Now to Fuamnach came tidings of the love and the worship that Etain had from Mac O’c, and she came to Mider, and “Let thy foster-son,” said she, “be summoned to visit thee, that I may make peace between you two, and may then go to seek for news of Etain.”  And the messenger from Mider went to Mac O’c, and Mac O’c went to Mider to greet him; but Fuamnach for a long time wandered from land to land till she was in that very mansion where Etain was; and then she blew beneath her with the same blast as aforetime, so that the blast carried her out of her bower, and she was blown before it, as she had been before for seven years through all the land of Erin, and she was driven by the wind of that blast to weakness and woe.  And the wind carried her over the roof of a house where the men of Ulster sat at their ale, so that she fell through the roof into a cup of gold that stood near the wife of Etar the Warrior, whose dwelling-place was near to the Bay of Cichmany in the province that was ruled over by Conor.  And the woman swallowed Etain together with the milk that was in the cup, and she bare her in her womb, till the time came that she was born thereafter as in earthly maid, and the name of Etain, the daughter of Etar, was given to her.  And it was one thousand and twelve years since the time of the first begetting of Etain by Ailill to the time when she was born the second time as the daughter of Etar.

Now Etain was nurtured at Inver Cichmany in the house of Etar, with fifty maidens about her of the daughters of the chiefs of the land; and it was Etar himself who still nurtured and clothed them, that they might be companions to his daughter Etain.  And upon a certain day, when those maidens were all at the river-mouth to bathe there, they saw a horseman on the plain who came to the water towards them.  A horse he rode that was brown, curvetting, and prancing, with a broad forehead and a curly mane and tail.  Green, long, and flowing was the cloak that was about him, his shirt was embroidered with embroidery of red gold, and a great brooch of gold in his cloak reached to his shoulder on either side.  Upon the back of that man was a silver shield with a golden rim; the handle for the shield was silver, and a golden boss was in the midst of the shield:  he held in his hand a five-pointed spear with rings of gold about it from the haft to the head.  The hair that was above his forehead was yellow and fair; and upon his brow was a circlet of gold, which confined the hair so that it fell not about his face.  He stood for a while upon the shore of the bay; and he gazed upon the maidens, who were all filled with love for him, and then he sang this song: 

West of Alba, near the Mound[FN#8]
Where the Fair-Haired Women play,
There, ’mid little children found,
Etain dwells, by Cichmain’s Bay.

She hath healed a monarch’s eye
By the well of Loch-da-lee;
Yea, and Etar’s wife, when dry,
Drank her:  heavy draught was she!