Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 17, 1906.djvu/169

Rh the subject by the Irish tract known as the Bailé an Scáil or 'Ecstasy of the Champion.' Conn, king of Ireland, who died in 157 A.D. or thereabouts, used to repair every day at sunrise to the battlements of the royal rath at Tara, along with three druids, for fear lest any aerial foes should descend upon Erin unperceived by him. One morning he happened to tread upon a stone, which screamed under his feet. Conn asked the cause, and, at the end of fifty-three days, one of the druids replied that the stone was named Fal, that it came from Inis Fáil or the Island of Fal, and that the number of the shrieks uttered by it was the number of kings who should succeed Conn to the end of time. While the king pondered this intelligence, he suddenly found himself and his companions enveloped in a mist. A horseman drew near and thrice cast a spear towards them, each