of the lands to the west of Greece, my heart
will go near to breaking if I do not see you every day. The parting of
us two will be the parting of two children of the one house; it will be
the parting of life from the body, Diarmuid, hero of the bright lake of
Carman."

And then to rouse him she would make another song, and it is what she
would say: "Caoinche will be loosed on your track; it is not slow the
running of Caoilte will be; do not let death reach to you, do not give
yourself to sleep for ever.

"The stag to the east is not asleep, he does not cease from bellowing;
though he is in the woods of the blackbirds, sleep is not in his mind;
the hornless doe is not asleep, crying after her speckled fawn; she is
going over the bushes, she does not sleep in her home.

"The cuckoo is not asleep, the thrush is not asleep, the tops of the
trees are a noisy place; the duck is not asleep, she is made ready for
good swimming; the bog lark is not asleep to-night on the high stormy
bogs; the sound of her clear voice is sweet; she is not sleeping between
the streams."

One time they were in a cave of Beinn Edair, and there was an old woman
befriending them and helping them to keep a watch. And one day she
chanced to go up to the top of Beinn Edair, and she saw an armed man
coming towards her, and she did now know him to be Finn; and when he was
come near she asked what was he looking for. "It is looking for a woman
I am come," he said, "and for a woman's love. And will you do all I will
ask you?" he said.

"I will do that," she said; for she thought it was her own love he was
asking.

"Tell me then," he said, "where is Diarmuid, grandson of Duibhne?"

So she told him where he was hiding, and he bade her to keep him in the
cave till such time as he would come back with his men.

The old woman went back then, and it is what she did, she dipped her
cloak in the sea-water before she went into the cave; and Diarmuid asked
her why was her cloak so wet. "It is," she said, "that I never saw or
never heard of the like of this day for cold and for storms. There is
frost on every hillside," she said, "and there is not a smooth plain in
all Elga where there is not a long rushing river between every two
ridges. And there is not a deer or a crow in the whole of Ireland can
find a shelter in any place." And she was shaking the wet off her cloak,
and she was making a complaint against the cold, and it is what she
said:

"Cold, cold