Page:Origin and Growth of Religion (Rhys).djvu/433

Rh by a thick mist, whence there issued a knight who took them to a beautiful plain, whereon they saw a royal ráth with a golden tree at its door. They entered a splendid house therein, where they beheld a youthful princess with a diadem of gold on her head, and a silver kieve with hoops of gold standing near her, full of red ale; and they saw seated before them on a royal seat a personage of the other sex, whose like had never been seen at Conn's court at Tara, either as to stature or beauty of face and figure. He explained to them that he was no phantom, but that he was Lug, and that it was his pleasure to reveal to Conn the duration of his rule, and that of every prince who should reign at Tara after him. This revelation to Conn begins with the crowned lady giving him two huge bones, the ribs of a gigantic ox and of a boar respectively; she then proceeds to distribute the red ale, with the question, 'For whom is this bowl?' Lug answers, 'For Conn the Fighter of a Hundred;' and the same distribution of the contents of the great vat is repeated in respect of each of Conn's successors; but I should have said that the queen was described by Lug to Conn as the Sovereignty of Erinn till the day of doom. In this story we have Lug pictured to us as a dweller in the other world, where the Sun-god was supposed to spend half his time, and there with him lived as his consort the youthful beauty typifying the kingdom of Erinn. No better proof could perhaps be desired that