Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 21, 1910.djvu/268

232 to it in giving a schematic arrangement of Dr. Pokomy's argument.

1. The parentage of both Conchobar and Cuchulinn is 'wropt in mystery.' So is that of the cuckoo.

2. Conchobar 'does' his uncle Fergus out of the kingship. The cuckoo turns his step-brothers out of the nest, and displays no affection towards his foster-parents.

3. Cuchulinn overcomes the 150 youths of the Ulster court. The cuckoo gets the better of the other nestlings, however many they may be.

4. Both Conchobar and Cuchulinn are pre-eminently 'ladies' men.' The cuckoo is the Don Juan or Solomon of the bird world.

5. As the cuckoo is unacquainted with its relations, he inevitably weds his sister, as does Conchobar, or fights unknown with his son, as does Cuchulinn.

6. Conchobar is deceived by Medhbh, and forsaken by Deirdre. The cuckoo's name is a wide-spread term of reproach to the deceived husband.

7. Cuchulinn is a great bird-hunter. The cuckoo is feared by smaller birds.

8. Cuchulinn pays a visit to the other world. The cuckoo disappears in the late summer, "whence the conception of its passing its time in the Under-world easily arose" (p. 115).

9. Arthur and Mongan live on in the deathless Other-world. According to Gubernatis the cuckoo is regarded as immortal because he goes and comes mysteriously.

10. Cuchulinn, when the fury of battle is upon him, is subject to a mysterious transformation which swells and distorts every limb. Birds when they fight,—and the cuckoo is very combative,—puff up their feathers and present such an appearance that the origin of the archaic description of the hero's distortion "cannot remain in doubt any longer" (p. 114).

II. Cuchulinn alone of the Ulster heroes is not subject to the childbirth weakness which overtakes the Ulstermen at stated periods. Like most scholars Dr. Pokorny refers this mysterious ailment to the custom of the couvade, and maintains that a cuckoo hero has naturally nothing to do with a custom intended to