ce for games, and if there
is no king to come to the last day of the gathering, there will be
hardness in that year. And when the stone screamed under your feet," he
said, "the number of the screams it gave was a foretelling of the number
of kings of your race that would come after you. But it is not I myself
will name them for you," he said.

And while they were in the same place, there came a great mist about
them and a darkness, so that they could not know what way they were
going, and they heard the noise of a rider coming towards them. "It
would be a great grief to us," said Conn, "to be brought away into a
strange country." Then the rider threw three spears at them, and every
one came faster than the other. "It is the wounding of a king indeed,"
said the Druids, "any one to cast at Conn of Teamhair."

The rider stopped casting his spears on that, and he came to them and
bade Conn welcome, and asked him to come to his house. They went on then
till they came to a beautiful plain, and there they saw a king's rath,
and a golden tree at its door, and inside the rath a grand house with a
roof of white bronze. So they went into the house, and the rider that
had come to meet them was there before them, in his royal seat, and
there had never been seen a man like him in Teamhair for comeliness or
for beauty, or the wonder of his face.

And there was a young woman in the house, having a band of gold on her
head, and a silver vessel with hoops of gold beside her, and it full of
red ale, and a golden bowl on its edge, and a golden cup at its mouth.
She said then to the master of the house: "Who am I to serve drink to?"
"Serve it to Conn of the Hundred Battles," he said, "for he will gain a
hundred battles before he dies." And after that he bade her to pour out
the ale for Art of the Three Shouts, the son of Conn; and after that he
went through the names of all the kings of Ireland that would come after
Conn, and he told what would be the length of their lifetime. And the
young woman left the vessel with Conn, and the cup and the bowl, and she
gave him along with that the rib of an ox and of a hog; twenty-four feet
was the length of the ox-rib.

And the master of the house told them the young woman was the Kingship
of Ireland for ever. "And as for myself," he said, "I am Lugh of the
Long Hand, son of Ethlinn."

BOOK THREE: THE COMING OF THE GAEL.

CHAPTER I. THE LANDING

It is not known, now, for what length of