In the house of Feidlimid,[FN#39] the son of Dall, even he who was the narrator of stories to Conor the king, the men of Ulster sat at their ale; and before the men, in order to attend upon them, stood the wife of Feidlimid, and she was great with child.  Round about the board went drinking-horns, and portions of food; and the revellers shouted in their drunken mirth.  And when the men desired to lay themselves down to sleep, the woman also went to her couch; and, as she passed through the midst of the house, the child cried out in her womb, so that its shriek was heard throughout the whole house, and throughout the outer court that lay about it.  And upon that shriek, all the men sprang up; and, head closely packed by head, they thronged together in the house, whereupon Sencha, the son of Ailill, rebuked them:  “Let none of you stir!” cried he, “and let the woman be brought before us, that we may learn what is the meaning of that cry.”  Then they brought the woman before them, and thus spoke to her Feidlimid, her spouse: 

What is that, of all cries far the fiercest,
In thy womb raging loudly and long? 
Through all ears with that clamour thou piercest;
With that scream, from Bides swollen and strong: 
Of great woe, for that cry, is foreboding my heart;
That is torn through with terror, and sore with the smart.

[FN#39] Pronounced Feylimid.

Then the woman turned her, and she approached Cathbad[FN#40] the Druid, for he was a man of knowledge, and thus she spoke to him: 

[FN#40] Pronounced Cah-ba.

Give thou ear to me, Cathbad, thou fair one of face,
Thou great crown of our honour, and royal in race;
Let the man so exalted still higher be set,
Let the Druid draw knowledge, that Druids can get. 
For I want words of wisdom, and none can I fetch;
Nor to Felim a torch of sure knowledge can stretch: 
As no wit of a woman can wot what she bears,
I know naught of that cry from within me that tears.

And then said Cathbad: 

’Tis a maid who screamed wildly so lately,
Fair and curling shall locks round her flow,
And her eyes be blue-centred and stately;
And her cheeks, like the foxglove, shall glow. 
For the tint of her skin, we commend her,
In its whiteness, like snow newly shed;
And her teeth are all faultless in splendour
And her lips, like to coral, are red: 
A fair woman is she, for whom heroes,
that fight In their chariots for Ulster, to death shall be dight.

’Tis a woman that shriek who hath given,
Golden-haired, with long tresses, and tall;
For whose love many chiefs shall have striven,
And great kings for her favours shall call. 
To the west she shall hasten, beguiling
A great host, that from Ulster shall steal: 
Red as coral, her lips shall be smiling,
As her teeth, white as pearls, they reveal: 
Aye, that woman is fair, and great queens shall be fain
Of her form, that is faultless, unflawed by a stain.