Clontarf, and the wars of the O'Briens with the Normans, than in
the tale in which is described the foundation of Emain Macha by
Kimbay. Exact-thinking, scientific France has not hesitated to
paint the battles of Louis XIV. with similar hues; and England,
though by no means fertile in angelic interpositions, delights to
adorn the barren tracts of her more popular histories with
apocryphal anecdotes.

How then should this heroic literature of Ireland be treated in
connection with the history of the country? The true method would
certainly be to print it exactly as it is without excision or
condensation. Immense it is, and immense it must remain. No men
living, and no men to live, will ever so exhaust the meaning of any
single tale as to render its publication unnecessary for the study
of others. The order adopted should be that which the bards
themselves deter mined, any other would be premature, and I think
no other will ever take its place. At the commencement should stand
the passage from the Book of Invasions, describing the occupation
of the isle by Queen Keasair and her companions, and along with it
every discoverable tale or poem dealing with this event and those
characters. After that, all that remains of the cycle of which
Partholan was the protagonist. Thirdly, all that relates to Nemeth
and his sons, their wars with curt Kical the bow-legged, and all
that relates to the Fomoroh of the Nemedian epoch, then first
moving dimly in the forefront of our history. After that, the great
Fir-bolgic cycle, a cycle janus-faced, looking on one side to the
mythological period and the wars of the gods, and on the other, to
the heroic, and more particularly to the Ultonian cycle. In the
next place, the immense mass of bardic literature which treats of
the Irish gods who, having conquered the Fir-bolgs, like the Greek