Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 3 (Celtic and Slavic).djvu/188

120 tales and also In the Grail romances. The seeker of the Grail finds himself no longer in the Grail castle in the morning, and the castle itself has become invisible. Such creations of glamour were probably suggested by dreams, whose beauty and terror alike vanish "when one awaketh."

Fruit-bearing, musical trees, in whose branches birds are constantly singing, grow in the gods' land. In the síd of Oengus were three trees always in fruit; and there were also two pigs, one always living, and the other always cooked and ready for eating—the equivalent of the Mucca Mhanannain, or "Pigs of Manannan"—and a jar of excellent beer, Goibniu's ale. None ever died there.$9$ The Elysian ale is doubtless a superlative form of the Irish cuirm or braccat, made from malt, of which the Gauls had a divinity, Braciaca;$10$ and it is analogous to the Vedic soma and the wine of Dionysos.$11$ Within the síd, or the gods' land, were other domestic animals, especially cows, which were sometimes brought thence by those who left it or were stolen by heroes or by dwellers in one síd from those of another. Where mortals steal them, there is a reminiscence of the mythical idea that the elements of civilization were wrested from the gods by man. Cauldrons were used by the Celts for domestic and sacrificial as well as other ritual purposes, and these also gave rise to myths of wonderful divine cauldrons like Dagda's, from which "no company ever went unthankful." Their contents restored the dead or produced inspiration, and they were stolen from the gods' land, e. g. by Cuchulainn and by Arthur.$12$ The cauldron rimmed with pearls which Arthur and his men sought resembles the basin with rows of carbuncles on its edge in which, according to another story, a fairy woman washed.$13$

The inspiration of wisdom was obtained in the gods' land, either by drinking from a well or by eating the salmon in it; but this knowledge was tabu even to some members of the divine land. Such a well, called Connla's Well, was in the Land under Waves, and thither Sinend, grand-daughter of