Ferdiah.

Let us go to this challenge,
  Let us fly to the Ford,
When the raven shall croak
  O’er my blood-dripping sword. 
Oh, woe for Cuchullin! 
  That sword will be red;
Oh, woe! for to-morrow
  The hero lies dead.

Charioteer.

Thy words are not gentle,
  Yet rest where thou art,
’Twill be dreadful to meet,
  And distressful to part. 
The champion of Ulster! 
  Oh! think what a foe! 
In that meeting there’s grief,
  In that journey there’s woe!

Ferdiah.

Thy counsel is craven,
  Thy caution I slight,
No brave-hearted champion
  Should shrink from the fight. 
The blood I inherit
  Doth prompt me to do—­
Let us go to the challenge,
  To the Ford let us go!

Then were the horses of Ferdiah yoked
Unto the chariot, and he rode full speed
Unto the Ford of battle, and the day
Began to break, and all the east grew red.

Beside the Ford he halted.  “Good, my friend,”
He said unto his servant, “Spread for me
The skins and cushions of my chariot here
Beneath me, that I may a full deep sleep
Enjoy before the hour of fight arrives;
For in the latter portion of the night
I slept not, thinking of the fight to come.” 
Unharnessed were the horses, and the boy
Spread out the cushions and the chariot’s skins,
And heavy sleep fell on Ferdiah’s lids.

Now of Cuchullin will I speak.  He rose
Not until day with all its light had come,
In order that the men of Erin ne’er
Should say of him that it was fear or dread
That made him from a restless couch arise. 
When in the fulness of its light at length
Shone forth the day, he bade his charioteer
Harness his horses and his chariot yoke. 
“Harness my horses, good, my servant,” said
Cuchullin, “and my chariot yoke for me,
For lo! an early-rising champion comes
To meet us here beside the Ford to-day—­
Ferdiah, son of Daman, Dare’s son.” 
“My lord, the steeds are ready to thy hand;
Thy chariot stands here yoked, do thou step in;
The noble car will not disgrace its lord.”

Into the chariot, then, the dextrous, bold,
Red-sworded, battle-winning hero sprang
Cuchullin, son of Sualtam, at a bound. 
Invisible Bocanachs and Bananachs,
And Geniti Glindi[48] shouted round the car,
And demons of the earth and of the air. 
For thus the Tuatha de Danaans used
By sorceries to raise those fearful cries
Around him, that the terror and the fear
Of him should be the greater, as he swept
On with his staff of spirits to the war.