"You shall not be slain with the weapons of a warrior," said Brian; and so saying, he and his brothers laid aside their arms, and smote him fiercely and rudely with the round stones of the earth, till they had reduced his body to a disfigured mass; and in this manner they slew him. They then buried him a man's height in the earth; but the earth, being angry at the fratricide,[XXXVI.] refused to receive the body, and cast it up on the surface. They buried him a second time, and again the body was thrown up from beneath the clay. Six times the sons of Turenn buried the body of Kian a man's height in the earth, and six times did the earth cast it up, refusing to receive it. But when they had buried him the seventh time, the earth refused no longer, and the body remained in the grave. Then the sons of Turenn prepared to go forward after Luga of the Long Arms to the battle. But as they were leaving the grave, they thought they heard a faint, muffled voice coming up from the ground beneath their feet-- The blood you have spilled, The hero you've killed, Shall follow your steps till your doom be fulfilled! FOOTNOTES: [XXXI.] Eas-Dara, now Ballysodare, in the county Sligo. [XXXII.] See page 1. [XXXIII.] Tara, in Meath, the chief seat of the kings of Ireland. [XXXIV.] Fairy Host, _i.e._ the Dedannans. (See notes 1 and 8 at end.) [XXXV.] Moy Murthemna, a plain in the county of Louth. [XXXVI.] Fratricide; Gaelic, _fionghal_, the murder of a relative. (See note, page 7.) The sons of Turenn and the sons of Canta appear to have been related to each other (see the third stanza of the poem, page 94). CHAPTER III. DEFEAT AND FLIGHT OF THE LOCHLANNS. Now as to Luga. After parting from his father, he journeyed westward till he reached Ath-Luan,[XXXVII.] thence to Ros-Coman, and over Moy-Lurg to the Curlieu Hills, and to the mountain of Kesh-Corran, till he reached the "Great Plain of the Assembly," where the foreigners were encamped, with the spoils of Connaught around them. As he drew nigh to the Fomorian encampment, Bres, the son of Balor, arose and said-- "A wonderful thing has come to pass this day; for the sun, it seems to me, has risen in the west." "It would be better that it were so," said the druids,[3] "than that matters should be as they are." "What else can it be, then?" asked Bres. "The light you see," replied the druids, "is the brightness of the face, and the flashing of the weapons of Luga of the Long Arms, our deadly enemy, he who slew our tax-gatherers, and who now approaches." Then Luga came up peacefully and saluted them. "How does it come to pass that you salute us," said they, "since you are, as we know well, our enemy?"