Books: The King of Ireland\'s Son

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They were in the middle of the play when Gilly of the Goatskin rushed into the
barn. "Master, master," he shouted, "your mill--your mill is on fire." The
Churl stood up, and then put his glass to his head and drained what was in it.
"Make way for me, good people," said he. "Let me out of this, good people."
Some people near the door began to talk of what Gilly held in his hands. "What
have you there, my servant?" said the Churl. "A pair of horse's legs, Master.
I could only carry two of them."

The Churl caught Gilly by the throat. "A pair of horse's legs," said he.
"Where did you get a pair of horse's legs?"

"Off a horse," said Gilly. "I had trouble in cutting them off. Bad cess to you
for telling me to come here with horse's legs."

"And whose horse did you cut the legs off?" "Your own, Master. You wouldn't
have liked me to cut the legs off any other person's horse. And I thought your
race-horse's legs would be the most suitable to cut off."

The mummers and the people were gathered round them and they saw the Churl's
face get black with vexation.

"0 my misfortune, that ever I met with you," said the Churl.

"Are you sorry for your bargain, Master?" said Gilly.

"Sorry--I'll be sorry every day and night of my life for it," said the Churl.

"You hear what my Master says, good people," said Gilly.

"Aye, sure. He says he's sorry for the bargain he made with you," said some of
the people.

"Then," said Gilly, "strip him and put him across the bench until I cut a
strip of his skin an inch wide from his neck to his heel."

None of the people would consent to do that. "Well, I'll tell you something
that will make you consent," said Gilly. "This man made two poor servant-boys
work for him, paid them no wages, and took a strip of their skin, so that they
are sick and sore to this day. Will that make you strip him and put him across
the bench?"

"No," said some of the people.

"He ordered me to come here to-night and to shout 'Master, master, your mill
is on fire,' so that he might be able to leave without paying the mummers
their dues. His mill is not on fire at all."

"Strip him," said the first mummer.

"Put him across the bench," said another.

"Here's a skinner's knife for you," said a third.

The mummers seized the Churl, stripped him and put him across the bench. Gilly
took the knife and began to sharpen it on the ground.

"Have mercy on me," said the Churl.

"You did not have mercy on the other two poor servant-boys," said Gilly.

"I'll give you your wages in full."

"That's not enough."

"I'll give you double wages to give to the other servant-boys."

"And will you pay the mummers' dues for all the people here?"

"No, no, no. I can't do that."

"Stretch out your neck then until I mark the place where I shall begin to cut
the skin."

"Don't put the knife to me. I'll pay the dues for all," said the Churl.

"You heard what he said," said Gilly to the people. "He will pay me wages in
full, give me double wages to hand to the servant-boys he has injured, and pay
the mummers' dues for everyone."

"We heard him say that," said the people.

"Stand up and dress yourself," said Gilly to the Churl. "What do I want with a
strip of your skin? But I hope all here will go home with you and stand in
your house until you have paid ail the money that's claimed from you."

"We'll go home with him," said the mummers.

"We'll stand on his floor until he has paid all the money he has agreed to
pay," said the others.

"And now I must tell you, neighbors," said Gilly, "that I never cut the legs
of a living horse--neither his horse nor anyone else's. This pair was taken
off a poor dead horse by the skinners that were cutting it up."

Well, they all went to the Churl's house and there they stayed until he opened
his stone chest and took out his money-box and paid to the mummers the dues of
all the people with sixpence over, and paid Gilly his wages in full, one
guinea, one groat and a tester, and handed him double wages to give to each of
the servant-boys he had injured. Gilly took the money and left the house of
the Churl of the Townland of Mischance, and the people and the mummers went to
the road with him, and cheered him as he went on his way.

XIV

So, without hap or mishap, Gilly came again to the house of the Spae-Woman.
She was sitting at her door-step grinding corn with a quern when he came
before her. She cried over him, not believing that he had come safe from the
Townland of Mischance. And as long as he was with her she spoke to him of his
"poor back."

He stayed with her for two seasons. He mended her fences and he cleaned her
spring-well; he ground her corn and he brought back her swarm of bees; he
trained a dog to chase the crows out of her field; he had the ass shod, the
sheep washed and the goat spancelled. The Spae-Woman was much beholden to him
for all he did for her, and one day she said to him, "Gilly of the Goat-skin
you are called, but another name is due to you now." "And who will give me
another name?" said Gilly of the Goatskin. "Who'll give it to you? Who but the
0ld Woman of Beare," said the Spae-Woman.

