Irish Druids And Old Irish Religions

agreeable plain, in order to obtain help in a contest with other deities. He disappeared in a lake, and fifty warriors dived in after him. War was, with the Irish, as with other people of German or Norse descent, a most pleasant way of beguiling time in the world beyond. Even Cuchulainn was induced to undertake his perilous voyage, that he might gain a goddess for a wife, by promising to help her family in a fight.

There they heard noble and melodious music of the gods, travelled from realm to realm, drinking from crystal cups, and entertaining themselves with their beloved. No wonder that a hero returned thence declared to an Irish sovereign that not for his kingdom would he relinquish a single night with the gods.

In Irish so-called history, we read of the emigrations of Nemed, son of Agnomen, from Mag more, the great plain, or Trag mâr, the great coast, or Mag meld, agreeable plain. Nennius supposed this was Spain. It was, however, the country from which all came, and to which at death all must return. In the legend of Tuân mac Cairill, says M. Jubainville, Nemed's four thousand and thirty men, and four thousand and thirty women, voyaged from The Great Plain, and all died; i. e. went there again.

The same French writer remarked how the relations which had existed here were continued there, even to the repayment of debts contracted on earth. "The life of the Dead," said he, "in the mysterious region beyond the sea is for each a second edition, so to speak--of the life led by the departed on this side of the ocean."

O'Beirne Crowe, treating of the Book of Leinster, and other MSS., says--"The point of departure from this world, as well as the entrance to the next, whether for pain, or bliss, or business, was always in the West, and the route westwards. For the ancient Irish beliefs on this point we can

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