Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 24, 1913.djvu/117

 Collectanea. lOi

the huge hammer held by his other hands. He had stolen a wonderful grey-green cow from Spain, and lived on its unlimited milk. After long seeking he found a " desert" sufficiently fruitful to support her in Teeskagh. Many tried to steal her, but failed, because her hoofs grew backwards and she could not be tracked. One of Lon's seven sons took charge of her on each day of the week, holding her tail while she grazed. When she reached the edge of the plateau, he pulled her round by the tail, and let her graze back to Lon's fort, Mohernagartan (" the smith's fort "). Siie drank of the seven streams of Teeskagh,-- and the rocks were marked in every direction with her hoof prints. At last the fame of Finn mac Cumhail reached Lon, and he, unlike the rest of his race, (who sulked in the fairy hills after their defeat by the Milesians), determined to recognize the chief hero of the new race and to make for him a wondrous sword. Lon set off to make himself known, and springing over the intervening plains and hills reached Ben Edair, the Hill of Howth, on the east coast. Finn and his warriors were holding a court when the strange being dropped into their midst, and Finn demanded the name and errand of the intruder. " I am Lon, skilled in the smith's craft, a servant to the King of Lochlan," the visitor replied. " I lay on ye a geis (obligation) to overtake me ere I reach my home," and off he sprung. The Fianna were soon outdistanced, except Caeilte "of the slender, hard legs," who came up with Lon hard by his forge, a cave with heaps of slaggy material in a nook still called Garraidh ?ia gceardchan. Caeilte slapped Lon on the shoulder with the words, "Stay, smith. Enter not thy cave." "Success and welcome, true man of the Fianna," replied Lon, in delight. " Not for witchcraft did I visit thee, but to lead thee to my forge and make thee a fame-giving weapon." The two had already wrought in the forge for two days when Finn and his followers arrived, and Lon sold them eight swords. He resumed work aided by GoU and Conan, sons of Morna, but their mighty blows split the anvil and ended the work.^^


 * ^ Seachi srotha na Teiscaighe.

^^ Ordnance Survey Letters (Co. Clare), vol. ii., p. 71 ; taken down in 1839 from Shane Reagh O'Cahane, an old tailor and shanachy (story-teller) in Corofin, by O' Donovan and E. O'Curry.