er
brothers nevermore. But first of all came Conn, his feathers all
battered and broken and his head drooping, and in a little Ficra
appeared, so drenched and cold and beaten by the winds that no word
could he speak. And Finola took her younger brothers under her great
white wings, and they were comforted and rested in that warm shelter.

"If Aed would only come," she said, "then should we be happy indeed."

And even as she spoke, they beheld Aed sailing towards them like a
proud ship with its white sails shining in the sun, and Finola held
him close to the snowy plumage of her breast, and happiness returned
to the children of Lir.

Many another tempest had they to strive with, and very cruel to them
were the snow and biting frosts of the dreary winters. One January
night there came a frost that turned even the restless sea into solid
ice, and in the morning, when the swans strove to rise from the rock
of Carricknarone, the iron frost clung to them and they left behind
them the skin of their feet, the quills of their wings, and the soft
feathers of their breasts, and when the frost had gone, the salt water
was torture for their wounds. Yet ever they sang their songs, piercing
sweet and speaking of the peace and joy to come, and many a
storm-tossed mariner by them was lulled to sleep and dreamt the happy
dreams of his childhood, nor knew who had sung him so magical a
lullaby. It was in those years that Finola sang the song which a poet
who possessed the wonderful heritage of a perfect comprehension of the
soul of the Gael has put into English words for us.

"Happy our father Lir afar,
With mead, and songs of love and war:
The salt brine, and the white foam,
With these his children have their home.

In the sweet days of long ago,
Soft-clad we wandered to and fro:
But now cold winds of dawn and night
Pierce deep our feathers thin and light.

* * * * *

Beneath my wings my brothers lie
When the fierce ice-winds hurtle by;
On either side and 'neath my breast
Lir's sons have known no other rest."

Fiona Macleod (William Sharp).

Only once during those dreary three hundred years did the children of
Lir see any of their friends. When they saw, riding down to the shore
at the mouth of the Bann on the north coast of Erin, a company in
gallant attire, with glittering arms, and mounted on white horses, the
swans hastened to meet them. And