The next day she said to him, "I had a dream last night, and I know now what
you are to do. You must go now to the 0Id Woman of Beare for the name that is
due to you. And before she gives it to you, you must tell her and whoever else
is in her house as much as you know of the Unique Tale."

"But I know nothing at ail of the Unique Tale," said Gilly of the Goatskin.

"There is always a blank before a beginning," said the Spae-Woman. "This
evening, when I am grinding the corn at the quern I shall tell you the Unique
Tale."

That evening when she sat at the door-step of her house and when the sun was
setting behind the elder-bushes the Spae-Woman told Gilly the third part of
the Unique Tale. Then she baked a cake and killed a cock for him and told him
to start on the morrow's morning for the house of the Old Woman of Beare.

Well, he started off in the morning bright and early, leaving good health with
the Spae-Woman behind him, and away he went, crossing high hills, passing low
dales, and keeping on his way without halt or rest, the clear day going and
the dark night coming, taking lodgings each evening wherever he found them,
and at last he came to the house of the Old Woman of Beare.

He went into the house and found her making marks in the ashes of her fire
while her cuckoo, her corncrake and her swallow were picking grains off the
table.

"And what can I do for you, good youth?" said the Old Woman of Beare.

"Give me a name," said Gilly, "and listen to the story I have to tell you."

"That I will not," said the Old Woman of Beare, "until you have done a task
for me."

"What task can I do for you?" said Gilly of the Goatskin. "I would know," said
she, "which of us four is the oldest creature in the world--myself or Laheen
the Eagle, Blackfoot the Elk or the Crow of Achill--I leave the Salmon of
Assaroe out of account altogether."

"And how can a youth like me help you to know that?" said Gilly of the
Goatskin.

"An ox was killed on the day I was born and on every one of my birthdays
afterwards. The horns of the oxen are in two quarries outside. You must count
them and tell me how much half of them amounts to and then I shall know my
age."

"That I'll do if you feed me and give me shelter," said Gilly of the Goatskin.
"Eat as you like," said the Old Woman of Beare. She pushed him a loaf of bread
and a bottle of water. When he cut a slice of the loaf it was just as if
nothing had been cut off, and when he took a cupful out of the bottle it was
as if no water had been taken out of it at all. When he had drunk and eaten he
left the complete loaf and the full bottle of water on the shelf, went outside
and began to count the horns on the right-hand side.

On the second day a strange youth came to him and saluted him, and then went
to count the horns in the quarry on the left-hand side. This youth was none
other than the King of Ireland's Son.

On the third day they had the horns all counted. Then Gilly of the Goatskin
and the King of Ireland's Son met together under a bush. "How many horns have
you counted?" said the King of Ireland's Son. "So many," said Gilly of the
Goatskin. "And how many horns have you counted?" "So many," said the King of
Ireland's Son.

Just as they were adding the two numbers together they both heard sounds in
the air--they were like the sounds that Bards make chanting their verses. And
when they looked up they saw a swan flying round and round above them. And the
swan chanted the story of the coming of the Milesians to Eirinn, and as the
two youths listened they forgot the number of horns they had counted. And when
the swan had flown away they looked at each other and as they were hungry they
went into the house and ate slices of the unwasted loaf and drank cupfuls out
of the inexhaustible bottle. Then the Old Woman of Beare wakened up and asked
them to tell her the number of her years.

"We cannot tell you although we counted all the horns," said the King of
Ireland's Son, "for just as we were putting the numbers together a swan sang
to us and we forgot the number we had counted."

"You didn't do your task rightly," she said, "but as I promised to give this
youth a name and to listen to the story he had to tell, I shall have to let it
be. You may tell the story now, Gilly of the Goatskin."

