rd from the
wood-cutter, William's party of Welshmen were followed by other
Welshmen--the Cusacks, the Petits, and the Brownes; and these in time
fell out with the Barretts, and a great battle fought, the Battle of
Moyne, in 1281, in which William Barrett was killed. But in spite of
their defeat, the Barretts held the upper hand of the country for many a
long year, and the priest began to smile, thinking of the odd story the
old woodman had told him about the Barretts' steward, Sgnorach bhuid
bhearrtha, 'saving your reverence's presence,' the old man said, and,
unable to translate the words into English fit for the priest's ears, he
explained that they meant a glutton and a lewd fellow.

The Barretts sent Sgnorach bhuid bhearrtha to collect rents from the
Lynotts, another group of Welshmen, but the Lynotts killed him and
threw his body into a well, called ever afterwards Tobar na Sgornaighe
(the Well of the Glutton), near the townland of Moygawnagh, Barony of
Tyrawley. To avenge the murder of their steward, the Barretts assembled
an armed force, and, having defeated the Lynotts and captured many of
them, they offered their prisoners two forms of mutilation: they were
either to be blinded or castrated. After taking counsel with their wise
men, the Lynotts chose blindness; for blind men could have sons, and
these would doubtless one day revenge the humiliation that was being
passed upon them. A horrible story it was, for when their eyes were
thrust out with needles they were led to a causeway, and those who
crossed the stepping-stones without stumbling were taken back; and the
priest thought of the assembled horde laughing as the poor blind men
fell into the water.

The story rambled on, the Lynotts plotting how they could be revenged on
the Barretts, telling lamely but telling how the Lynotts, in the course
of generations, came into their revenge. 'A badly told story,' said the
priest, 'with one good incident in it,' and, instead of trying to
remember how victory came to the Lynotts, Father Oli ver's eyes strayed
over the landscape, taking pleasure in the play of light along sides and
crests of the hills.

The road followed the shore of the lake, sometimes turning inland to
avoid a hill or a bit of bog, but returning back again to the shore,
finding its way through the fields, if they could be called fields--a
little grass and some hazel-bushes growing here and there between the
rocks. Under a rocky headland, lying w