And another chain of the seven fell from
the girdle of the captive maiden.
Thus for seven days went on the combat, and Oisin had seven nights of
healing and rest, with the tenderness and beauty of Niam about his
couch; and on the seventh day the maiden was free, and her folk
brought her away, rejoicing, with banners and with music that made a
brightness for a while in that forlorn and evil place.
But Oisin's heart was high with pride and victory, and a longing
uprose in his heart with a rush like a springtide for the days when
some great deed had been done among the Fianna, and the victors were
hailed and lauded by the home-folk in the Dun of Allen, men and women
leaving their toil or their pleasure to crowd round the heroes, and to
question again and again, and to learn each thing that had passed; and
the bards noting all to weave it into a glorious tale for after days;
and more than all the smile and the look of Finn as he learned how his
children had borne themselves in the face of death. And so Oisin said
to Niam, "Let me, for a short while, return to the land of Erinn, that
I may see there my friends and kin and tell them of the glory and joy
that are mine in the Land of Youth." But Niam wept and laid her white
arms about his neck, entreating him to think no more of the sad world
where all men live and move under a canopy of death, and where summer
is slain by winter, and youth by old age, and where love itself, if it
die not by falsehood and wrong, perishes many a time of too complete
a joy.
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