-for space will not allow of
more than a sample--the story of "The Pursuit of Gilla Backer and his
Horse," not by any means one of the best, yet characteristic enough. In
it we learn that from Beltane, the 1st of May--the great Celtic festival
of the sun--to Sanim, the 1st of November, the chiefs and Fenni hunted
each day with their hounds through the forests and over the plains,
while from Sanim to Beltane they lived in the "Betas," or houses of
hospitality, or feasted high with Finn McCumal, son of Cumal, grandson
of Trenmore O'Baskin, whose palace stood upon the summit of the hill of
Allen, a hill now crowned with a meaningless modern obelisk, covering
the site of the old historic rath, a familiar object to thousands who
have looked up at it from the Curragh of Kildare, certainly with no
thought in their minds of Finn McCumal or his vanished warriors.

The tale tells how one day, after hunting on the Plains of Cliach, the
Fenni sat down to rest upon the hill of Colkilla, their hunting tents
being pitched upon a level spot near the summit. How presently, afar off
over the plain at their feet, they saw one of the conquered race of
earlier inhabitants, a "Formorian" of huge size and repulsive ugliness
coming towards them, leading his horse by the halter, an animal larger,
it seems, than six ordinary horses, but broken down and knock-kneed,
with jaws that stuck out far in advance of its head. How the heroes,
idling pleasantly about in the sunshine, laughed aloud at the uncouth
"foreigner" and his ugly raw-boned beast, "covered with tangled scraggy
hair of a sooty black." How he came before the king and, having made
obeisance, told him that his name was the Gilla Backer, and then and
there took service with him for a year, desiring at the same time that
special care should be paid to his horse, and the best food given it,
and care taken that it did not stray, whereat the heroes laughed again,
the horse standing like a thing carved in wood and unable apparently to
move a leg.

No sooner, however, was it loosed, and the halter cast off, than it
rushed amongst the other horses, kicking and lashing, and seizing them
with its teeth till not one escaped. Seeing which, the Fenni rose up in
high wrath, and one of them seized the Gilla Backer's horse by the
halter and tried to draw it away, but again it became like a rock, and
refused to stir. Then he mounted its back and flogged it, but still it
remained like a stone. Then, one