It is said that there were two quite different kinds of people in
Ireland: one set of people with long dark hair and dark eyes, called
Fomorians--they carried long slender spears made of golden bronze when
they fought--and another race of people who were golden-haired and
blue-eyed, and who carried short, blunt, heavy spears of dull metal.
The golden-haired people had a great chieftain who was also a kind of
high priest, who was called the Dagda. And this Dagda had a wonderful
magic harp. The harp was beautiful to look upon, mighty in size, made of
rare wood, and ornamented with gold and jewels; and it had wonderful
music in its strings, which only the Dagda could call out. When the men
were going out to battle, the Dagda would set up his magic harp and
sweep his hand across the strings, and a war song would ring out which
would make every warrior buckle on his armour, brace his knees, and
shout, "Forth to the fight!" Then, when the men came back from the
battle, weary and wounded, the Dagda would take his harp and strike a
few chords, and as the magic music stole out upon the air, every man
forgot his weariness and the smart of his wounds, and thought of the
honour he had won, and of the comrade who had died beside him, and of
the safety of his wife and children. Then the song would swell out
louder, and every warrior would remember only the glory he had helped
win for the king; and each man would rise at the great table, his cup in
his hand, and shout "Long live the King!"
There came a time when the Fomorians and the golden-haired men were at
war; and in the midst of a great battle, while the Dagda's hall was not
so well guarded as usual, some of the chieftains of the Fomorians stole
the great harp from the wall, where it hung, and fled away with it.
Their wives and children and some few of their soldiers went with them,
and they fled fast and far through the night, until they were a long way
from the battlefield. Then they thought they were safe, and they turned
aside into a vacant castle, by the road, and sat down to a banquet,
hanging the stolen harp on the wall.
The Dagda, with two or three of his warriors, had followed hard on their
track. And while they were in the midst of their banqueting, the door
was suddenly burst open, and the Dagda stood there, with his men. Some
of the Fomorians sprang to their feet, but before any of them could
grasp a weapon, the Dagda called out to his harp on the wall, "Come to
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