Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 3 (Celtic and Slavic).djvu/202

126 version says that now they were counted. From this cave came other destructive creatures—a great three-headed bird which wasted Erin till Amairgen killed it, and red birds which withered everything with their breath until the Ulstermen slew them.'^ It is strange why such animals should be associated with this divine cave, but probably the tradition dates from the time when it was regarded as "Ireland's gate of hell," so that any evil spirit might inhabit it.

In these stories of divinities or heroes hunting fabulous swine it is possible that the animals represent some hurtful power, dangerous to vegetation; for the swine is apt to be regarded in a sinister light and might well be the embodiment of demoniac beings. On the other hand, the animal sacrificed to a god, or of which the god is an anthropomorphic aspect, is sometimes regarded as his enemy, slain by him. Whether this conception lurks behind these tales is uncertain, as also is the question whether the magic immortal swine—the food of the gods—were originally animals sacrificed to them. Divine swine appear in a Fionn tale. The Feinn were at a banquet given by Oengus, when the deity said that the best of Fionn's hounds could not kill one of his pigs, but rather his great pig would kill them. Fionn, on the contrary, maintained that his hounds. Bran and Sgeolan, could do so. A year after, a hundred and one pigs appeared, one of them coalblack, and each tall as a deer; but the Feinn and their dogs killed them all. Bran slaying the black one, whereupon Oengus complained that they had caused the death of his sons and many of the Tuatha Dé Danann, for they were in the form of the swine. A quarrel ensued, and Fionn prepared to attack Oengus's brug, when the god made peace.$8$ In another instance a fairy as a wild boar eluded the Féinn, but Fionn offered the choice of the women to its slayer, and by the help of a "familiar spirit" in love with him Caoilte "got the diabolical beast killed." Fionn covered the women's heads lest Caoilte should take his wife, but his ruse was unsuccessful.$9$