"
PATRICK. "If Faolan and Goll were living, and all the Fianna that ever
were, they could not bring out Finn from the house where he is in pain."
OISIN. "What did Finn do against God but to be attending on schools and
on armies? Giving gold through a great part of his time, and for another
while trying his hounds."
PATRICK. "In payment for thinking of his hounds and for serving the
schools of the poets, and because he gave no heed to God, Finn of the
Fianna is held down."
OISIN. "You say, Patrick of the Psalms, that the Fianna could not take
out Finn, or the five provinces of Ireland along with them.
"I have a little story about Finn. We were but fifteen men when we took
the King of Britain of the feasts by the strength of our spears and our
own strength.
"We took Magnus the great, the son of the King of Lochlann of the
speckled ships; we came back no way sorry or tired, we put our rent on
far places.
"O Patrick, the story is pitiful, the King of the Fianna to be under
locks; a heart without envy, without hatred, a heart hard in earning
victory.
"It is an injustice, God to be unwilling to give food and riches; Finn
never refused strong or poor, although cold Hell is now his
dwelling-place.
"It is what Finn had a mind for, to be listening to the sound of Druim
Dearg; to sleep at the stream of Ess Ruadh, to be hunting the deer of
Gallimh of the bays.
"The cries of the blackbird of Leiter Laoi, the wave of Rudraighe
beating the strand, the bellowing of the ox of Magh Maoin, the lowing of
the calf of Gleann da Mhail.
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