Then Cairell of the White Skin, son of Finn, said: "It is many a man of
Finn's household you have put down, Goll!" And Bald Conan when he heard
that said: "I swear by my arms, Goll was never without having a hundred
men in his household, every one of them able to get the better of
yourself." "And is it to them you belong, crooked-speaking, bare-headed
Conan?" said Cairell. "It is to them I belong, you black, feeble,
nail-scratching, rough-skinned Cairell; and I will make you know it was
Finn was in the wrong," said Conan.
With that Cairell rose up and gave a furious blow of his fist to Conan,
and Conan took it with no great patience, but gave him back a blow in
his teeth, and from that they went on to worse blows again. And the two
sons of Goll rose up to help Conan, and Osgar went to the help of
Cairell, and it was not long till many of the chief men of the Fianna
were fighting on the one side or the other, on the side of Finn or on
the side of the sons of Morna.
But then Fergus of the True Lips rose up, and the rest of the poets of
the Fianna along with him, and they sang their songs and their poems to
check and to quiet them. And they left off their fighting at the sound
of the poets' songs, and they let their weapons fall on the floor, and
the poets took them up, and made peace between the fighters; and they
put bonds on Finn and on Goll to keep the peace for a while, till they
could ask for a judgment from the High King of Ireland.
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