occur, although a king was his rival and his master. It may be
that his mother was watching the match and that he could not but
exhibit his skill before her. He committed the enormity of
winning seven games in succession from the king himself! ! !

It is seldom indeed that a subject can beat a king at chess, and
this monarch was properly amazed.

"Who are you at all?" he cried, starting back from the chessboard
and staring on Fionn.

"I am the son of a countryman of the Luigne of Tara," said Fionn.

He may have blushed as he said it, for the king, possibly for the
first time, was really looking at him, and was looking back
through twenty years of time as he did so. The observation of a
king is faultless--it is proved a thousand times over in the
tales, and this king's equipment was as royal as the next.

"You are no such son," said the indignant monarch, "but you are
the son that Muirne my wife bore to Uall mac Balscne."

And at that Fionn had no more to say; but his eyes may have flown
to his mother and stayed there.

"You cannot remain here," his step-father continued. "I do not
want you killed under my protection," he explained, or
complained.

Perhaps it was on Fionn's account he dreaded the sons of Morna,