonders_, and _Poets and Dreamers_. When in the
first month of the new year I began to choose from among them, it
seemed strange to me that the laments so far outnumbered any songs
of joy. But before that month was out news was brought to me that made
the keening of women for the brave and of those who are left lonely
after the young seem to be but the natural outcome and expression
of human life.