Note 10 — Chapter XIX

See Text 1. paragraph 123 of Thurneysen's "Mittelirische Verslehren" for three versions of this curious poem, printed side by side from the Books of Leinster and Ballymote, and a MS. in the Bodleian. The old Irish tract for the instruction of poets gives it as an example of what it calls Cetal do chendaib. I have followed D'Arbois de Jubainville's interpretation of it. He sees in it a pantheistic spirit, but Dr. Sigerson has proved, I think quite conclusively, that it is liable to a different interpretation, a panegyric upon the bard's own prowess, couched in enigmatic metaphor. (See "Bards of the Gael and Gaul," p. 379.)