Then Brian, one of the sons of Tuireann, said to his brothers: "Did you
see that armed man that was walking the plain a while ago?" "We did see
him," said they. "Do you know what was it took him away?" said Brian.
"We do not know that," said they. "It is a pity you not to be keeping a
better watch over the plains of the open country in time of war," said
Brian; "and I know well what happened him, for he struck himself with
his Druid rod into the shape of a pig of these pigs, and he is rooting
up the ground now like any one of them; and whoever he is, he is no
friend to us." "That is bad for us," said the other two, "for the pigs
belong to some one of the Tuatha de Danaan, and even if we kill them
all, the Druid pig might chance to escape us in the end."
"It is badly you got your learning in the city of learning," said Brian,
"when you cannot tell an enchanted beast from a natural beast." And
while he was saying that, he struck his two brothers with his Druid
rod, and he turned them into two thin, fast hounds, and they began to
yelp sharply on the track of the enchanted pig.
And it was not long before the pig fell out from among the others, and
not one of the others made away but only itself, and it made for a wood,
and at the edge of the wood Brian gave a cast of his spear that went
through its body. And the pig cried out, and it said: "It is a bad thing
you have done to have made a cast at me when you knew me." "It seems to
me you have the talk of a man," said Brian.
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