The great harp recognized its master’s voice, and leaped from the wall.  Whirling through the hall, sweeping aside and killing the men who got in its way, it sprang to its master’s hand.  And the Dagda took his harp and swept his hand across the strings in three great, solemn chords.  The harp answered with the magic Music of Tears.  As the wailing harmony smote upon the air, the women of the Fomorians bowed their heads and wept bitterly, the strong men turned their faces aside, and the little children sobbed.

Again the Dagda touched the strings, and this time the magic Music of Mirth leaped from the harp.  And when they heard that Music of Mirth, the young warriors of the Fomorians began to laugh; they laughed till the cups fell from their grasp, and the spears dropped from their hands, while the wine flowed from the broken bowls; they laughed until their limbs were helpless with excess of glee.

Once more the Dagda touched his harp, but very, very softly.  And now a music stole forth as soft as dreams, and as sweet as joy:  it was the magic Music of Sleep.  When they heard that, gently, gently, the Fomorian women bowed their heads in slumber; the little children crept to their mothers’ laps; the old men nodded; and the young warriors drooped in their seats and closed their eyes:  one after another all the Fomorians sank into sleep.

When they were all deep in slumber, the Dagda took his magic harp, and he and his golden-haired warriors stole softly away, and came in safety to their own homes again.

THE TAILOR AND THE THREE BEASTS[1]

[1] From Beside the Fire, Douglas Hyde (David Nutt, London).

There was once a tailor in Galway, and he started out on a journey to go to the king’s court at Dublin.

He had not gone far till he met a white horse, and he saluted him.

“God save you,” said the tailor.

“God save you,” said the horse.  “Where are you going?”

“I am going to Dublin,” said the tailor, “to build a court for the king and to get a lady for a wife, if I am able to do it.”  For, it seems the king had promised his daughter and a great lot of money to any one who should be able to build up his court.  The trouble was, that three giants lived in the wood near the court, and every night they came out of the wood and threw down all that was built by day.  So nobody could get the court built.

“Would you make me a hole,” said the old white garraun, “where I could go a-hiding whenever the people are for bringing me to the mill or the kiln, so that they won’t see me; for they have me perished doing work for them.”

“I’ll do that, indeed,” said the tailor, “and welcome.”

He brought his spade and shovel, and he made a hole, and he said to the old white horse to go down into it till he would see if it would fit him.  The white horse went down into the hole, but when he tried to come up again, he was not able.