met
To listen to the lay that charms
The Connacht peasant yet.

There Honour shines through passions dire,
There beauty blends with mirth--
Wild hearts, ye never did aspire
Wholly for things of earth!

Cold, cold this thousand years--yet still
On many a time-stained page
Your pride, your truth, your dauntless will,
Burn on from age to age.

And still around the fires of peat
Live on the ancient days;
There still do living lips repeat
The old and deathless lays.

And when the wavering wreaths ascend,
Blue in the evening air,
The soul of Ireland seems to bend
Above her children there.

BARDIC ROMANCES

CHAPTER I

The Story of the Children of Lir

Long ago there dwelt in Ireland the race called by the name of De
Danaan, or People of the Goddess Dana. They were a folk who delighted
in beauty and gaiety, and in fighting and feasting, and loved to go
gloriously apparelled, and to have their weapons and household vessels
adorned with jewels and gold. They were also skilled in magic arts,
and their harpers could make music so enchanting that a man who heard
it would fight, or love, or sleep, or forget all earthly things, as
they who touched the strings might will him to do. In later times the
Danaans had to dispute the sovranty of Ireland with another race, the
Children of Miled, whom men call the Milesians, and after much
fighting they were vanquished. Then, by their sorceries and
enchantments, when they could not prevail against the invaders, they
made themselves invisible, and they have dwelt ever since in the Fairy
Mounds and raths of Ireland, where their shining palaces are hidden
from mortal eyes. They are now called the Shee, or Fairy Folk of
Erinn, and the faint strains of unearthly music that may be heard at
times by those who wander at night near to their haunts come from the
harpers and pipers who play for the People of Dana at their revels in
the bright world underground.

At the time when the tale begins, the People of Dana were still the
lords of Ireland, for the Milesians had not yet come. They were
divided it is said, into many families and clans; and it seemed good
to them that their chiefs should assemble together, and choose one to
be king and ruler over the whole people. So they met in a great
assembly for this purpose, and found that five of the greatest lords
all desired the sovranty of Erin. These five were