Excerpt from the foreword:
There is an old tale told in Ireland of a loveable and bright and handsome youth named Donn-bo, who was the best singer of ” songs of idleness,” and the best teller of ” King-stories” in the world. He could tell a tale of each King who reigned at Tara from the Tale of the Destruction of Dind Righ, when Cobthach Coel- breg was killed, down to the Kings who reigned in his own time. One night before a battle, the warriors said : ” Make minstrelsy for us, O Donn-b6.” But Donn-b6 said: ” No word at all will come on my lips to-night; there- fore, for this night let the King-buffoon of Ireland amuse you. But to-morrow at this hour, in whatever place they and I shall be, I will make minstrelsy for the fighting-men.” For the warriors had said that unless Donn-b6 went with them on that hosting, not one of them would go. On the evening of the morrow Donn-b6 lay dead, his fair young body stretched across the body of the King of Erin, for he had died in defending his chief. But his head had rolled away and lay amongst a wisp of growing rushes by the water-side.
This book is available in:
