Poems by Denis Florence MacCarthy (websites to read books for free .TXT) 📖

None to raise The red-mouthed vulture's hoarse, inviting croak Unto the many-coloured flocks, nor one Who will for Croghan combat like to thee, O red-cheeked son of Daman!" Thus he said, Then standing o'er Ferdiah he resumed: "Oh! great has been the treachery and fraud The men of Erin practised upon thee, Ferdiah, thus to bring thee here to fight With me, 'gainst whom it is no easy task Upon the Tain Bo Cuailgne to contend." And thus he said, and thus again he spake:

CUCHULLIN.

O my Ferdiah, O my friend, forgive:
'Tis not my hand but treachery lays thee low:- Thou doomed to die and I condemned to live,
Both doomed for ever to be severed so!

When we were far away in our young prime,
With Scatha, dread Buannan's chosen friend, A vow we made, that till the end of time,
With hostile arms we never should contend.

Dear was thy lovely ruddiness to me,
Dear was thy gray-blue eye, so bright and clear,- Thy comely, perfect form how sweet to see!
Thy wisdom and thy eloquence how dear!

In body-cutting combat, on the field
Of spears, when all is lost or all is won, None braver ever yet held up a shield,
Than thou, Ferdiah, Daman's ruddy son.

Never since Aife's only son I slew,
Not knowing who the gallant youth might be,- Ah! hapless deed, that still my heart doth rue!-
None have I found, Ferdiah, like to thee.

Thy dream it was to win fair Finavair,
From Mave her beauteous daughter's hand to gain; As soon might'st thou in the wide fields of air
The glancing sunbeam's swift-winged flight restrain.

He paused awhile, still gazing on the dead, Then to his charioteer he spoke: "Friend Laegh, Strip now Ferdiah, take his armour off, That I may see the golden brooch of Mave, For which he undertook the fatal fight." Laegh took the armour then from off his breast, And then Cuchullin saw the golden pin That cost so dear, and then these words he spake:

CUCHULLIN.

Alas! O brooch of gold!
O chief, whose fame each poet knows,
O hero of stout slaughtering blows, Thy arm was brave and bold.

Thy yellow flowing hair,
Thy purple girdle's silken fold
Still even in death around thee rolled,- Thy twisted jewel rare.

Thy noble beaming eyes,
Now closed in death, make mine grow dim,
Thy dazzling shield with golden rim, Thy chess a king might prize.

Oh! piteous to behold,
My fellow-pupil falls by me:
It was an end that should not be, Alas! O brooch of gold!

After another pause Cuchullin spoke:- "O Laegh, my friend, open Ferdiah now, And from his body the Gaebulg take out, For I without my weapon cannot be."

Laegh then approached, and with a strong, sharp knife Opened Ferdiah's body, and drew out The dread Gaebulg. And when Cuchullin saw His bloody weapon lying red beside Ferdiah on the ground, again he thought Of all their past career, and thus he said:

CUCHULLIN.

Sad is my fate that I should see thee lying,
Sad is the fate, Ferdiah, I deplore,- I with my weapon which thy blood is dyeing,
Thou on the ground a mass of streaming gore.

When we were young, where Scatha's eye hath seen us
Fond fellow-pupils in her schools of Skye, Never was heard the angry word between us,
Never was seen the angry spear to fly.

Scatha, with words of eloquent persuading,
Roused us in many a glorious feat to join; "Go," she exclaimed, "each other bravely aiding,
Go forth to battle with the dread Germoin."

I to Ferdiah said: "Oh, come, my brother,"
I to the ever-generous Luaigh said, I to fair Baetan's son, and many another:
"Come, let us go and fight this foe so dread."

Crossing the sea in ships of peaceful traders,
All of us came to lone Lind Formairt's lake, With us we brought four hundred brave invaders
Out of the islands of the Athisech.

I and Ferdiah were the first to enter,
Where he himself, the dread Germoin, held rule, Rind, Nial's son, I clove from head to centre,
Ruad I killed, the son of Finniule.

First on the shore, as swift our fleet ships flew there,
Blath, son of Calba of red swords, was slain; Struck by Ferdiah, Luaigh also slew there
Fierce rude Mugarne of the Torrian main.

Bravely we battled against that court enchanted,
Full four times fifty heroes fell by me: He, by their savage onslaught nothing daunted,
Slew ox-like monsters clambering from the sea.

Wily Germoin, amid so many slaughters,
We took alive as trophy of the field, Him o'er the broad, bright sea of spangled waters
We bore to Scatha of the bright broad shield.

She, our famed tutoress, with kind endeavour,
Bound us from that day forth with heart and hand, When met fair Elgga's tribes, that we should never
In hostile ranks before each other stand.

Oh, day of woe! oh, day without a morrow!
Oh, fatal Tuesday morning, when the bud Of his young life was scattered! Oh! the sorrow,
To give the friend I loved a drink of blood!

Ah, if I saw thee among heroes lying
Dead on some glorious battlefield of Greece, Soon would I follow thee, and proudly dying,
Sleep with my friend triumphant and at peace.

