"And what reward," he said, "will ye that I make you for the saving of the kingdom of Sorca ?" "Thou wert in my service awhile," said Finn, "and I mind not that I paid thee any wage for it.

Let that service even go against this, and so we are quits." "Nay, then," cried Conan the Bald, "but what shall I have for my ride on the mare of the Gilla Dacar ?" "What wilt thou have ?" said the King of Sorca.
"This," said Conan, "and nothing else will I accept.

Let fourteen of the fairest women of the land of Sorca be put on that same mare, and thy wife, O King, clinging to its tail, and let them be thus haled across the sea until they come to Corcaguiny in the land of Erinn.

I will have none of thy gold and silver, but the indignity that has been put upon me doth demand an honourable satisfaction." Then the King of Sorca smiled, and he said, "Behold thy men, Finn." [Illustration: "'Follow me now to the Hill of Allen'"] Finn turned his head to look round, and as he did so the plain and the encampment of the Fairy Host vanished from his sight, and he saw himself standing on the shingly strand of a little bay, with rocky heights to right and left, crowned with yellow whin bushes whose perfume mingled with the salt sea wind.

It was the spot where he had seen the Gilla Dacar and his mare take water on the coast of Kerry.
Finn stared over the sea, to discover, if he might, by what means he had come thither, but nothing could he see there save the sunlit water, and nothing hear but what seemed a low laughter from the twinkling ripples that broke at his feet.