noise.

"Be wary," said the king, "there are men within the stable, let us
get at them somehow."

The king followed the tracks of the men, and he found them. Every
one knew Conall, for he was a valued tenant of the king of Erin, and
when the king brought them up out of the holes he said, "Oh, Conall,
is it you that are here?"

"I am, O king, without question, and necessity made me come. I am
under thy pardon, and under thine honour, and under thy grace." He
told how it happened to him, and that he had to get the brown horse
for the king of Erin, or that his sons were to be put to death. "I
knew that I should not get him by asking, and I was going to steal
him."

"Yes, Conall, it is well enough, but come in," said the king. He
desired his look-out men to set a watch on the sons of Conall, and
to give them meat. And a double watch was set that night on the sons
of Conall.

"Now, O Conall," said the king, "were you ever in a harder place
than to be seeing your lot of sons hanged tomorrow? But you set it
to my goodness and to my grace, and say that it was necessity
brought it on you, so I must not hang you. Tell me any case in which
you were as hard as this, and if you tell that, you shall get the
soul of your youngest son."

"I will tell a case as hard in which I was," said Conall. "I was