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186 Gaelic Society of Inuerness.
he warded oil'. Then his war rage seized him. " He shut one
eye till it was not wider than the eye of a needle ; he 0])ened the
other till it was bigger than the mouth of a meal-goblet." He attacked
the youths and set them flying every way. Conchobar recognised
him and introduced him to tlie boys. The next thing was
the choosing of arms when he was fit to bear them. Conchobar
gave him first ordinary weapons, but he shivered them with a
shake. Fifteen sets did he so break in ever rising gmde of strength.
At last Conchobar gave him his own royal weapons. TJiese he
could not shiver. Fifteen war-chariots did he break by leaping
into them and shaking them, until he got the king's own chariot,
which withstood him. He and the charioteer then darted oft',
reached Meath, cliallenged and slew three champions, and came
back again to Emania, his uncle's capital, safe and sound.
A wife had now to be got for him, and Conchobar searched
all Erin for a suitable j^artner, but in vain. The ladies of Erin
greatly loved him, as the records say — " for his splendour at the
feat, for the readiness of his leap, for the excellence of his wisdom,
for the melodiousness of his eloquence, for the beauty of his face,
for the lovingness of his countenance. For there were seven pupils
in his royal eyes, four in the one and three in the other for him ;
seven fingers on each of his two hands and seven on each of his
two feet." And another says, after the usual profusion of colour
and minutiae as to garments— " I should think it was a shower of
pearls that was flung into his head. Blacker than the side of a
black cooking-spit each of his two l^rows; retlder than ruby his lips.''
The Highland ballad of the Chariot of Cuchulin describes him
even better and certainly in true Celtic style of successive ei)ithets.
Cuchulinn himself set out for a wife, and fell in with Emer,
daughter of Forgill, a " noble farmer " holding extensive lands
near Dublin. " Emer had these six victories upon her," says the
tale, " the victory of form, the victory of voice, the victory of
melodiousness, the victory of emljroidery, the victory of wisdom,
the victory of chastity." Emer did not immediately accept him,
though latterly she was violently in love with him. Her father
would not have him at all ; he did not like professional champions.
He got him to leave the countiy to complete his military education
with the celebrated lady Scathach in the Isle of Skye. Cuchulinn
went to Scathach, whose school was certainly no easy one to enter
or pass through. Here he learned all those wondei-ful feats—
c^ea.sYt—for which he is so famous in story. His sjtecial cleas
was tlie (/ae hi>l