Page:More Celtic Fairy Tales.djvu/94

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Celtic Fairy Tales

bellowed, and commanded the killing of the scholar. But that was not done for him.

"Listen, King of Munster," said MacConglinney, "a vision appeared to me last night, and I will relate it to you."

He then began his vision, and as he related it he put morsel after morsel past Cathal's mouth into his own.

"A lake of new milk I beheld
In the midst of a fair plain,
Therein a well-appointed house,
Thatched with butter.
Puddings fresh boiled,
Such were its thatch-rods,
Its two soft door posts of custard,
Its beds of glorious bacon.
Cheeses were the palisades,
Sausages the rafters.
Truly 'twas a rich filled house,
In which was great store of good feed.

Such was the vision I beheld, and a voice sounded into my ears. 'Go now, thither, MacConglinney, for you have no power of eating in you.' 'What must I do,' said I, for the sight of that had made me greedy. Then the voice bade me go to the hermitage of the Wizard Doctor, and there I should find appetite for all kinds of savoury tender sweet food, acceptable to the body.

"There in the harbour of the lake before me I saw a juicy little coracle of beef; its thwarts were of curds, its prow of lard; its stern of butter; its oars were flitches of venison. Then I rowed across the wide expanse of the New Milk Lake, through seas of broth, past river mouths of meat, over swelling boisterous waves of butter milk, by perpetual pools of savoury lard, by islands of cheese, by