Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 3 (Celtic and Slavic).djvu/287

Rh in the rock, and Oisin remained with her for centuries, although it seemed only a week; but when he wished to return to the Féinn, she told him that none of them was left.$76$ In an Irish version Oisin entered a cave and there saw a woman with whom he lived for what seemed a few days, although it was really three hundred years. When he went to revisit the Feinn, he was warned not to dismount from his white steed; but in helping to raise a cart he alighted and became an old man.$77$ The tales of his visit to the Land of Youth vary. Some refer it to his more youthful days, but Michael Comyn was probably on truer ground in placing it after the battle of Gabhra. In these, however, it is not his mother, but Niamh, the exquisitely beautiful daughter of the King of Tír na nÓg, who takes him there, laying upon him geasa whose fulfilment would give him Immortal life. Crossing the sea with her, he killed a giant who had abducted the daughter of the King of Tír na m-Beo ("the Land of the Living"); and in Tír na nÓg he married Niamh, with whom he remained three centuries. In one tale he actually became King because he outraced Niamh's father, who held the throne until his son-in-law should do this; and to prevent It he had given his daughter a pig's head, but Oisin, after hearing Niamh's story, accepted her, and her true form was then restored.$78$ In the poem the radiant beauty and joy of Tír na nÓg are described in traditional terms; but, in spite of these, Oisin longed for Erin, although he thought that his absence from it had been brief. Niamh sought to dissuade him from going, but In vain, and now she bade him not descend from his horse. When he reached Erin, the Féinn were forgotten; the old forts were in ruins; a new faith had arisen. In a glen men trying to lift a marble flagstone appealed to him for aid, and stooping from his horse, he raised the stone; but as he did so, his foot touched ground, whereupon his horse vanished, and he found himself a worn, blind old man. In this guise he met St. Patrick and became dependent on his bounty.$79$

These stories illustrate what Is found In all Celtic tales of