It is said that shortly before, Melachlin, when at the court of Turges, had told him that Ireland was full of a kind of foul, ravenous bird, and asked his advice how to get rid of them; to which Turges answered, that he had better destroy the nests--eggs, nestlings, and all--counsel which the Irish hardly needed; and the massacre of the Danish raven’s brood was frightful. During the lull brought about by Alfred’s conquests, the Irish enjoyed the halcyon days remembered as those of Malachy with the collar of gold (which he had torn from the neck of a conquered Dane), and those of Brien Boromhe, or Boru, the great Brien, in whose reign a maiden, though “Rich and rare were the gems she wore,” travelled safely round the Green Isle unprotected, save by “Erin’s honor and Erin’s pride.” But when England suffered again, Ireland shared its fate, and, in 1004, Brien Boru, at the age of eighty-eight, perished in the great battle of Clontarf, with his eldest son Morogh, and the Danes gained a permanent settlement, besides making endless forays on the coast. King Olaf Trygvesson, of Norway, conducted one of these descents; and while driving off a large herd of cattle, a peasant so piteously entreated to have his own cows restored, that the king told him he might take them, if he could tell at once which they were, but that he must not delay the march. The peasant said his dog knew them, and sent the animal into the midst of the herd, which consisted of several hundreds, when he drove out just the number his master had asked, and all bearing the same mark. The King desired to purchase the intelligent animal, but the man begged that he would take it as a gift; on which Olaf presented him with a gold ring, and kept and valued the faithful Vige as “the best of dogs” for many years after. Turlogh, the contemporary of the Conqueror, seems to have been prosperous, since his subjects were rich enough to buy the unfortunate English, who were sold for slaves, till St. Wulstan put a stop to the traffic. Morogh O’Brien, of Leinster, sent to William Rufus bog oak from the green of Oxmanton, on the Liffey, to serve for the timber of the roof of Westminster Hall; and this wood, enjoying the universal Irish exemption from vermin, is said never to harbor a spider. Morogh was once told that William Rufus intended to make a bridge of his ships, and conquer Ireland. After some musing, Morogh asked, “Hath the King, in his great threatening, said, ‘If it please God?’” “No!” “Then, seeing he putteth his trust only in man, and not in God, I fear not his coming.”