The Red Rout
Daily upon the ramparts of Dun Dalgan Emer of the beauteous hair
looked out and waited for Cuchulain, for nought of Laeg’s grim
tale, that he was dead or dying on the Plain, would take hold on
her mind. But still and evermore he came not home.
Upon a certain day, far off she saw a single horseman coming
towards the fort, upon a horse that wearily and weakly moved along,
dropping red blood at every step. Weary the horseman seemed, and
in his hand he bore a rod made out of osiers of the stream, and on
it hung the gory heads of lately slaughtered men. Then trembling
and affright fell on the queen. Full well she knew the horse that
dripped with blood, the Grey of Macha, Cuchulain’s chariot-steed,
but on his back another rider sat. “’Tis Conall the Victorious,”
she exclaimed, “he rides Cuchulain’s horse. With evil news he comes
to me this day. The tale is true that Laeg told, Cuchulain in his
blood lies on Murthemne’s Plain, dying or dead. Woe that another
rides Cuchulain’s steed! Woe that the Hound of Ulster draws not
near. Full many a day in triumphant pride by this same path he hath
come home to me! Full many a day along this beaten way in gallant
glee he hath gone forth to war!” Sadly and sorrowfully drew Conall
near and greeted Emer. And Emer said, “What gory heads are those
thou bearest on the withe? How and in what fight didst thou come
by them?” “These are the heads of those who slew thy hero and my
friend! Alas! that I in distant lands was wandering when Cuchulain
died. Too late I came to save him, if perchance he still might shun
the hour of his death; but not too late my promise to redeem and
to avenge his fall. See here upon the withe is Luga’s head, and
here the head of dark Curoi mac Daire, and here is Erc’s, the fair
young lad who stained his youth with blood, the blood of Ulster’s
Guardian and its Hound. These and the others I bear here with me
in token of my duty well performed, my promise kept. Where’er men
speak the praise of Ulster’s Hound and tell his deeds, there also
shall they speak of the Red Rout of Conall Cernach, in vengeance of
his death!”
Then trembling Emer said, “One head I see not here upon the withe;
yet in thy bosom surely thou hast yet one head for me. I see fair
hair, O Conall, bring it forth; give back to me my lover and my
friend.”
Then Conall said: “Listen, O Emer, to the tale I tell. When round
the men of Erin in my wrath and battle-fury I had passed, cutting
and hewing down their chiefs and leaders and their mighty men,
close up to Tara’s wall I made my way, seeking for Erc, who fled
before my steps surrounded by his chosen counsellors. Passing the
playing-fields without the fort, I saw men playing hurley with a
head, a human head in place of hurley-balls, a human head yet fresh
and wet with blood. My own blood froze within my veins! It was the
head of Ulster’s Hound they struck and flung from hand to hand!
And at the shame of it methought its cheeks blushed hot and rosy
red. Even as I came the head was struck; it bounded up, and nobly
took the goal. A shout went up from all those reckless men. ‘So,
so, the Hound of Ulster wins again; good man, good man, we hit him
under once and took his head from him, but he would take revenge
upon us now.’
“‘Revenge,’ I cried, ‘revenge he’ll find indeed,’ and at that word
into their midst I sprang, dealing on every hand death-bringing
blows. Like corn before the mower’s scythe, or like grown grass
beneath the feet of many hosts, I hewed them down. Harsh cries
went up, for all unarmed they fell, helpless and with no power to
withstand, and Erc came out upon the green, and stood there in
dismay. I held Cuchulain’s head on high in my left hand. ‘Thy head
to match with his,’ I cried, and ere he raised a sound his head was
rolling at my feet. I picked it up and hither came to seek thee,
gentle queen.”
Then Emer, white as death, and trembling as a rush that bows before
the onward-flowing stream, put forth her hands, and said, “Give me
Cuchulain’s head.” But when with reverence Conall placed within her
hands Cuchulain’s head, a cry of sorrow and of grief rang out from
Emer’s lips, and pierced the souls of all who heard it in the fort.
She bent to kiss the head, and at that moment her sad heart broke
within her breast, and o’er Dun Dalgan’s rampart Emer fell, her
fair hair mingled with the hair of Cuchulain, her mantle rent and
torn, and all her lovely face splashed o’er with blood. Gently and
reverently they raised her up, and bore her, with the head still
clasped within her arms, to where the body of Cuchulain lay. There
on Murthemne’s plain they buried them, two lovers and two friends
within one tomb, husband and wife. And when the grave was digged
and filled again, the Grey of Macha roamed away; through all the
fields and furrows of the plain, through all the glens and hills
in Erin’s bounds he seemed to search and closely scrutinise, as
though to find some being he had lost. But when he found him not,
back to the lonely loch among the reeds, where first Cuchulain
found and mastered him, he came again; and with one bound he leaped
into the very centre of the loch, and so appeared no more. This
witnessing, the Black Steed neighed in mournful wise, and went back
to the glen in Donegal, and no man dared to seek or follow him, nor
ever found they trace of him again.
