rd and struck the head off
the boy. "I do not like a thing of that sort to be done in my presence,"
said Tadg O'Cealaigh. "If it did not please you, I can set all right
again," said the stranger. And with that he took up the head and made a
cast of it at the body, and it joined to it, and the young man stood
up, but if he did his face was turned backwards. "It would be better for
him to be dead than to be living like that," said O'Cealaigh. When the
man of tricks heard that, he took hold of the boy and twisted his head
straight, and he was as well as before.

And with that the man of tricks vanished, and no one saw where was he
gone.

That is the way Manannan used to be going round Ireland, doing tricks
and wonders. And no one could keep him in any place, and if he was put
on a gallows itself, he would be found safe in the house after, and some
other man on the gallows in his place. But he did no harm, and those
that would be put to death by him, he would bring them to life again
with a herb out of his bag.

And all the food he would use would be a vessel of sour milk and a few
crab-apples. And there never was any music sweeter than the music he
used to be playing.

CHAPTER X. HIS CALL TO BRAN

And there were some that went to Manannan's country beyond the sea, and
that gave an account of it afterwards.

One time Bran, son of Febal, was out by himself near his dun, and he
heard music behind him. And it kept always after him, and at last he
fell asleep with the sweetness of the sound. And when he awoke from his
sleep he saw beside him a branch of silver, and it having white
blossoms, and the whiteness of the silver was the same as the whiteness
of the blossoms.

And he brought the branch in his hand into the royal house, and when all
his people were with him they saw a woman with strange clothing standing
in the house.

And she began to make a song for Bran, and all the people were looking
at her and listening to her, and it is what she said:

"I bring a branch of the apple-tree from Emhain, from the far island
around which are the shining horses of the Son of Lir. A delight of the
eyes is the plain where the hosts hold their games; curragh racing
against chariot in the White Silver Plain to the south.

"There are feet of white bronze under it, shining through life and time;
a comely level land through the length of the world's age, and many
blossoms falling on it.

"There is an old tree there with