Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 3 (Celtic and Slavic).djvu/201

Rh Dáthó's grandson, Lena, who, though buried in a trench which the boar rooted up over him, succeeded in killing the animal with his sword. For seven years the boar had been nurtured on the flesh of fifty cows; sixty oxen were required to drag its carcass; and its tail was a load for sixty men; yet Conall Cernach sucked it entire into his mouth!$2$ The story tells nothing more of this remarkable animal, but it may commemorate an old ritual feast upon an animal regarded as divine and endowed with mythic qualities.

The Mirabilia added to Nennius's History speak of the Porcus Troit or Twrch Tnvyth, hunted by Arthur, an episode related in the tale of Kulhwch and Olwen. This creature, which was a transformed knight, slaughtered many of the hunters before it was overcome and three desirable possessions taken from between its ears.$3$ The Porcus Troit resembles the Wild Boar of Gulban, a transformed child, hunted by DIarmaid when the Féinn had fled before it; and tradition tells of its great size—sixteen feet long.$4$ Fionn himself chased a huge boar which terrified every one until it was slain by his grandson, Oscar. It was blue-black, with rough bristles, and no ears or tail; its teeth protruded horribly; and each flake of foam from its mouth resembled the foam of a mighty waterfall.$5$ A closer analogy to Arthur's hunt occurs in a story of the Dindsenchas concerning a pig which wasted the land. Manannan and Mod's hounds pursued it, when it sprang into a lake where it maimed or drowned the following hounds; and then it crossed to Muic-Inis, or Pig Island, where it slew Mod with its tusk.$6$ Another hunting of magic swine concerns animals from the cave of Cruachan, which is elsewhere associated with divinities. Nothing grew where they went, and they destroyed corn and milk; no one could count them accurately, and when shot at they disappeared. Medb and Ailill hunted them, and when one of them leaped into Medb's chariot, she seized its leg, but the skin broke, and the pig left it in her hand. After that no one knew whither they went, although a variant