Celts -- Folklore; Fairy tales; Fairy tales -- Great Britain; Folklore -- Great Britain; Tales -- Great Britain
"I was a long time in the Wet Mantle, even till my two sons grew to be
big lads. They asked me one day if I had any thought of going to seek
their mother. I told them that I was waiting till they were stronger,
and that they should then go with me. They said that they were ready to
go with me at any time. I said to them that we had better get the ship
ready, and go. They said, 'Let each of us have a ship to himself.' We
arranged accordingly; and each went his own way.
"As I happened one day to be passing close to land I saw a great battle
going on. Being under vows never to pass a battle without helping the
weaker side, I went on shore, and set to work with the weaker side, and
I knocked the head off every one with the short spear. Being tired, I
lay myself down among the bodies and fell asleep.
"Stretch out your leg, Kayn, till I put a salve of herbs and
healing to it. Salve and binding herb and the poultice are
cooling; the worm is channering. Pressure and haste hard bind me,
for I must hear Mass in the great church at Rome, and be in
Norway before I sleep."
Kayn Mac Loy said:
"May it be no foot to Kayn or a foot to any one after one, or I
be Kayn son of Loy, if I stretch out my foot for you to put a
salve of herbs and healing on it, till you tell me if you found
the daughter of the King of the Universe, or if you went home, or
what happened to you."
[Illustration]
"The mischief is upon you," said the big man; "that tale is long to
tell, but I will tell another short tale. When I awoke out of sleep I
saw a ship making for the place where I was lying, and a big giant with
only one eye dragging it after him: and the ocean reached no higher than
his knees. He had a big fishing-rod with a big strong line hanging from
it on which was a very big hook. He was throwing the line ashore, and
fixing the hook in a body, and lifting it on board, and he continued
this work till the ship was loaded with bodies. He fixed the hook once
in my clothes; but I was so heavy that the rod could not carry me on
board. He had to go on shore himself, and carry me on board in his arms.
I was then in a worse plight than I ever was in. The giant set off with
the ship, which he dragged after him, and reached a big, precipitous
rock, in the face of which he had a large cave: and a damsel as
beautiful as I ever saw came out, and stood in the door of the cave. He
was handing the bodies to her, and she was taking hold of them and
putting them into the cave. As she took hold of each body she said, 'Are
you alive?' At last the giant took hold of me, and handed me in to her,
and said, 'Keep him apart; he is a large body, and I will have him to
breakfast the first day that I go from home.' My best time was not when
I heard the giant's sentence upon me. When he had eaten enough of the
bodies, his dinner and supper, he lay down to sleep. When he began to
snore the damsel came to speak to me; and she told me that she was a
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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