But Eochy summoned together all the host of the heroes of the Gael, and they surrounded Tara, ring within ring; and the King himself and Etain were in the palace, with the outer court of it shut and locked.  For they looked that Midir should come with a great host of the Danaan folk to carry off the Queen.  And on the appointed day, as the kings sat at meat, Etain and her handmaids were dispensing the wine to them as was wont.  Then suddenly as they feasted and talked, behold, Midir, stood in the midst of them.  If he was fair and noble to look on as he had appeared before to the King and to Etain, he was fairer now, for the splendour of the Immortals clothed him, and his jewels flamed as he moved like eyes of living light.  And all the kings and lords and champions who were present gazed on him in amazement and were silent, as the King arose and gave him welcome.

“Thou hast received me as I expected to be received,” said Midir, “and now let thy debt be paid, since I for my part faithfully performed all that I undertook.”

“I must consider the matter yet longer,” said Eochy.

“Thou hast promised Etain’s very self to me,” said Midir; “that is what hath come from thee.”  And when she heard that word Etain blushed for shame.

“Blush not,” said Midir, “for all the treasures of the Land of Youth have not availed to win thee from Eochy, and it is not of thine own will that thou art won, but because the time is come to return to thy kin.”

Then said Eochy, “I have not promised Etain’s self to thee, but to take her in thine arms and kiss her, and now do so if thou wilt.”

[Illustration:  “They rose up in the air”]

Then Midir took his weapons in his left hand and placed his right around Etain, and when he did so they rose up in the air over the heads of the host, and passed through a roof-window in the palace.  Then all rose up, tumultuous and angry, and rushed out of doors, but nothing could they see save two white swans that circled high in air around the Hill of Tara, and then flew southwards and away towards the fairy mountain of Slievenamon.  And thus Etain the immortal rejoined the Immortals; but a daughter of Etain and of Eochy, who was another Etain in name and in beauty, became in due time a wife, and mother of kings.

CHAPTER VIII

How Ethne Quitted Fairyland

By the banks of the River Boyne, where rises the great Fairy Mound now called Newgrange, there stood long ago the shining Palace of a prince of the People of Dana, named Angus.  Of him it is that the lines are written—­

  “By the dark rolling waters of the Boyne
   Where Angus Og magnificently dwells.”

When the Milesian race invaded Ireland, and after long fighting subdued the Danaans in spite of all their enchantments and all their valour, the Danaans wrought for themselves certain charms by which they and all their possessions became invisible to mortals, and thus they continued to lead their old joyous life in the holy places of the land, and their palaces and dancing-places and folk-motes seem to the human eye to be merely a green mound or rath, or a lonely hillside, or a ruined shrine with nettles and foxgloves growing up among its broken masonry.