MacjaListkk — Temair Bret/ : Remains and Traditions of Tarn. .'J 5 5 



Brecc Glosses). 1 The descriptions of the plague there given would snil a 

 rushing wind. According to the strange prophetic tract called FmmaccUlam 

 in da Tlma-rad one of the signs of the coining end of the age is to be a "conflict 

 round Cnamchoill,'"- which the Eawlinson MS. explains in a gloss thus : " the 

 Eoth Eamach will proceed till it will be in contact with Cnamchoill." Among 

 the writings of the prophecy-mongers who compiled lists of portents in the names 

 of Adamna.li, Colum Cille, and Moling, the Eoth Eamach figures conspicuously; 

 a collection of allusions to it will be found in O'Curry's Manuscript Material* 

 (references sub voce " Eoth Eamhach " in index). Putting these together, we 

 gather that they understood the Eoth Eamach to be a sort of ship 3 which 

 was to sail out of Cnamchoill ; and that it was to be associated with a " fiery 

 dart " which was to destroy a large number of the men of Ireland on St. John 

 Baptist's Day, and with the Sciiap a Fanait, which was also to work much 

 mischief. Even when the magical instruments are not mentioned, the Feast 

 of St. John the Baptist is indicated as a time when evils may be expected; 

 see for example in Adamndn's Second Vision, published in Revue celtique xii. at 

 page 424. In the JUind-s/ienchas of Crotta Cliach {Revue celtique xv 440) the 

 affliction takes the shape of a dragon. 



It is noteworthy, for a reason that will presently appear, that Adamnan's 

 "Prophecy" tells us that "a flame of fire swift as a blast of wind" is to kill 

 three-fourths of the men, women, boys, and girls of Ireland in the twinkling 

 of an eye. 



All this mass of seemingly incoherent nonsense becomes intelligible when 

 we remember that St. John Baptist's day is Midsummer day, and that all 

 over Christendom the saint has entered on the heritage of the Midsummer 

 rites of Pagandom. In these prophecies of judgment to come, with this clue 

 in hand, we can discern the fragments of a lost folk-tale, told to children in 

 ancient Ireland to warn them against meddling with things that do not 

 concern them. 



Our interpreters, the Australians, once more come to our assistance. The 

 Kurnai of Gippsland have a story to the effect thai once upon a Dime "some 

 children of the Kurnai, playing about, found a bull-roarer, which the) took 

 home to the camp and showed the women. Immediately the earth crumbled 

 away, and it was all water, and the Kurnai were drowned."* Tins is the 



1 Bradshaw edition, p. 190. August 29. 

 - See Hemic celtique, xxvi, 47, for the text. 



3 O'Curry, in his ms. catalogue of manuscripts in the Royal [riah Academy Library, 

 speculates on the possibility of the Roth Ramaoh being a prophecy of a Bteamor's 

 paddle-wheel ! Nicholas O'Kearney seems to have bad no doubt of this. 



4 Quoted from Rev. L. Fison in Lang's Ousiom and Myth, p. 36 ; also Badd< Q, 

 p. 310. 