They sat at the fire, and while the 0ld Woman of Beare spun threads on a very
ancient spindle, and while the corncrake, the cuckoo and the swallow picked up
grains and murmured to themselves, Gilly of the Goatskin told them the Unique
Tale. And the story as Gilly of the Goatskin told it follows this.--

A Unique Tale

A King and a Queen were walking one day by the blue pool in their domain. The
swan had come to the blue pool, and the bright yellow flowers of the broom
were above the water. "Och," said the Queen, "if I might have a daughter that
would show such colors--the blue of the pool in her eyes, the bright yellow of
the broom in her hair, and the white of the swan in her skin--I would let my
seven sons go with the wild geese." "Hush," said the King. "You ask for a
doom, and it may be sent you." A shivering came upon the Queen. They went back
to the Castle, and that evening the nurse told them that a gray man had passed
in a circle round her seven sons saying, "If it be as your mother desired, let
it be as she has said."

Well, before the broom blossomed again and before the swan came to the blue
pool, a child was born to the Queen. It was a girl. The King was sitting with
his seven sons when the women came to tell him of the new birth. "O my sons,"
said he, "may ye be with me all my life." But his sons moved from him as he
said it. Out through the door they went, and up the mound that was before the
door. There they changed into gray wild geese, and the seven flew towards the
empty hills.

No councillor that the King consulted could help to win them back again, and
no hunter that he sent through the country could gain tale or tidings of them.
The King and Queen were left with one child only, the girl just born. They
called her "Sheen," a word that means "Storm," because her coming was a storm
that swept away her seven brothers. The Queen died, my hearers. Then little
Sheen was forgotten by her father, and she was reared and companioned by the
servants of the house.

One day, when she was the age her eldest brother was when he was changed from
his human form, Sheen went with Mor, the Woodman's daughter, and Siav, the
basket-maker's foster-child, to gather berries in the wood. Going here and
there she got separated from Siav and Mor. She came to a place where there
were lots of berries and went step after step to pick them. Her feet went down
in a marsh. She cried to Mor and Siav, but no answers came from them. She
cried and cried again. Her cries startled seven wild geese that rose up and
flew round her. "Save me," she cried to them. Then one of the wild geese spoke
to her. "Anyone but a girl we would save from the marsh, but such a one we
cannot save, because it was a girl who lost us our human forms and the loving
companionship of our father." Then Sheen knew--for the servants had often told
her the story--that it was one of her seven brothers who spoke. "Since ever I
knew of it," said she, "the whole of my trouble has been that I was the cause
of your losing your human form and the companionship of our father who is now
called the Lonely King. Believe me," said she, "that I would have striven and
striven to win you back." There was so much feeling in her voice that her
seven brothers, although they had been hardened by thinking about their
misfortune, were touched at their hearts and they flew down to help her. They
bore up her arms, they caught at her shoulders, they raised up her feet. They
carried her beyond the marsh. Then she knelt down and cried to them, "O my
brothers dear, is there anything I can do to restore you to your human forms?"
"There is," said the first of the seven wild geese. She begged them to tell it
to her. "It's a long and a tiresome labor we would put on you," said one. "If
you would gather the light down that grows on the bogs with your own hands,"
said another, "and if you spun that down into threads, and wove the threads
into a cloth and sewed the cloth into a shirt, and did that over and over
again until you had made seven shirts for us, all that time without laughing
or crying or saying a word, you could save us. One shirt you could weave and
spin and sew in a year. And it would not be until the seven shirts were put
upon us that the human form would be restored to each of us." "I would be glad
to do all that," said Sheen, "and I would cry no tear, laugh no laugh, and say
no word all the time I was doing this task."

Then said the eldest brother, "The marsh is between you and our father's
house, and between you and the companions who were with you to-day. If you
would do the task that would restore us to our human forms, it were best you
did not go back. Beyond the trees is the house of a lone woman, and there you
may live until your task is finished." The seven wild geese then flew back to
the marsh, and Sheen went to the house beyond the trees. The Spae-Woman lived
there. She took Sheen to be a dumb girl, and she gave her food and shelter for
the services she did--bringing water from the well in the daytime and grinding
corn at the quern at dusk. She had the rest of the day and night for her own
task. She gathered the bog-down between noon and sunset and spun the thread at
night. When she had lengths of thread spun she began to weave them on the
loom. At the end of a year she had the first shirt made. In another year she
made the second, then the third, then the fourth, the fifth and the sixth. And
all the time she said no word, laughed no laugh and cried no tear.

