The Huntsman’s Son

A long, long time ago a huntsman lived with his wife and son in a little hut at the edge of a great forest. From his earliest years the boy, Fergus, hunted in the forest with his father, and he grew up strong and nimble, as sure-footed and swift as a deer and as free and fearless as the wind. He was tall and handsome and as supple as a mountain ash; his lips were as red as its berries, his eyes as blue as the spring sky, and his hair fell over his shoulders like a shower of gold. His heart was as light as a bird’s, and no bird loved green woods and swaying branches more.

He had lived all his life in the forest hut and never wished to leave it, until one winter night a wandering minstrel asked for shelter and paid for his lodging with songs of love and battle. From that night on Fergus longed for a different life. The music of the hounds and the cries of the huntsmen no longer gave him joy. He yearned for battle, the clash of shields and the shouts of fighting warriors, and he spent every spare hour practising the harp and learning to use weapons, for the warriors Fergus admired in these songs combined fighting with music.

So spring, summer and autumn passed. When winter came round, there was a stormy night when thunder rolled through the forest and lightning struck the huge oaks, hurling them to the ground. Fergus lay awake wondering what the future held for him, while lightning played round the hut and every so often lit up the room. After a peal louder than any before it, he heard three loud knocks at the door and called out to his parents.

“Then open it at once,” said his father. “This is no night to leave a poor wanderer outside.”

Fergus opened the door, and a flash of lightning showed a little wizened old man on the doorstep with a small harp under his arm. “Come in, and welcome,” said Fergus.

“It is a wild night, neighbours,” said the little man.

“A wild night indeed,” said the huntsman and his wife, who had got up and dressed, “and we are sorry we have no better shelter or food to offer you, but you are welcome to the best we have.”

“A king can do no more than his best,” said the little man.

The huntsman’s wife lit the fire, and soon the pine logs were blazing and the hut was bright and warm. She brought out a wooden cup of milk and a barley cake. “You must be hungry, sir.”

“Hungry I am, but I wouldn’t ask for better food than this if I were in the king’s palace.”

The huntsman offered to make him a bed of fresh rushes, but the little man said, “Don’t trouble yourself. When I’ve had my supper, I’ll lie here by the fire, if you don’t mind, and sleep like a top till morning. Go back to bed now and leave me to myself, and maybe some day, when you least expect it, I’ll do you a good turn for your kindness to a poor traveller.”

“Oh, it’s no kindness at all,” said the huntsman’s wife. “It would be a strange thing if an Irish cabin refused shelter on a wild night like this. Good night, and we hope you sleep well.”

“Good night,” said the little man, “and may you and yours never taste sorrow to the end of your days.”

About an hour later a loud clap of thunder woke Fergus, and before it died away there were three knocks at the door. He woke his parents. “Get up at once,” said his mother. “This is no night to keep a stranger outside.” Fergus opened the door, and the lightning showed a little old woman with a weaving shuttle in her hand. “Come in, and welcome,” he said.

“Blessings on those who welcome a wanderer on a night like this,” said the old woman.

“And who wouldn’t?” said the huntsman’s wife, bringing her a cup of milk and a barley cake. “We are only sorry we have nothing better.”

“Enough is as good as a feast,” said the little woman. She would not let them shake down rushes for her, but sent them back to bed, ate her supper and lay down by the fire, and was soon fast asleep.

An hour after that another clap of thunder startled Fergus, and there were three more knocks. He woke his parents, but this time he did not wait to be told. He opened the door, and the lightning showed a small, shaggy, wild-looking horse standing outside, and Fergus knew it was the Pooka, the wild horse of the mountains. Bold as he was, his heart beat fast at the sight of the fire coming from the Pooka’s nostrils. But he put his fear aside and cried, “Come in, and welcome.”

“Welcome you are,” said the huntsman, “and we are sorry we have no better shelter or food to give you.”

“I couldn’t wish for a better welcome,” said the Pooka, and he went over to the fire and sat down on his haunches.

“Maybe you would like a bit of this, Master Pooka,” said the huntsman’s wife, offering him a barley cake.

“I never tasted anything sweeter in my life,” said the Pooka, crunching it. “And now, if you can give me a sup of milk, I’ll want for nothing.” When he had drunk it, he sent them all to bed and curled up by the fire, and soon everyone in the hut was fast asleep.

In the morning the storm was over and the sun was shining through the windows. Fergus got up at the lark’s first song, and nobody was ever more surprised than he was to find no sign of the little old man, the little old woman or the wild horse of the mountains. His parents were just as surprised, and they would have thought they had dreamed it all if it had not been for the empty cups round the fire and the crumbs of barley bread.

After that Fergus wanted a new life more than ever, and at last he told his parents he had made up his mind to seek his fortune as a soldier. He would go to the king’s palace and try to join the ranks of the Feni. About a week later he said goodbye, took his parents’ blessing and set out on the road to the palace of the High King of Ireland.

He arrived just when the great captain of the Fenian host was filling up battalions that had been thinned in recent battle. Fergus’s manly figure, gallant bearing and handsome face were all in his favour, but before the Feni would take him, he had to prove that he could play the harp like a bard, hold his own with staff and shield against nine Fenian warriors, and run through the tangled forest with his hair braided without loosening a single hair, jumping over branches as high as his head and stooping under branches as low as his knee, so lightly that not a rotten twig snapped under his feet. Thanks to the minstrel who had taught him the harp, his own brave heart and his forest upbringing, he passed every test. He joined the second battalion of the Feni, and before long he was its bravest and ablest champion.

