Macaustkr — Temair Breg : Remains and Traditions of Tara. 261 



are given in Tara, p. 1^0, and need not here be repeated 1 ; Inn we must nol 

 (nail to mention the entirely different Btory told in Acallam no Sen&rach 

 ed. Stokes, line 7!>7S If.), t" the effeel bhal the dwarf was the property of 

 Conn Cet-chathach, and equal in height to thrice his master'.- list: the 

 best chess- and checker-player in Ireland, the best leech, and the best peace- 

 maker. The stone w 7 as his bed, and the largest man and the smallest infant 

 who lay thereon would find just sufficient room for himself — a sort of 

 converse of the bed of Procrustes! All the men of Ireland, we are told iu 

 line 7979, used to resort thither for the experiment. The Triads (Todd Leet. 

 xiii, p. 14 mention the dwarf's grave as one of the three wonders, not merely 

 of Temair, but of all Ireland. 



It is probable that the development of the tale along the lines indicated 

 was helped by the peculiar properties, of which we have still to speak, 

 ascribed to the stones Bloec and Bluicne. 



22. Dall ocus Dorcha 



"Blind" and "Dark," it appears, were two beggars who fought over the 

 division of the alms which they had collected, and killed each other; the 

 dwarf of the previous monument rashly endeavoured to separate them, and 

 was trampled to death by the combatants. The beggars were commemorated 

 by two mounds north of the dwarf's grave, which still remain where Petrie 

 records them, though in a much abraded condition. Dall was south and 

 Dorcha north. 2 



It is surely obvious that this trivial story is merely a floating bit of folk- 

 lore that lias somehow become attached to these monuments. It is unlikely 

 that two beggars would have been buried under special tumuli on the 

 summit of the sacred ridge of Temair. The story of the blind beggars who 

 trampled to death one who tried to separate them is a rough rustic jeu 

 d'esprit — a folk-tale of the kind technically called a "droll." Dall and 

 Dorcha are names such as might have been given to blind seers: compare 

 Dalian, the name of the drtiid of king Eochu Airem. 



The essential point in the description i I'D 23 i tes at the end of the 



paragraph. After mentioning the graves, their names, their positions relative 

 to Leeht in Abaic and to each other, and, after hinting at the story (more 



1 To them should be added the Tomb of Amir, described by >~ ennuis at the end of 

 his list of the wonders of Britain. This had the properties ascribed to Lecht in Abaic 

 in an even more remarkable degree. 



- Adopting the reading of H. The other Mss. have " west." B has a peculiar reading 

 which makes Dorcha west and Dall east. The relative positions of these mounds. Leo!.; 

 in abaic. Mdel and its companions, and Raith na Senad, are difficult to reconstruct : tin- 

 plan shows the best I can make of the indications in the l)ind-shench<is. 



