Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 3 (Celtic and Slavic).djvu/237

Rh making a cairn of their heads and arms. Wearied and sad, he now heard the loch roaring like the sea and saw a monster emerging from it and approaching with open jaws to gulp the castle down. With one leap he came behind it, tore out its heart, and cutting off its head, placed it on the heap. At dawn the giant arrived, and when he stretched out his hand, Cúchulainn made his salmon-leap and whirled his sword round his head, whereupon the monster vanished after having agreed to grant his three wishes—the sovereignty of Ireland's heroes, the champion's morsel, and precedence for Emer over the women of Ulster. Cúchulainn's leap had brought him outside the castle, but after several trials he sprang back into it with a sigh, and Bláthnat said, "That is a sigh of victory." When Cúroi arrived, he found the trophies outside his castle and gave judgement in Cúchulainn's favour.

Later, when all three were absent from Emain Macha, a huge boor arrived, carrying a tree, a vast beam, and an axe with a handle which required a plough-team to move it. He announced that he had sought everywhere for a man capable of lighting him and proposed the covenant of the axe. This passage repeats grotesquely the former incident, save that Fat-Neck, who struck off the boor's head, refused to fulfil his part of the covenant, as also did Loegaire and Conall on their return. Cúchulainn took his place, but the boor spared him, calling him the bravest of warriors and fulfilling for him the three wishes he had made; for he was none other than Cúroi, who had taken first the giant's, then the boor's form.$24$

The story of The Exile of the Sons of Doel the Forgotten (Longes mac nDuil Dermait) opens with a version of Bricriu's Feast. Cúchulainn had been cursed by Eocho Rond to have no rest until he discovered why Doel's sons left their country. With Loeg and Lugaid he captured the ship of the King of Alba's son, who gave him a charm; and thus they reached an island with a rampart of silver and a palisade of bronze, while on it was a castle where dwelt a royal pair—Riangabair and