sition,
Who to the gap of his destruction goes;
Alas! my death-sick voice needs no physician,
My end hath come--my life's stream seaward flows.

The natural ramparts of my breast are broken,
In its own gore my struggling heart is drowned:--
Alas! I have not fought as I have spoken,
For thou hast killed me in the fight, O Hound!

Cuchullin towards him ran, and his two arms
Clasping about him, lifted him and bore
The body in its armour and its clothes
Across the Ford unto the northern bank,
In order that the slain should thus be placed
Upon the north bank of the Ford, and not
Among the men of Erin, on the west.
Cuchullin laid Ferdiah down, and then
A sudden trance, a faintness on him came
When bending o'er the body of his friend.
Laegh saw the weakness, which was seen as well
By all the men of Erin, who arose
Upon the moment to attack him there.
"Good, O Cuchullin," Laegh exclaimed, "arise,
For all the men of Erin hither come.
It is no single combat they will give,
Since fair Ferdiah, Daman's son, the son
Of Dare, by thy hands has here been slain."
"O servant, what availeth me to rise,"
Cuchullin said, "since he hath fallen by me?"
And so the servant said, and so replied
Cuchullin, in his turn, unto the end;

LAEGH.

Arise, Emania's slaughter-hound, arise,
Exultant pride should be thy mood this day:--
Ferdiah of the hosts before thee lies--
Hard was the fight and dreadful was the fray.

CUCHULLIN.

Ah, what availeth me a hero's pride?
Madness and grief are in my heart and brain,
For the dear blood with which my hand is dyed--
For the dear body that I here have slain.

LAEGH.

It suits thee ill to shed these idle tears,
Fitter by far for thee a fiercer mood--
At thee he flung the flying pointed spears,
Malicious, wounding, dripping, dyed with blood.

CUCHULLIN.

Even though he left me crippled, maimed, and lame,
Even though I lost this arm that now but bleeds,
All would I bear, but now the fields of fame
No more shall see Ferdiah mount his steeds.

LAEGH.

More pleasing is the victory thou hast gained,
More pleasing to the women of Creeve Rue,
He to have died and thou to have remained,
To them the brave who fell here are too few.

From that black day in brilliant Mave's long reign
Thou camest out of Cuailgne it has been--
Her people slaughtered and her champions slain--
A time of desolation to the queen.

When thy great plundered flock was borne away,
T