nd to bring him out to see how
were the cattle doing. And one night the servants had no mind to go, and
they agreed together to tell him it was a very bad night.

And it is what the first of them said; "It is outside there is a heavy
sound with the heavy water dropping from the tops of trees; the sound of
the waves is not to be heard for the loud splashing of the rain." And
then the next one said: "The trees of the wood are shivering, and the
birch is turning black; the snow is killing the birds; that is the story
outside." And the third said: "It is to the east they have turned their
face, the white snow and the dark rain; it is what is making the plain
so cold is the snow that is dripping and getting hard."

But there was a serving-girl in the house, and she said: "Rise up,
Oisin, and go out to the white-headed cows, since the cold wind is
plucking the trees from the hills."

Oisin went out then, and the serving-man on his shoulders; but it is
what the serving-man did, he brought a vessel of water and a birch broom
with him, and he was dashing water in Oisin's face, the way he would
think it was rain. But when they came to the pen where the cattle were,
Oisin found the night was quiet, and after that he asked no more news of
the weather from the servants.

CHAPTER III. THE ARGUMENTS

And S. Patrick took in hand to convert Oisin, and to bring him to
baptism; but it was no easy work he had to do, and everything he would
say, Oisin would have an answer for it. And it is the way they used to
be talking and arguing with one another, as it was put down afterwards
by the poets of Ireland:--

PATRICK. "Oisin, it is long your sleep is. Rise up and listen to the
Psalm. Your strength and your readiness are gone from you, though you
used to be going into rough fights and battles."

OLSIN. "My readiness and my strength are gone from me since Finn has no
armies living; I have no liking for clerks, their music is not sweet to
me after his."

PATRICK. "You never heard music so good from the beginning of the world
to this day; it is well you would serve an army on a hill, you that are
old and silly and grey."

OLSIN. "I used to serve an army on a hill, Patrick of the closed-up
mind; it is a pity you to be faulting me; there was never shame put on
me till now.

"I have heard music was sweeter than your music, however much you are
praising your clerks: the song of the blackbird in Leiter Laoi, and the
sound of the D