Celts -- Folklore; Fairy tales; Fairy tales -- Great Britain; Folklore -- Great Britain; Tales -- Great Britain
Fin went the third night, and things happened as before. There was no
one before him, and he took to pacing to and fro. He saw the sea coming
till it came down below him: the Big Monster came up; he saw the little
black speck, and asked who was there, and what he wanted. "I have come
to combat you," said Fin.
Fin and Bran began the combat. Fin was going backwards, and the Huge Man
was following. Fin called to Bran, "Are you going to let him kill me?"
Bran had a venomous shoe; and he leaped and struck the Huge Man with the
venomous shoe on the breast-bone, and took the heart and lungs out of
him. Fin drew his sword, Mac-a-Luin, cut off his head, put it on a
hempen rope, and went with it to the Palace of the King. He took it into
the _Kitchen_, and put it behind the door. In the morning the servant
could not turn it, nor open the door. The King went down; he saw the
Huge Mass, caught it by the top of the head, and lifted it, and knew it
was the head of the Man who was for so long a time asking combat from
him, and keeping him from sleep. "How at all," said he, "has this head
come here? Surely it is not my dwarf that has done it." "Why," said Fin,
"should he not?"
Next night the King wanted to go himself to the place of combat;
"because," said he, "a bigger one than the former will come to-night,
and the kingdom will be destroyed, and you yourself killed; and I shall
lose the pleasure I take in having you with me." But Fin went, and that
Big Man came, asking vengeance for his son, and to have the kingdom for
himself, or equal combat. He and Fin fought; and Fin was going
backwards. He spoke to Bran, "Are you going to allow him to kill me?"
Bran whined, and went and sat down on the beach. Fin was ever being
driven back, and he called out again to Bran. Then Bran jumped and
struck the Big Man with the venomous shoe, and took the heart and the
lungs out of him. Fin cut the head off, and took it with him, and left
it in front of the house. The King awoke in great terror, and cried out,
"My kingdom is lost, and my dwarf and my lapdog are killed!" Fin raised
himself up and said, "They are not"; and the King's joy was not small
when he went out and saw the head that was in front of the house.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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