She was gathering the bog-down for the seventh and last shirt. Once she went
abroad on a day when the snow was melted and she felt her footsteps light.
Hundreds of birds were on the ground eating plentifully and calling to one
another. Sheen could hardly keep from her mouth the song that was in her mind.
She would sing and laugh and talk when the last thread was spun and woven,
when the last stitch was sewn, and when the shirts of bog-down she had made in
silence would have brought back her brothers to their own human forms. She
gathered the scarce heads of the cannavan or bog-down with one hand, while she
held the other hand to her lips.

Something dropped down at her feet. It was a white grouse and it remained
cowering on the ground. Sheen looked up and she saw a hawk above. And when she
looked round she saw a man coming across the bog. The hawk flew towards him
and lighted on his shoulder.

Sheen held the white grouse to her breast. The man came near to her and spoke
to her and his voice made her stand. He wore the dress of a hunter. His face
was brown and lean and his eyes were bright-blue like gentian-flowers. No word
did Sheen say to him and he passed on with the hawk on his shoulder. Then with
the grouse held at her breast she went back to the Spae-Woman's house.

That night when she spun her thread she thought of the blue-eyed, brown-faced
man. Would any of her brothers be like him, she wondered, when they were
restored to their human shapes. She fed the white grouse with grains of corn
and left it to rest in the window-niche above her bed. And then she lay awake
and tried to know the meaning in the song the Spae-Woman sang when she sat
spinning wool in the chimney Corner--

You would not slumber
If laid at my breast!
Little sister,
I'll rock you to rest!

The flood on the river beats
The swan from its nest!
You would not slumber
If laid at my breast!

The rain-drops encumber
The hawthorn's crest:
My thoughts have no number:
You would not slumber
If laid at my breast,
Little sister,
I'll rock you to rest.

She passed the night between sleeping and waking, and when the light grew she
saw the white grouse crouching against the window-opening. She opened the door
and stepped outside to let the grouse fly from her hands.

And there, on the ground before her was a sword! Sheen knew it to be the sword
of the man she had seen yesterday, and she knew the man had been before the
door in the night-time. She knelt on the ground to look at the bright blue
blade. 0 my listeners, if I was there I was in the crows that flew down
heavily and cawed as they picked up something that pleased them, in the wood-
cushats that cooed in the trees, in the small birds that quarreled in the
thatch of the house, and in the breeze that blew round--the first breeze of
the day.

The Spae-Woman came outside and saw what Sheen was looking at--the sword on
the ground. "It is wrought with cunning that only the smiths of Kings
possess," she said. She took the sword and hung it on the branch of a tree so
that the dews of the ground might not rust it. "I think the one who owns it is
the stranger who is seen in the wild places hereabouts--the man whom the
neighbors call the Hunter-King," she said to Sheen.

On another day Sheen went to gather bog-down. This time she crossed the river
by the stepping-stones and went into a country where there were many cattle.
She stood wondering at their numbers and wishing that such a cow and such a
calf might belong to the Spae-Woman. Then the next thing she saw was two black
horses striving with each other. They showed their teeth at each other and bit
and kicked. Then they came racing towards her. "Oh," said Sheen to herself,
"they are Breogan's wild stallions." She ran, but the horses were able to make
circles round her. "Breogan's wild stallions," said she, "they will rush in
and trample me to death." Then she heard someone shouting commands to the
horses. She saw a man strike one of the stallions with a staff, making him
rear high. She saw him make the other stand with the command that was in his
voice. She ran to the river, but she slipped on the stepping-stones; she fell
down and she felt the water flowing upon her. The man came and lifting her up
carried her to her own side of the river. Across the bog he carried her, and
when she looked at him she saw the lean face and eyes blue like gentian-
flowers--she saw the face of the man who was called the Hunter-King. He left
her on the ground when they passed the bog, and she went on her way without
speaking.

Nothing of this no more than of anything else that happened to her, or
anything that she thought of, did Sheen tell the Spae-Woman. But she wished
and she wished that the Hunter-King might come past while there was a light in
the house and step within and talk to the Spae-Woman, so that she herself,
while spinning the thread, could hear his voice and listen to the things he
talked about. She often stood at the door and watched across the bog to see if
anything was coming to her.

