

#Cuchulain's Fight with the Sea


<!-- // 
 function footNote(link) {
 openpopup = window.open(link,"openpopup","width=512,height=128,left=256,top=256,resizable=no,scrollbars=1,menubar=1,statusbar=0,toolbar=0");
}
// -->



#### Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition


### Background details and bibliographic information


Cuchulain's Fight with the Sea
==============================


Author: William Butler Yeats
----------------------------


### File Description

Electronic edition compiled and proof-read by Beatrix Färber, Rebecca Daly

Funded by School of History, University College, Cork 1. First draft.Extent of text: 1380 words#### Publication


CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts: a project of University College, Cork  
College Road, Cork, Ireland—http://www.ucc.ie/celt

 (2014) Distributed by CELT online at University College, Cork, Ireland.  
Text ID Number: E890001-004Availability [RESTRICTED] 
The works by W. B. Yeats are in the public domain. This electronic text is available with prior consent of the CELT programme for purposes of private or academic research and teaching.


#### Notes

First published 11 June 1892, in the journal *United Ireland* (A. Norman Jeffares, p. 28).

#### Sources


**Literature (a small selection)**2. Jeremiah Curtin, Myths and Folk-lore in Ireland (Boston 1890).
3. W. B. Yeats, The Rose (1893).
4. W. B. Yeats, Poems (London 1895).
5. W. B. Yeats, The Autobiography of William Butler Yeats, consisting of Reveries over childhood and youth, The trembling of the veil, and Dramatis personae (New York 1938).
6. Richard Ellmann, Yeats: The Man and the Masks. Corrected edition with a new preface (Oxford 1979). [First published New York 1948; reprinted London 1961.]
7. Peter Allt and Russell K. Alspach, The Variorum Edition of the Poems of W.B. Yeats (New York: Macmillan 1957).
8. W. B. Yeats, Essays and Introductions (New York: Macmillan 1961).
9. W. B. Yeats, Explorations: selected by Mrs W. B. Yeats (London/New York: Macmillan 1962).
10. Richard Ellmann, The Identity of Yeats (New York 1964).
11. A. Norman Jeffares, A New Commentary on the Poems of W.B. Yeats (Stanford 1984).
12. Helen Vendler, Our Secret Discipline: Yeats and Lyric Form (Oxford/New York 2007).
13. A general bibliography is available online at the official web site of the Nobel Prize. See: http://nobelprize.org/nobel\_prizes/literature/laureates/1923/yeats-bibl.html
**The edition used in the digital edition**2. William Butler Yeats Cuchulain's Fight with the Sea in , Ed. Richard J. Finneran The Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats. Macmillan Press, London, (1991) pages 33–36

### Encoding


#### Project Description


CELT: Corpus of Electronic Texts


#### Sampling Declaration


The whole poem.


#### Editorial Declaration


##### Correction


The text has been proof-read twice.


##### Normalization


The electronic text represents the edited text.


##### Hyphenation


The editorial practice of the hard-copy editor has been retained.


##### Segmentation


div0= the individual poem, stanzas are marked lg.


##### Interpretation


Names of persons (given names), and places are not tagged. Terms for cultural and social roles are not tagged.


### Profile Description


Created: (1892) #### Use of language


##### Language: [EN] The poem is in English.


### Revision History


* (2014-03-27) Beatrix Färber (ed.)

* File parsed and validated; SGML and HTML files created.
* (2014-03-27) Beatrix Färber (ed.)

* File proofed; structural markup applied according to CELT practice; TEI header created with bibliographical detail.
* (1996) Donnchadh Ó Corráin (data capture)

* Text captured




---


#### Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition: E890001-004


### Cuchulain's Fight with the Sea: Author: William Butler Yeats




---

p.33


1. A man came slowly from the setting sun, 
  
To Emer, raddling raiment in her dun, 
  
And said, 'I am that swineherd whom you bid 
  
Go watch the road between the wood and tide, 
  
But now I have no need to watch it more.' 
  
