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"On the morning of Sunday," Dermod exploded. The cleric nodded with savage emphasis. "On the morning of this self-same and instant sacred day." "Tell on," said the king wrathfully. But terror gripped with sudden fingers at Becfola's heart. "Do not tell horrid stories on the Sunday," she pleaded. "No good can come to any one from such a tale." "Nay, this must be told, sweet lady," said the king.
Dermod walked straight up to Harry Feversham, looking for once in a way what he was, a very old man, and stood there staring into Feversham's face with a muddled and bewildered expression. Twice he opened his mouth to speak, but no words came. In the end he turned to the table and lit his candle and Harry Feversham's.
The first who attended to him was Richard de Clare, son of the Earl of Pembroke, and surnamed Strongbow a bold, adventurous man, ruined by his extravagance, and kept at a distance by the King on account of his ambition. To him Dermod offered the hand of his daughter Eva, and the succession of Leinster, provided he would recover for him the kingdom.
"Dermod is old, his estates are going to ruin, and there are other things. You know, Jack?" The direct appeal he had to repeat, and even then Durrance answered it absently: "Yes, I know," and he added, like one quoting a catch-word. "If you want any whiskey, rap twice on the floor with your foot. The servants understand." "Precisely," said Feversham.
"Good, my Treasure," Dermod answered, "our minds are astonished when we see a woman able to drive a cow to pasture, for it has always seemed to us that they do not drive well." Crimthann absorbed instruction like a sponge and digested it as rapidly. "I think that is justly said," he agreed. "But," Dermod continued, "when we see a woman driving a chariot of two horses, then we are amazed indeed."
He was married to the daughter of Dermod McMurrough, chief of Leinster, acknowledged Righ Dahma, that is, successor to the crown, while the Irish, accustomed for ages to admire valor and bow submissively to the law of conquest, admitted the claim. The English adventurer they looked upon as one of themselves by marriage.
"I am sorry," replied Dermod, wistfully, "though I have no reason for sorrow. He struck us a cruel blow, Colonel Durrance. I should have nothing but curses for him in my mouth and my heart. A black-throated coward my reason calls him, and yet I would be very glad to hear how the world goes with him. You were his friend. But you do not know?"
As a fairish record of these successful efforts, I would recommend to the reader's notice a very well-conditioned and truly learned-looking folio volume, called "The General History of Ireland, collected by the learned Jeffrey Keating, D.D., faithfully translated from the original Irish Language, with many curious Amendments taken from the Psalters of Tara and Cashel, with other authentic Records, by Dermod O'Connor, Antiquary to the Kingdom of Ireland."
They first besieged Wexford, and took it; then attacked the Prince of Ossory, and gained a great victory; after which they had full opportunity of seeing of what a savage they had undertaken the defence, for Dermod mangled with his teeth the face of his chief foe among the slain, to gratify his revenge.
Everybody came, for a banquet given by Fionn was not a thing to be missed. There was Goll mor mac Morna and his people; Fionn's son Oisi'n and his grandson Oscar. There was Dermod of the Gay Face, Caelte mac Ronan but indeed there were too many to be told of, for all the pillars of war and battle-torches of the Gael were there. The banquet began.
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