xviii THE BATTLE OF VENTRY. 



those four in four places round the battahon, so that they might not be 

 separated from each other. And he himself went among them and into 

 their midst, and mangled bodies and tore off arms in that attack, so that 

 the manner of the rush which he made through them was like a powerful 

 tidal wave bursting through narrow canals. Not one of them escaped to 

 tell tidings. 



They were there thus until the next morning, and soon they saw the 

 people of Finn in the rath above the ground of the harbour, which is now 

 called RditJi na Fiann or Rdith Finndin. Then spoke Oisin the son of 

 Finn : ' Oh father Finn,' said he, 'shall we now fight the foreigners 

 altogether?' ' Not so, oh son,' said Finn, ' for the number of the hosts 

 would kiU us, and there never was known noble or ignoble among us, 

 but some son of a king or a leader of the fiann will every day go against 

 some king of the kings of the world that is of equal nobility as we are, 

 and I shall form a slender front with my own battalion and a broad 

 back. And let none of you redden his arm but against a prince or chief 

 at first, for when the chief has fallen, the better will his people foUow 

 him.' Then said Finn : 'Who will now announce battle from me?' 

 ' I will do that,' said Finn the son of Cuban, the son of Murchad, viz. the 

 king-warrior of the fianns of Munster, ' and the fiann of Munster together 

 with me.' ' Thou wilt not go, oh son,' said Finn, ' for it is not revealed 

 to me that luck of battle will be upon thee, and nobody ever went frorn 

 me to fight whom I did not know would return safely.' ' Do not say 

 that, oh king-warrior,' said Mac Cubain, ' for by the bounty of the world ! 

 I would not shirk a fight that I have undertaken on account of an 

 evil prophecy. And since it is my own country that they have first 

 plundered, I shall defend it for thee.' 'I am sad about it,' said Finn; 

 'for thou and thy adversary will fall together, whoever of the kings 

 of the world will meet thee to-day.' Then Glas the son of Dreman 

 announced fight from Finn the son of Cubain, and Margaret, the king of 

 Greece, answered to the challenge. They meet in single combat. The 

 king makes an awful cast with his thick-shafted battle-spear at Mac 

 Cubain and hits him between his loin (?) and navel so that his slender 

 back broke in two, and no material of Hfe was in him any longer. But 

 Mac Cubain did not accept this as a gift, but he gave a truly powerful 

 monstrous hurl to his spear and made a victorious cast with his golden 



