“If it was I myself had killed your father,” said the king, “I would be well content you to take a fine from me for him.”

“It is at us Lugh is saying all this,” said the sons of Tuireann among themselves.  “Let us acknowledge the killing of his father to him,” said Iuchar and Iucharba.  “I am in dread,” said Brian, “that it is wanting an acknowledgment from us he is, in the presence of all the rest, and that he will not let us off with a fine afterwards.”  “It is best to acknowledge it,” said the others; “and let you speak it out since you are the eldest.”

Then Brian, son of Tuireann, said:  “It is at us you are speaking, Lugh, for you are thinking we went against the sons of Cainte before now; and we did not kill your father,” he said, “but we will pay the fine for him the same as if we did kill him.”  “I will take a fine from you that you do not think of,” said Lugh, “and I will say here what it is, and if it is too much for you, I will let you off a share of it.”  “Let us hear it from you,” said they.  “Here it is,” said Lugh; “three apples, and the skin of a pig, and a spear, and two horses, and a chariot, and seven pigs, and a dog’s whelp, and a cooking-spit, and three shouts on a hill.  That is the fine I am asking,” he said; “and if it is too much for you, a part of it will be taken off you presently, and if you do not think it too much, then pay it”

“It is not too much,” said Brian, “or a hundred times of it would not be too much.  And we think it likely,” he said, “because of its smallness that you have some treachery towards us behind it.”  “I do not think it too little of a fine,” said Lugh; “and I give you the guarantee of the Tuatha de Danaan I will ask no other thing, and I will be faithful to you, and let you give the same pledge to me.”  “It is a pity you to ask that,” said Brian, “for our own pledge is as good as any pledge in the world.”  “Your own pledge is not enough,” said Lugh, “for it is often the like of you promised to pay a fine in this way, and would try to back out of it after.”

So then the sons of Tuireann bound themselves by the King of Ireland, and by Bodb Dearg, son of the Dagda, and by the chief men of the Tuatha de Danaan, that they would pay that fine to Lugh.

“It would be well for me now,” said Lugh, “to give you better knowledge of the fine.”  “It would be well indeed,” said they.

“This is the way of it then,” said Lugh.  “The three apples I asked of you are the three apples from the Garden in the East of the World, and no other apples will do but these, for they are the most beautiful and have most virtue in them of the apples of the whole world.  And it is what they are like, they are of the colour of burned gold, and they are the size of the head of a child a month old, and there is the taste of honey on them, and they do not leave the pain of wounds or the vexation of sickness on any one that eats them, and they do not lessen by being eaten for ever.  And the skin