“There is one youth only amongst the Red Branch,” said Levarcam, “who answers to that description, namely Naysi, the son of Usna, who is the battle-prop of the Ultonians and the clear-shining torch of their valour, and what god or druid or power hath set that vision before thy mind, I cannot tell.”

“Would that I could see him with eyes and have speech with him,” answered the girl.  “If but once he smiled upon me and I heard the sweet words flow from his mouth which is beyond price, then gladly would I die!”

“Thou shall both see him and have speech with him, O best, sweetest, dearest, and loveliest of all maidens.  Truly I will bring him to thee and thee to him, for there is with me power beyond the wont of women.”

Now Levarcam was a mighty Druidess amongst the Ultonians.  So the lady in whom they trusted forgot the ancient prophecies and the stern commands of the Red Branch and of their King, owing to the great love which she bore to the maiden and the great compassion which grew upon her day by day, as she observed the life of the solitary girl and thought of the cruel law to which all her youth and beauty and wealth of sweet love beyond all the jewels of the world were thus barbarously sacrificed by the Ultonians in obedience to soothsayers and Druids.

Naysi, son of Usna, once in a hunting became separated from his companions.  He wandered far in that forest, seeking some one who should direct him upon his way.  Oftentimes he raised his voice, but there was no answer.  Such were his beauty, his grace, and his stature, that he seemed more like a god than a man, and such another as Angus Ogue, son of Dagda, [Footnote:  Angus Ogue was the god of youth and beauty, son of the Dagda who seems to have been the genius of earth and its fertility or perhaps the Zeus of our Gaelic mythology.] whose fairy palace is on the margin of the Boyne.  His head and his feet were bare.  His short hunting-cloak was dark-red with flowery devices along the edge.  On his breast he wore a brooch of gold bronze; carbuncles and precious stones were set in the bronze, and it was carved all over with many spiral devices.  His shirt below the mantle was coloured like the tassels of the willow trees.  His hair was fastened behind with a clasp and an apple of red gold, and that apple lay below the blades of his ample shoulders.  In one hand he bore a broken leash of red bronze, and in the other two hunting spears with blades of flashing findruiney and the hafts were long, slender, and shining.  By his thigh hung a short sword in a sheath of red yew and beside it the polished and nigh transparent horn of the Urus, suspended in a baldrick of knitted thread of bronze.  The grass stood erect from the pressure of his light feet.  His manly face had not yet known the razor; only the first soft down of budding manhood was seen there.  His countenance was pure and joyous with bright beaming eyes, and his complexion red and white and of a brilliancy beyond words.  In his heart was no guile, only indomitable valour and truth and loyalty and sweet affection.  He had never known woman save in the way of courtesy.  The very trees and rocks and stones seemed to watch him as he passed.