Page:A book of folk-lore (1913).djvu/198

Rh at Harlech, where the head would converse with them and be as entertaining as it had ever been when attached to the trunk. From Harlech they were to proceed to Gresholm, and remain there feasting in company with the head so long as they did not open a door that looked towards Cornwall. Should they open that door, then they must set out for London, and there, on the White Hill, bury it with its face towards France; so long as the head remained undisturbed in this position, the island would have nothing to fear from foreign invasion.

There is an Irish story also concerning a speaking head. Finn had his hunting-lodge in Jeffia. Whilst he was absent, his fool Lomna discovered Finn’s wife engaged in an intrigue with one Cairbre, and he divulged the fact to Finn. Next time that Finn was abroad, Cairbre returned to see the lady, and, discovering who had betrayed what he had done, cut off Lomna’s head and carried it away with him. Finn, in the evening, found a headless body in the booth, and at once concluded that this was Lomna’s, and that Cairbre had been his murderer. He went in pursuit, and tracked Cairbre and his party to an empty house, where they had been cooking fish on a stone, with Lomna’s head on