The wave of the great sea is speaking; the winter is striking us with it; I do not look to welcome to-day Fermuid son of Mugh. I know what they are doing; they are rowing through the reeds of the ford of Alma; it is cold is the place where they sleep. The summer of youth where we were has been spent along with its harvest; winter age that drowns everyone, its beginning has come upon me. It is beautiful was my green cloak, my king liked to see it on me; it is noble was the man that stirred it, he put wool on it when it was bare. Amen, great is the pity; every acorn has to drop. After feasting with shining candles, to be in the darkness of a prayer-house. I was once living with kings, drinking mead and wine; to-day I am drinking whey-water among withered old women. There are three floods that come up to the dun of Ard-Ruide: a flood of fighting-men, a flood of horses, a flood of the hounds of Lugaidh's son. The flood-wave and the two swift ebb-tides; what the flood-wave brings you in, the ebb-wave sweeps out of your hand. The flood-wave and the second ebb-tide; they have all come as far as me, the way that I know them well. The flood-tide will not reach to the silence of my kitchen; though many are my company in the darkness, a hand has been laid upon them all. My flood-tide! It is well I have kept my knowledge. It is Jesus Son of Mary keeps me happy at the ebb-tide. It is far is the island of the great sea where the flood reaches after the ebb: I do not look for floods to reach to me after the ebb-tide. There is hardly a little place I can know again when I see it; what used to be on the flood-tide is all on the ebb to-day! _Some of the Wonders Told at the Great in the East of the World by the Voice of Philip the Apostle, that Was Like the Laughter of an Army, and With that No Louder than the Talk of Friend in the Ear of Friend;_ _I. The Seven Heavens_ As to the Seven Heavens that are around the earth, the first of them is the bright cloudy heaven that is the nearest and that has shining out of it the moon and the scattering of stars. Beyond that are two flaming heavens, angels are in them and the breaking loose of winds. Beyond those an ice-cold heaven, bluer than any blue, seven times colder than any snow, and it is out of that comes the shining of the sun. Two heavens there are above that again, bright like flame, and it is out of them shine the fiery stars that put fruitfulness in the clouds and in the sea. A high heaven, high and fiery, there is above all the rest; highest of all it is, having within it the rolling of the skies, and the labour of music, and quires of angels. In the belts, now, of the seven heavens are hidden the twelve shaking beasts that have fiery heads upon their heavenly bodies and that are blowing twelve winds about the world. In the same belts are sleeping the dragons with fiery breath, tower-headed, blemished, that give out the crash of the thunders and blow lightnings out of their eyes.