up to a certain point, the noble implements wrought by human skill out
of natural materials. And this is another element in all these
stories, as it is in the folk-lore also of other lands. In the tale of
the Sons of Turenn, the stones of the wayside tell to Lugh the story
of the death of his father Kian, and the boat of Mananan, indwelt by a
spirit, flies hither and thither over the seas, obeying the commands,
even the thought, of its steersman. The soul of some famed spears is
so hot for slaughter that, when it is not being used in battle, its
point must stand in a bath of blood or of drowsy herbs, lest it
should slay the host. The swords murmur and hiss and cry out for the
battle; the shield of the hero hums louder and louder, vibrating for
the encouragement of the warrior. Even the wheels of Cuchulain's
chariot roar as they whirl into the fight. This partial life given to
the weapons of war is not specially Celtic. Indeed, it is more common
in Teutonic than in Celtic legend, and it seems probable that it was
owing to the Norsemen that it was established in the Hero tales of
Ireland.

This addition of life, or of some of the powers of life, to tree and
well and boulder-stone, to river and lake and hill, and sword and
spear, is common to all mythologies, but the special character of each
nation or tribe modifies the form of the life-imputing stories. In
Ireland the tree, the stream were not dwelt in by a separate living
being, as in Grecian story; the half-living powers they had were given
to them from without, by the gods, the demons, the fairies; and in the
case of the weapons, the powers they had of act or sound arose from
the impassioned thoughts and fierce emotions of their forger or their
wielder, which, being intense, were magically transferred to them. The
Celtic nature is too fond of reality, too impatient of illusion, to
believe in an actual living spirit in inanimate things. At least, that