Then Emer cast the web upon the floor, 
  
And raising arms all raddled with the dye, 
  
Parted her lips with a loud sudden cry. 
  
That swineherd stared upon her face and said, 
  
'No man alive, no man among the dead, 
  
Has won the gold his cars of battle bring.' 
  
'But if your master comes home triumphing 
  
Why must you blench and shake from foot to crown?' 
  
Thereon he shook the more and cast him down 
  
Upon the web-heaped floor, and cried his word: 
  
'With him is one sweet-throated like a bird.' 


---

p.34


'You dare me to my face,' and thereupon 
  
She smote with raddled fist, and where her son 
  
Herded the cattle came with stumbling feet, 
  
And cried with angry voice, 'It is not meet 
  
To idle life away, a common herd.' 
  
'I have long waited, mother, for that word: 
  
But wherefore now?' 
  
 'There is a man to die; 
  
You have the heaviest arm under the sky.' 
  
'Whether under its daylight or its stars 
  
My father stands amid his battle-cars.' 
  
'But you have grown to be the taller man.' 
  
'Yet somewhere under starlight or the sun 
  
My father stands.' 
  
' Aged, worn out with wars 
  
On foot, on horseback or in battle-cars.' 
  
'I only ask what way my journey lies, 
  
For He who made you bitter made you wise.' 
  
'The Red Branch camp in a great company 
  
Between wood's rim and the horses of the sea. 
  
Go there, and light a camp-fire at wood's rim; 
  
But tell your name and lineage to him 
  
Whose blade compels, and wait till they have found 
  
Some feasting man that the same oath has bound.' 
  
Among those feasting men Cuchulain dwelt, 
  
And his young sweetheart close beside him knelt, 
  
Stared on the mournful wonder of his eyes, 
  
Even as spring upon the ancient skies, 
  
And pondered on the glory of his days; 
  
And all around the harp-string told his praise, 
  
And Conchubar, the Red Branch king of kings, 
  
With his own fingers touched the brazen strings. 


---

p.35


  
At last Cuchulain spake, 'Some man has made 
  
His evening fire amid the leafy shade. 
  
I have often heard him singing to and fro, 
  
I have often heard the sweet sound of his bow. 
  
Seek out what man he is.' 
  
 One went and came. 
  
'He bade me let all know he gives his name 
  
At the sword-point, and waits till we have found 
  
Some feasting man that the same oath has bound.' 
  
Cuchulain cried, 'I am the only man 
  
Of all this host so bound from childhood on. 
  
After short fighting in the leafy shade, 
  
He spake to the young man, 'Is there no maid 
  
Who loves you, no white arms to wrap you round, 
  
Or do you long for the dim sleepy ground, 
  
That you have come and dared me to my face?' 
  
'The dooms of men are in God's hidden place,' 
  
'Your head a while seemed like a woman's head 
  
That I loved once.' 
  
 Again the fighting sped, 
  
But now the war-rage in Cuchulain woke, 
  
And through that new blade's guard the old blade broke, 
  
And pierced him. 
  
 'Speak before your breath is done.' 
  
'Cuchulain I, mighty Cuchulain's son.' 
  
'I put you from your pain. I can no more.' 
  
While day its burden on to evening bore, 
  
With head bowed on his knees Cuchulain stayed; 
  
Then Conchubar sent that sweet-throated maid, 
  
And she, to win him, his grey hair caressed; 
  
In vain her arms, in vain her soft white breast. 
  
Then Conchubar, the subtlest of all men, 
  
Ranking his Druids round him ten by ten, 


---

p.36


Spake thus: 'Cuchulain will dwell there and brood 
  
For three days more in dreadful quietude, 
  
And then arise, and raving slay us all. 
  
Chaunt in his ear delusions magical, 
  
That he may fight the horses of the sea.' 
  
The Druids took them to their mystery, 
  
And chaunted for three days. 
  
 Cuchulain stirred, 
  
Stared on the horses of the sea, and heard 
  
The cars of battle and his own name cried; 
  
And fought with the invulnerable tide.










