------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XI THE GODS IN EXILE But though mortals had conquered gods upon a scale unparalleled in mythology, they had by no means entirely subdued them. Beaten in battle, the people of the goddess Danu had yet not lost their divine attributes, and could use them either to help or hurt. “Great was the power of the Dagda”, says a tract preserved in the Book of Leinster, “over the sons of Milé, even after the conquest of Ireland; for his subjects destroyed their corn and milk, so that they must needs make a treaty of peace with the Dagda. Not until then, and thanks to his good-will, were they able to harvest corn and drink the milk of their cows.”[152] The basis of this lost treaty seems to have been that the Tuatha Dé Danann, though driven from the soil, should receive homage and offerings from their successors. We are told in the verse _dinnsenchus_ of Mag Slecht, that— “Since the rule Of Eremon, the noble man of grace, There was worshipping of stones Until the coming of good Patrick of Macha”.[153] Dispossessed of upper earth, the gods had, however, to seek for new homes. A council was convened, but its members were divided between two opinions. One section of them chose to shake the dust of Ireland off its disinherited feet, and seek refuge in a paradise over-seas, situate in some unknown, and, except for favoured mortals, unknowable island of the west, the counterpart in Gaelic myth of the British ... “island-valley of Avilion; Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies Deep-meadow’d, happy, fair with orchard-lawns And bowery hollows crown’d with summer sea”[154] —a land of perpetual pleasure and feasting, described variously as the “Land of Promise” (_Tir Tairngiré_), the “Plain of Happiness” (_Mag Mell_), the “Land of the Living” (_Tir-nam-beo_), the “Land of the Young” (_Tir-nan-ōg_), and “Breasal’s Island” (_Hy-Breasail_). Celtic mythology is full of the beauties and wonders of this mystic country, and the tradition of it has never died out. Hy-Breasail has been set down on old maps as a reality again and again;[155] some pioneers in the Spanish seas thought they had discovered it, and called the land they found “Brazil”; and it is still said, by lovers of old lore, that a patient watcher, after long gazing westward from the westernmost shores of Ireland or Scotland, may sometimes be lucky enough to catch a glimpse against the sunset of its— “summer isles of Eden lying in dark-purple spheres of sea”.