Note 14 — Chapter XXIX

"There were many among the Fenians," says Keating, "who were more remarkable for their personal prowess, their valour, and their corporeal stature than Finn. The reason why he was made king of the Fiann, and set over the warriors, was simply because his father and grandfather had held that position before him. Another reason also why he had been made king of the Fiann was because he excelled his contemporaries in intellect and learning, in wisdom and in subtlety, and in experience and hardihood in battlefields. It was for these qualities that he was made king of the Fiann, and not for his personal prowess or for the great size or strength of his body."

"Warrior better than Finn," says an old vellum MS. in the British Museum, "never struck his hand into chiefs, inasmuch as for service he was a soldier, a hospitaller for hospitality, and in heroism a hero. In fighting functions he was a fighting man, and in strength a champion worthy of a king, so that ever since and from that until this, it is with Finn that every such is co-ordinated."

And in another place the same vellum says, "A good man verily was he who had those Fianna, for he was the seventh king ruling Ireland, that is to say, there were five kings of the provinces, and the King of Ireland, he being himself the seventh conjointly with the King of all Ireland."

In a MS. saga in my own possession, called "The Pursuit of Sadhbh (Sive)," there is an amusing account of the truculence of the Fenians about their exclusive right of hunting, and the way they terrorised the people they were quartered on, but I have not space for this extract.