We, Scatha's pupils, ah, how sad the story!
Thou to be dead and I to be alive: I to be wounded here, all gashed and gory,
Thou never more thy chariot's steeds to drive.

We, Scatha's pupils, ah! how sad the story;
Sad is the fate to which we both are led: I to be wounded here, all gashed and gory,
And thou, alas! my friend, to lie here dead.

We, Scatha's pupils, ah, how sad the story!
Sad is the deed and sorrowful the wrong: Thou to be dead without thy meed of glory,
And I, oh! shame, to be alive and strong!

Laegh interposed at length, and thus he said: "Good, O Cuchullin, let us leave the Ford, For long have we been here, by far too long." "Let us then leave it now," Cuchullin said, "O Laegh, my friend, but know that every fight In which I hitherto have drawn my sword, Has been but as a pastime and a sport Compared with this one with Ferdiah fought." And he was saying, and he spake these words:

CUCHULLIN.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford, I played but with the spear and sword: Alike the teaching we received, Alike were glad, alike were grieved, Alike were we by Scatha's grace Deemed worthy of the highest place.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford, I played but with the spear and sword: Alike our habits and our ways, Alike our prowess and our praise, Alike the trophies of the brave, The glittering shields that Scatha gave.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford, I played but with the spear and sword: How dear to me, ah! who can know? This golden pillar here laid low, This mighty tree so strong and tall, The chief, the champion of us all!

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford, I played but with the spear and sword: The lion rushing with a roar, The wave that swallows up the shore, When storm-winds blow and heaven is dim, Could only be compared to him.

Until Ferdiah sought the Ford, I played but with the spear and sword: Through me the friend I loved is dead, A cloud is ever on my head- The mountain form, the giant frame, Is now a shadow and a name.

The countless legions of the 'Tain,' Those hands of mine have turned and slain: Their men and steeds before me died, Their flocks and herds on either side, Though numerous were the hosts that came From Croghan's Rath of fatal fame.

Though less than half the foes I led, Before me soon my foes lay dead: Never to gory battle pressed, Never was nursed on Bamba's breast, Never from sons of kings there came A hero of more glorious fame.[52]


28. This poem is now published for the first time in its complete state.

29. Autumn; strictly the last night in October. (See O'Curry's "Sick Bed of Cuchullin," "Atlantis," i., p. 370).

30. Culann was the name of Conor MacNessa's smith, and it was from him that Setanta derived the name of Cu-Chulainn, or Culann's Hound.

31. Iorrus Domnann, now Erris, in the county of Mayo. It derived its name ("Bay of the Domnanns," or "Deep-diggers,") from the party of the Firbolgs, so called, having settled there, under their chiefs Genann and Rudhraighe. (See "The Fate of the Children of Lir," by O'Curry, Atlantis, iv., p. 123; Dr. Reeve's "Adamnan's Life of St. Columba," note 6, p. 31; O'Flaherty's "Ogygia," p. 280; and Hardiman's "West Connaught," by O'Flaherty, published by the Irish Archaeological Society.)

32. The name of Scatha, the Amazonian instructress of Ferdiah and Cuchullin, is still preserved in Dun Sciath, in the island of Skye, where great Cuchullin's name and glory yet linger. The Cuchullin Mountains, named after him, "those thunder-smitten, jagged, Cuchullin peaks of Skye," the grandest mountain range in Great Britain, attract to that remote island of the Hebrides many worshippers of the sublime and beautiful in nature, whose enjoyments would be largely enhanced if they knew the heroic legends which are connected with the glorious scenes they have travelled so far to witness. Cuchullin is one of the foremost characters in MacPherson's "Ossian," but the quasi-translator of Gaelic poems places him more than two centuries later than the period at which he really lived. (Lady Ferguson's "The Irish before the Conquest," pp. 57, 58.)

33. For a description of this mysterious instrument, see Dr. Todd's "Additional Notes to the Irish version of Nennius," p. 12.

34. On the use of mail armour by the ancient Irish, see Dr. O'Donovan's "Introduction and Notes to the Battle of Magh-Rath," edited for the Archaeological Society.

35. For an interesting account of this sovereign, so famous in Irish story, see O'Curry's "Lectures," pp. 33, 34. Her Father, according to the chronology of the "Four Masters," is supposed to have reigned as monarch of Erin about a century before the Christian era. "Of all the children of the monarch Eochaidh Fiedloch," says O'Donovan (cited in O'Mahony's translation of Keating's "History," p. 276) "by far the most celebrated was Meadbh or Mab, who is still remembered as the fairy queen of the Irish, the 'Queen Mab' of Spenser."

36. "The belief that a 'ferb' or ulcer could be produced," says Mr. Stokes, in his preface to 'Cormac's Glossary,' "forms the groundwork of the tale of Nede mac Adnae and his uncle, Caier." The names of the three blisters (Stain, Blemish, and Defect) are almost identical with those Ferdiah is threatened with in the present poem.

37. A 'cumal' was three cows, or their value. On the use