them back to him, and he gave
me an axe, and when a pig is to be killed, it is with the axe it is
killed, and the log is cut with it, and there is enough wood to boil the
pig, and enough for the palace besides. And that is not all, for the log
is found whole again in the morning. And from that time till now, that
is the way they are."

"It is true indeed that story is," said the man of the house.

They turned the pig in the cauldron then, and but one quarter of it was
found to be cooked. "Let us tell another true story," they said. "I will
tell one," said the master of the house. "Ploughing time had come, and
when we had a mind to plough that field outside, it is the way we found
it, ploughed, and harrowed, and sowed with wheat. When we had a mind to
reap it, the wheat was found in the haggard, all in one thatched rick.
We have been using it from that day to this, and it is no bigger and no
less."

Then they turned the pig, and another quarter was found to be ready. "It
is my turn now," said the woman. "I have seven cows," she said, "and
seven sheep. And the milk of the seven cows would satisfy the whole of
the men of the world, if they were in the plain drinking it, and it is
enough for all the people of the Land of Promise, and it is from the
wool of the seven sheep all the clothes they wear are made." And at that
story the third quarter of the pig was boiled.

"If these stories are true," said Cormac to the man of the house, "you
are Manannan, and this is Manannan's wife; for no one on the whole ridge
of the world owns these treasures but himself. It was to the Land of
Promise he went to look for that woman, and he got those seven cows with
her."

They said to Cormac that it was his turn now. So Cormac told them how
his wife, and his son, and his daughter, had been brought away from him,
and how he himself had followed them till he came to that place.

And with that the whole pig was boiled, and they cut it up, and Cormac's
share was put before him. "I never used a meal yet," said he, "having
two persons only in my company." The man of the house began singing to
him then, and put him asleep. And when he awoke, he saw fifty armed men,
and his son, and his wife, and his daughter, along with them. There was
great gladness and courage on him then, and ale and food were given out
to them all. And there was a gold cup put in the hand of the master of
the house, and Cormac was wondering at it, for the number of the sh