Page:Athletics and Manly Sport (1890).djvu/226

Rh shelig, Fiach does not mean hunt; it means simply a deer; but, at last, it came to mean a hunt, because a deer was the animal usually hunted.

"The great in-door game,—in fact, the only one mentioned,—is chess; Fithchill (pronounced Fichill; feat-fichille, a chessman). Innumerable are the mentions of this game in Gaelic MSS. There is every reason to think the game was played just as it is now; but the pieces were very large, made of bronze; some of them have been found. You will see a drawing of one in the 'Book of Rights.' [See Figure No. 28.]

"You must bear in mind that we know only very little yet about ancient Ireland, and cannot know all until all the