A neighbor-woman came across the door-step one evening and Sheen went into the
house after her, for she felt that something was going to be told. There was a
dead man in a house. He had been found in the wood. He was known as the
Hunter-King. Sheen stood at her bed and heard what the neighbor-woman said.

The Hunter-King was being waked in the neighbor-woman's house, and her eldest
daughter had been the corpse-watcher the first night. In the morning they
found that the girl's hand had been withered. The woman's second daughter was
the corpse-watcher the second night and her right hand had been left
trembling. This was the third and last night that the Hunter-King would be
waked, and to-night there was no one to watch his corpse.

Sheen thought that nothing would ever happen in the world again, now that the
Hunter-King was dead. She thought that there was no loneliness so great as
that of his corpse with no one to watch it on the last strange night it would
be above ground. The neighbor-woman went from the Spae-Woman and Sheen went
after her. She was standing on the door-step of her house. "Oh, colleen," said
the neighbor-woman, "I am wanting a girl to watch a corpse in my house to-
night--the third and the last night for watching. Will you watch and I will
give you a comb for your hair?" Sheen showed that she would serve the woman
and she went into the wake-house. At first she was afraid to look at the bed.
Then she went over and saw the Hunter-King with his face still, his eyes
closed down, and the plate of salt on his breast. His gray gaunt hound was
stretched across his feet.

The woman and her daughters lighted candles and placed them in the window
recesses and at the head of the corpse. Then they went into their dormer-room
and left Sheen to her watching. She sat at the fire and made one fagot after
another blaze up. She had brought her basket of bog-down and she began to spin
a thread upon the neighbor-woman's wheel.

She finished the thread and put it round her neck. Then she began to search
for more candles so that she might be able to light one, as another went out.
But as she rose up all the candles went out all at once. The hound started
from the foot of the bed. Then she saw the corpse sitting up stiffly in the
place where it had been laid.

Something in Sheen overcame her dread, and she went over to the corpse and
took the salt that was on its breast and put it on its lips. Then a voice came
from between the lips. "Fair Maid," said the voice, "have you the courage to
follow me? The others failed me and they have been stricken. Are you
faithful?" "I will follow you," said Sheen. "Then," said the corpse, "put your
hands on my shoulders and come with me. I must go over the Quaking Bog, and
through the Burning forest, and across the Icy Sea." Sheen put her hands on
his shoulders. A storm came and they were swept through the roof of the house.
They were carried through the night. Down they came on the ground and the dead
man sprang away from Sheen. She went to follow him and found her feet upon a
shaking sod. They were on the Quaking Bog, she knew. The corpse of the Hunter-
King went ahead and she knew that she must keep it in sight. He went swiftly.
The sod went under her feet and she was in the watery mud. She struggled out
and jumped over a pool that was hidden with heather. All the time she was in
dread that the figure that went before her so quickly would be lost to her.
She sank and she struggled and she sprang across pools and morasses. All the
time what had been the corpse of the Hunter-King went before her.

Then she saw fires against the sky and she knew they were coming to the
Burning Forest. The figure before her sprang across a ditch and went into the
forest. Sheen sprang across it too. Burning branches fell across her path as
she went on. Hot winds burnt her face. Flames dazzled and smoke dazed her. But
the figure before her went straight on and Sheen went straight on too.

The forest ended on a cliff. Below was the sea. The figure before her dived
down and Sheen dived too. The cold chilled her to the marrow. She thought the
chill would drive the life out of her. But she saw the head of one swimming
before her and she swam on.

And then they were on land again. "Fair Maid," said the corpse of the Hunter-
King, "put your hands on my shoulders again." She put her hands on his
shoulders. A storm came and swept them away. They were driven through the roof
of the neighbor-woman's house. The candle-wicks fluttered and light came on
them again. She saw the hound standing in the middle of the floor. She saw the
corpse sitting where it had been laid and the eyes were now open.

"Fair Maid," said the voice of the Hunter-King, "you have brought me back to
life. I am a man under enchantment. There is a witch-woman in the wood that I
gave my love to. She enchanted me so that the soul was out of my body, and
wandering away. It was my soul you followed. And the enchantment was to be
broken when I found a heart so faithful that it would follow my soul over the
Quaking Bog, through the Burning Forest and across the Icy Sea. You have
brought my soul and my life back to me."

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