Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
The birth and life of St Mo Ling (Author: [unknown])

chapter 14

CHAPTER XIV.

41

Then came Ruadsech the Red, wife of Gobbán the Wright, 46 to have speech with the cleric. She took to praising his form and colour and shape and appearance. ‘Why is that, O woman?’ asked the cleric. ‘To converse with thee and to entreat thee have we come,’ says she: ‘ill we deem it to have no herd of cattle.’ ‘Two cows shall go to thee, and a cow to each of the other women,’ said the cleric. ‘May there be good to thee, O cleric!’ say they, ‘for that is our own award.’

42

Thereafter they went home. Now there was a son of malediction, robbing and marauding there at that time: Grác was his name. He came towards the kine, and stole

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one of the two cows of Ruadsech the Red. That was told to Ruadsech. ‘Tis true,’ she says; ‘the grudging, denying cleric! 'tis he who caused that destruction. He repents of what he gave us, and so he has practised fraud upon us.’ ‘My people shall go in pursuit of the cow,’ says Moling, ‘and Grác will be killed.’ ‘The more likely, meseems, he will have a long life!’ says Ruadsech. ‘If, then, it were thy wish to burn him, (this) would be done.’ ‘The more likely, meseems, that a good fire would be got for him if he should feel cold.’ ‘Or if it be better to drown him, (this) would be done.’ ‘The more likely, meseems, that a drink would be got for him if he should be athirst.’

43

Then said the cleric:

    1. The wife of the wright,
      round whom the narrow hut is built,
      if vile madness
      [...]

      O great God, may it not be her wealth!
    2. Ruadsech the red,
      O Son of my God, may withering reach her:
      for every food which she brings out of an oven
      may (her) belly be no bigger than a cod.
    3. Eight wrights,
      and eight women beside them,
      eight boys with great duty
      Gobbán the wright brought to me.
    4. Ruadsech . . .
      (...)
      a place in pure heaven
      of the man whose wife she is.

      5. The wife.

‘Go ye in pursuit of the cattle,’ says Moling. ‘Grác the marauder, 'tis he that has done yon deed, and he is by the

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streampools of the Barrow, with his wife and his child. And he has killed the cow, and is taking her flesh out of the cauldron. And catch ye him, and let him be killed by you; but let not the wife or the child be killed.’47

44

Thereafter Moling's household reached the place where Grác was taking the cow's flesh out of the cauldron. Then Grác flees before the captors, and climbs into the top of a tree. Up in the tree he is wounded, and he fell into the fire. Thence he fell into the Barrow, and therein he was drowned. Now Moling's people after that brought (him) their cow amid her hide, and the cleric then restored her to life, so that she was whole.

45

Thus then was the cow afterwards, the half of her that had been boiled was brown, and the other half was white. Moling afterwards had the cow, and he gave her not to Ruadsech, and twelve men's fill of milk used to be yielded by her (every day). 'Tis then that Grác's wife, with her child on her back, came to Moling, and was in great grief, asking aid from the cleric. Whereupon Moling said:

    1. O wife of Grác, that is
      [...]

      heardest thou not that Grác slain?
      heardest thou not of his ebbing by fire
      and of his drowning by sea?
    2. O wife of Grác, that is
      [...]

      heardest thou not that Grác was slain?
      he will be for ever in hell,
      this will be his fate and his due.
    3. O wife of Grác, that is
      [...]

      heardest thou not that Grác was slain?
      not
      [...]

      the calf48 that is on thy back.
    4. O wife of Grác, that is
      [...]

      heardest thou not that Grác was slain?
      thy husband in hell for a time of days:
      his wife will be where he is.

      5. O wife of Grác

46

So anger and rage came to Gobbán's wife, because the cow was not given again to her. She said that night

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to Gobbán that she would never, never lie with him unless Gobbán would make on Moling her award, as the wage of his labour. ‘Thus shall it be done,’ says Gobbán. ‘The oratory is finished,’ says she: ‘take no wage other than the full of the oratory of rye-grain.’ ‘It shall be done,’ says Gobbán.

47

‘Make thine award,’ says the cleric; ‘for this is what was promised to thee, thine own award.’ ‘I will award,’ says he; ‘its fill of rye-grain to be given to me.’ ‘Invert it,’ says Moling, ‘and put its mouth upwards, and it shall be filled.’ So Gobbán applies tackle and apparatus to it, so that the oratory was inverted; and not a plank of it went from its place, and no joining of any plank moved from another.

48

Then Moling went and sent messengers to the Húi Degha, east and west, to help him with the demand that had been made upon him. Whereupon he said this below:

    1. Grief seizes me
      between the two mountains,
      Degha to the east of me,
      Degha to the west of me.
    2. He (Gobbán) has asked of me
      the full of a brown oratory,—
      a demand that is hard for me—
      of grain of bare rye.
    3. If he carry away that,
      may he not gain a victory!
      may it not be malt of a truth!
      may it not be seed or dried grain!
    4. The Húi Degha to benefit me,
      let them help me for sake of knowledge,
      because this is what is desirable:
      here I am in grief.49

      5. G.

49

'Tis then from east and west the Húi Dega came to him, so that the hill was filled with them. He told them the award that had been made upon him. ‘If we had that (rye),’ they say, ‘it would be given to thee; but all the corn in Húi Dega is not more than the full of that oratory.’

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‘That is true,’ says Moling; ‘so get ye home to-night, and come to-morrow at rising time; and spare nothing, both corn and nuts and apples and green rushes, so that yon (oratory) may be full.’

50

On the morrow they come, and they fill up the oratory (with the things that Moling had mentioned). The Lord wrought a miracle for Moling, so that nothing else was found therein save bare grain of rye. Wherefore Moling is entitled to that tribute every year from the Húi Dega for ever.

Thereafter Gobbán took away his corn, and thus it was found on the morrow, a heap of maggots!

Through those miracles fame and renown and splendour accrued to Moling; so the Leinstermen gave him headship and honour and counsel, so that it was he who was a high-chief to them all.