The version in the Yellow Book is sometimes hard to read, which seems to be the reason why Windisch prefers to translate the younger authority, but though in some places the Egerton version is the fuller, the Yellow Book version (Y.B.L.) often adds passages, some of which Windisch has given in notes; some he has left untranslated.  In the following prose version as much of Y.B.L. as adds anything to the Egerton text has been translated, with marks of interrogation where the attempted rendering is not certain:  variants from the text adopted are placed below the prose version as footnotes.  The insertions from Y.B.L. are indicated by brackets; but no note is taken of cases where the Egerton version is fuller than Y.B.L.

The opening of the story (the first five lines in the verse rendering) is in the eleventh century Book of the Dun Cow:  the fragment agrees closely with the two later texts, differing in fact from Y.B.L. in one word only.  All three texts are given in the original by Windisch.

The story is simple and straightforward, but is a good example of fairy vengeance, the description of the appearance of the troop recalls similar descriptions in the Tain bo Fraich, and in the Courtship of Ferb.  The tale is further noticeable from its connection with the province of Munster:  most of the heroic tales are connected with the other three provinces only.  Orlam, the hero of the end of the tale, was one of Cuchulain’s earliest victims in the Tain bo Cualgne.

THE RAID FOR DARTAID’S CATTLE

FROM THE EGERTON MS. 1782 (EARLY FIFTEENTH-CENTURY), AND THE YELLOW BOOK OF LECAN (FOURTEENTH-CENTURY)

Eocho Bec,[FN#43] the son of Corpre, reigning in the land of
Clew,[FN#44]
Dwelt in Coolny’s[FN#45] fort; and fostered sons of princes not a few: 
Forty kine who grazed his pastures gave him milk to rear his wards;
Royal blood his charges boasted, sprung from Munster’s noblest lords. 
Maev and Ailill sought to meet him:  heralds calling him they sent: 
“Seven days hence I come” said Eocho; and the heralds from him went. 
Now, as Eocho lay in slumber, in the night a vision came;
By a youthful squire attended, rose to view a fairy dame: 
“Welcome be my greeting to you!” said the king:  “Canst thou discern
Who we are?” the fairy answered, “how didst thou our fashion learn?”
“Surely,” said the king, “aforetime near to me hath been thy place!”
“Very near thee have we hovered, yet thou hast not seen my face.” 
“Where do ye abide?” said Eocho.  “Yonder dwell we, with the Shee:[FN#46]
“In the Fairy Mound of Coolny!” “Wherefore come ye hereto me?”
“We have come,” she said, “a counsel as a gift to thee to bring!”
“Speak! and tell me of the counsel ye have brought me,” said the king. 
“Noble gifts,” she said, “we offer that renown for thee shall gain
When in foreign lands thou ridest; worship in thine