But to the three times fifty queens who wept for him, the soul of
Cuchulain, radiant and noble as in life, appeared once more; and
on the ramparts of Emain by night, old warriors tell how, when
men are asleep, the spirit-chariot of a spirit-chief, clad in his
battle armour as of yore, moves round the walls, guarding the outer
ramparts from the foe; and all men sleep in safety, for the Hound
of Ulster wakes.
And as, with slow and stately pace the chariot moves, drawn by two
noble horses, white and black, a chant goes up upon the midnight
air, not like the pagan chants of other days, but sweet and gentle
as a summer-song, and with a note of triumph in its sound, telling
the coming of a hero-chief, who shall be called the Christ, and
who will bring great peace and rest to men. And when that song is
heard, rising with its sweet strain o’er all the fort, the fires
of war and hate are softened in the chieftains’ hearts, and women
smile upon their little babes and hug them to their breasts. And
all, the young and old, set forward minds to welcome the new time
when wars shall cease, and peace shall come to men.
Notes on the Sources
“Táin bó Cuailnge.” The two oldest versions of the long tale of
the “Táin bó Cuailnge,” or “Cattle-Raid of Cooley,” from which the
main part of Chapters ii.-vi. and ix.-xix. of this book are taken,
are those found in the old vellum manuscripts known as the “Leabhar
na h-Uidhre” (L.U.), compiled about the year 1100 in the monastery
of Clonmacnois on the Shannon, and preserved in the Library of
the Royal Irish Academy, Dublin, and that occurring in the Book
of Leinster (L.L.), preserved in Trinity College, Dublin, the
larger portion of which appears to belong to the twelfth century.
A version found in the Yellow Book of Lecan corresponds closely
to that in L.U., and seems to contain an even earlier text. The
text of this older version is in course of publication in Ériu,
the journal of the School of Irish Learning in Dublin, and a
translation has been made of it by Miss W. Faraday (Grimm Library
Series, vol. xvi.). The lengthy L.L. version has been published
with a German translation, and copious notes and glossary, by Dr
Ernst Windisch, 1905.
Among the later versions of parts of this long tale, is a copy
found in the British Museum (marked Add. 18748) 1800 A.D., which
coincides in the main with that of the Book of Leinster. A
translation of large portions of this manuscript was contributed by
Dr Standish H. O’Grady to the present author’s “Cuchullin Saga in
Irish Literature” (Grimm Library, vol. viii.).
The story of “The Education of Cuchulain” in Alba or Scotland, with
the amazon Scáth, originally formed part of the tale of “The Wooing
of Emer,” but separate accounts exist of these adventures. For the
details of Chapter vii., I have drawn partly upon the incidents
contained in the longer version of “The Wooing of Emer,” and partly
upon two late manuscripts found in the British Museum (Egerton, 106
and 145). These have since been edited by Dr Whitley Stokes in the
Revue Celtique, vol. xxix.
“The Wooing of Emer.” This story is taken from Dr Kuno Meyer’s
edition of the tale found in Stowe MS. 992, and first published by
him in the Archæological Review, vol. i.
The story of “Cuchulain’s Visit to Fairy-land,” usually known as
“The Sick-bed of Cuchulain” (our Chapters xx., xxi.), is adapted
from the accounts as given in the only two copies known to exist
of it, one found in L.U. and the other in a fifteenth-century
manuscript in Trinity College, Dublin. It was first published by
O’Curry in Atlantis, vols. i. and ii., and later Dr Windisch edited
the tale in Irische Texte, vol. i. An English translation will be
found in Leahy’s “Heroic Romances of Ireland,” vol. i.
The story of “Deirdre,” usually called “The Tragical Fate of the
Sons of Usnach,” is one of three favourite titles that for the last
two hundred years at least have been known as “The Three Sorrowful
Tales of Erin,” the other two being “The Fate of the Children of
Lir” and “The Fate of the Children of Tuireann.” There is, however,
no connection or similarity between these tales. The story is found
in numerous versions dating from the twelfth century down to the
present day, and it has undergone much modification in the course
of repetition. It is still a popular story in the Highlands of
Scotland, and all round Loch Etive and its neighbourhood are the
remains of forts and sites bearing the names of the unfortunate
lovers.
