[1-1] LU. and YBL. 398.

    [b] ‘Nine,’ LU. and YBL. 399 and Eg. 1782.

    [2-2] Stowe.

    [3-3] LU. and YBL. 400.

    [4-4] LU. and YBL. 403-404.

    [5-5] LU. and YBL. 405.

“The little lad went [LL.fo.63a.] [1]into the game again[1] under the protection of the boy-troop.  Thereupon they loosed hands from him, and once more he rushed amongst them [2]throughout the house.[2] He laid low fifty of their princes on the ground under him.  Their fathers thought it was death he had given them.  That was it not, but stunned they were with front-blows and mid-blows and long-blows.  “Hold!” cried Conchobar.  “Why art thou yet at them?” “I swear by my gods whom I worship” (said the boy) “they shall all come under my protection and shielding, as I have put myself under their protection and shielding.  Otherwise I shall not lighten my hands off them until I have brought them all to earth.”  “Well, little lad, take thou upon thee the protection of the boy-troop.”  “I grant it, indeed,” said the lad.  Thereupon the boy-troop went under his protection and shielding.

    [1-1] Stowe.

    [2-2] LU. and YBL. 410.

“[3]Then they all went back to the play-field, and the boys whom he had overthrown there arose.  Their nurses and tutors helped them.

“Now, once upon a time,” continued Fergus, “when he was a gilla, he slept not in Emain Macha till morning.”  “Tell me,” Conchobar said to him, “why sleepest thou not [4]in Emain Macha, Cuchulain?"[4] “I sleep not, unless it be equally high at my head and my feet.”  Then Conchobar had a pillar-stone set up at his head and another at his feet, and between them a bed apart was made for him.

    [3-3] LU. and YBL. 413-481.

    [4-4] YBL. 418.

“Another time a certain man went to wake him, and the lad struck him with his fist in [1]the neck or in[1] the forehead, so that it drove in the front of his forehead on to his brain and he overthrew the pillar-stone with his forearm.”  “It is known,” exclaimed Ailill, “that that was the fist of a champion and the arm of a hero.”  “And from that time,” continued Fergus, “no one durst wake him, so that he used to wake of himself.

    [1-1] Eg. 1782.

“Then, another time, he played ball on the play-field east of Emain, and he was alone on one side against the thrice fifty boys.  He always worsted in every game in the east (?) in this way.  Thereafter the lad began to use his fists on them, so that fifty boys of them died thereof.  He took to flight then, till he took refuge under the cushion of Conchobar’s couch.  The Ulstermen sprang up all around him.  I, too, sprang up, and Conchobar, thereat.  The lad himself rose up under the couch, so that he hove up the couch and the thirty warriors that were on it withal, so that he bore it into the middle of the house.  Straightway the Ulstermen sat around him in the house.  We settled it then,” continued Fergus, “and reconciled the boy-troop to him afterwards.