By the Barrow River (e-book) (used book) | Edmund Leamy | bookbook.eu

Description

"There are some who see and cannot hear, and some who hear and do not see, and some who neither see nor hear, and you are one of these last, Dermod, son of Carroll." The speaker was a man of about forty years, a little above the medium height, of well-knit frame, of a sanguine complexion. His bushy brows, shaded pensive eyes, that one would look for in a poet or a dreamer rather than in a soldier, yet a soldier, Cathal, son of Rory, was, and one of the guards of Cobhthach Cael, the usurper, who reigned over Leinster; it was in the guard-room in the outer wall of the Fortress of Dun Righ that he addressed these words to one of his companions, a stripling of twenty, but of gallant bearing. "But what did you see or hear, O Cathal?" said another of the guards, who numbered altogether some six or seven. "They say of you, Cathal, that the wise woman of the Sidhe came to you the night you were born and touched your eyes and ears, and that you can see and hear what and when others cannot see or hear." "What matters it what I see or hear? What matters it what is seen or heard, Domhnall, son of Eochy, when the king is blind and deaf, and those about him also?" answered Cathal.