No single version contains the entire story, and I have therefore
been obliged to combine the accounts given in various versions
belonging to different ages, slightly altering the arrangement
in order to fit them together. In the chapter called “The
Sleep-Wanderer,” and in the account of “The Death of the Sons of
Usnach,” I have drawn largely on a very beautiful and poetic Gaelic
folk-version taken down by Dr Alexander Carmichael from the lips
of an old man of eighty-three years of age, John Macneill or “Iain
Donn” of Barra, and first published by him in the Trans. of the
Gaelic Society of Inverness, vols. xiii., xiv. It has since been
republished under the title of “Deirdre.”
Some suggestions I have also taken from a modern manuscript found
by Dr Douglas Hyde in the Belfast Museum, part of which was printed
by him in Zeit. für Celt. Phil., vol. ii.
But the main body of the story follows the mediæval version, which
has been printed repeatedly, one of the best recent editions being
that of Dr Whitley Stokes in Irische Texte, 2nd series, pt. 2.
In the oldest version, that found in the Book of Leinster, Deirdre
is made to survive the sons of Usnach, and is forced to come into
Conor’s house; but she will neither eat nor smile, and finally
she puts an end to her intolerable existence by springing from a
chariot and dashing her head against a rock. This version is much
ruder and more barbaric than any of those belonging to a later
period.
“The Tragical Death of Conla (or Conlaech), Son of Aiffe.”
Apparently the oldest form of this story, which is the Irish
parallel to the Persian story of “Sohrab and Rustem,” is that found
in the Yellow Book of Lecan, recently edited by Dr Kuno Meyer
in Ériu, vol. i. pt. I; Mr J. G. O’Keeffe gives another ancient
version in the same journal. The story is usually told in verse,
and is still alive in Gaelic-speaking parts of Ireland and in the
Highlands of Scotland. Miss Brooke has published one of these
poetical forms in her “Reliques of Irish Poetry,” 1789.
“The Tragical Death of Cuchulain.” The incidents connected with the
death of Cuchulain, and immediately preceding and following it, are
chiefly taken from, or suggested by, two good but comparatively
recent manuscripts in the British Museum (Egerton, 132, and
Add. 18947) dating from the early eighteenth and the nineteenth
centuries respectively. They contain the cycle of events known
as “The Great Defeat on the Plain of Murthemne,” “The Death of
Cuchulain,” “The Red Rout of Conall Cernach,” “The Lay of the
Heads,” and “Emer’s Death.” Portions of the material from the first
of these two manuscripts were translated for my “Cuchullin Saga” by
Dr S. H. O’Grady, but these five stories as a consecutive whole
have not yet been published. An older (L.L.) version of Cuchulain’s
death was published by Dr Whitley Stokes in Revue Celtique, vol.
iii.
Murthemne, or Cuchulain’s country, formed part of the present Co.
Louth, and a great pillar stone is still pointed out by the people
as the place of Cuchulain’s death, a split in the side having been
caused, according to living tradition, by the dying sigh of the
hero.
The poem on p. 141 is reprinted by kind permission of Mr T. Fisher
Unwin.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] This story has been published by Dr Wh. Stokes in _Rev. Celt._
xxix. (1908), since the above was written.
[2] The raths or earthworks of Emain Macha are still to be
discerned two miles west of Armagh, at a place now called Navan
Fort.
[3] Cruachan (now Rath Crogan) is in Co. Roscommon; tumuli mark the
site of the ancient kingly fort.
[4] From Dr George Sigerson’s _Bards of the Gael and Gall_. The
translation is in the metre and style of the original.
* * * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been
corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within
the text and consultation of external sources.
Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the text
and inconsistent or archaic usage have been retained. For example,
lookout, look-out; fairy-maid, fairy maid; Shadowland, Shadow-land;
curvetted; engraven; unweaponed; whinneyed; loth; draggled; forbad;
phantasies; digged.
Pg 10, 'orginally recited' replaced by 'originally recited'.
Pg 27, 'future renoun' replaced by 'future renown'.
Pg 56, 'Fiacha, who told' replaced by 'Fiacra, who told'.
Pg 144, 'fairyland drew' replaced by 'fairy-land drew'.
Pg 153, 'seasoned wariors' replaced by 'seasoned warriors'.
Pg 181, 'and is own' replaced by 'and his own'.
Pg 190, 'today; and for ever' replaced by 'to-day; and for ever'.
Pg 197, 'what constallations' replaced by 'what constellations'.
Pg 249, 'stranger boy got the' replaced by 'stranger-boy got the'.
Pg 272, 'trembing as a rush' replaced by 'trembling as a rush'.