" "It is likely enough
they are," said O'Cealaigh. With that the stranger drew in the thread,
and it is what he found, the boy making love to the girl and the hound
chewing the bones of the hare. There was great anger on the man of
tricks when he saw that, and he took his sword and struck the head off
the boy. "I do not like a thing of that sort to be done in my presence,"
said Tadg O'Cealaigh. "If it did not please you, I can set all right
again," said the stranger. And with that he took up the head and made a
cast of it at the body, and it joined to it, and the young man stood
up, but if he did his face was turned backwards. "It would be better for
him to be dead than to be living like that," said O'Cealaigh. When the
man of tricks heard that, he took hold of the boy and twisted his head
straight, and he was as well as before.
And with that the man of tricks vanished, and no one saw where was he
gone.
That is the way Manannan used to be going round Ireland, doing tricks
and wonders. And no one could keep him in any place, and if he was put
on a gallows itself, he would be found safe in the house after, and some
other man on the gallows in his place. But he did no harm, and those
that would be put to death by him, he would bring them to life again
with a herb out of his bag.
And all the food he would use would be a vessel of sour milk and a few
crab-apples. And there never was any music sweeter than the music he
used to be playing.
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