At that time the High King’s niece, Princess Maureen, was staying with the king and queen in their palace at Tara. She was the loveliest lady in the land, and as proud as she was beautiful. The princes and chiefs of Ireland asked for her hand in vain. Kings came to woo her from Scotland and Spain and the far-off isles of Greece, and Vikings came from the northern lands in stately ships with brass prows, their oarsmen tearing white foam from the green sea. But she had vowed to marry no one but a battle champion who could beat the High King’s chief bard at music, outrace the white steed of the plains in the great race of Tara, and give her for a wedding dress a robe of all the colours of the rainbow, woven so fine that when folded it would fit in the palm of her small white hand. No suitor could meet those three conditions, and it seemed that the loveliest lady in the land would go to her grave unmarried.

One day, when the Fenian battalions were playing a hurling match, Fergus saw the princess watching from her sunny bower, and he fell head over heels in love with her. He thought of her night and day, and believing his love was hopeless, he often wished he had never left his forest home.

The great fair of Tara was coming, and all the Feni were busy from morning till night practising feats of arms and games for the contests. Knowing the princess would be there, Fergus made up his mind to do his best to win the prizes before the ladies’ eyes. The fair began on the first of August, but for a whole week before, the five great roads of Ireland were crowded: princes and warriors on horseback, champions in chariots, harpers by the hundred, smiths with gleaming spears and shields and harness, men and boys leading racehorses, jewellers with golden drinking horns, brooches and gems and silver and gold chessboards, dyers with bright cloth, jugglers, drovers with cattle, shepherds with sheep, huntsmen with game, fishermen with salmon and speckled trout, and crowds of country people on horseback and on foot, all making for the meeting place by the mound that had been raised a thousand years before over the grave of the great queen.

On the first day the High King set out from the palace with the four kings of Ireland, and the queen and the ladies of the court followed in sparkling chariots. The princess rode with the high queen under an awning made of birds’ wings to keep off the sun, and the court ladies came after under awnings of purple and yellow silk, followed by the brehons, who were the great judges, the chief bards of Tara, and the druids crowned with oak leaves and carrying wands of divination. The royal party sat in enclosures right against the great mound, the High King among the four kings, all in golden helmets, and the queen, the princess and the court ladies in the enclosure beside them. Stands for the nobles and benches for the people completed a great circle, and in the green space in the middle, where everyone could see and hear, the contests were held. At the king’s signal the heralds rode round the circle, struck their shields three times with their swords and proclaimed the peace of the fair, and all the bards sang to their harps in honour of the mighty dead. Then the heralds struck their shields, and the contests began.

First came the spear-throwing between the champions of the seven battalions of the Feni. When the seven took their places in front of the royal enclosure, everyone, even the proud princess, was struck by the manly beauty of Fergus. At the stroke of the shields, seven spears flashed through the air and stuck in the ground, shafts up, and two stood side by side ahead of the rest: one was Fergus’s, the other belonged to the great chief Oscar. So the prize lay between Oscar and Fergus. When they stood before the king with their spears raised, every heart was pounding. The heralds struck their shields, out flew the spears faster than lightning, and when Fergus’s spear was seen quivering in the ground a full length ahead of Oscar’s, a wild cheer shook the air that was heard far beyond the plains of Tara. But as Fergus went to receive the prize from the High King, he thought more of the princess’s lovely glance than of the prize or the cheering. And Princess Maureen was almost sorry for her vow, for the Fenian champion’s good looks had touched her heart.

That night, while the Fenian warriors feasted in their camps, Fergus, victor though he was, felt low and sad. He slipped away from his companions to his native forest, for when the heart is sick and sore, there is balm in the forest for its pain. As he lay under the spreading branches, watching the stars glint through the leaves and listening to the drowsy murmur of the water, a strange peace came over him. But in the camp and among the vast crowd on the plains of Tara, everyone was chattering about the next day’s contest, which would decide whether the chief bard of Ireland could hold his own against all comers, for it was rumoured that a great Skald had come from the northern lands to challenge him.

Fergus woke at the first birdsong. He knew he ought to go back and watch the contest that might decide whether the princess would become someone else’s bride, but his love and his despair weighed on him so heavily that he lay as still as a broken reed. Then a shadow fell across his eyes, and he looked up gloomily to see the little wizened old man who had sheltered in his father’s hut on the night of the storm.

“This is a fine place for a battle champion to be,” said the little man, “on the day that is to decide who wins the princess.”

“What does it matter to me who wins her, since I cannot?” said Fergus.

“I told you, the night you opened the door to me, that the time might come when I could do a good turn for you and yours. That time has come. Take this harp, and my luck go with you, and in the contest of the bards today you’ll reap the reward of the kindness you showed a poor old traveller in the midnight storm.” He handed Fergus his harp and vanished as swiftly as the wind passing through the leaves. Fergus hid the harp under his silk cloak and was back in camp before his comrades were awake.

When the hour came, the chief bard of Ireland climbed the mound to a roar of cheers, but at the first note of his harp, a silence like night fell on the vast crowd. As his fingers moved softly over the strings, every heart grew quiet and restful, and the lark singing overhead hung silent and still in the air. Then he changed key, and a gentle sorrow filled the listeners until tears came to their eyes. Then with a bolder hand he swept the strings, and every heart was moved to joy and laughter, and eyes that had been wet sparkled like water dancing in the sun. When the last notes faded, a cheer went up as loud as a storm in the glen when the thunder is rolling on the mountaintops.

Next the Skald from the northern lands took his place, welcomed by a hundred thousand voices. He touched his harp, and in the silence everyone heard the mermaid’s song and through it the ripple of summer water on a pebbly beach. Then came the steady sweep of countless oars, the swish of water round the prows of racing ships, the sailors’ voices and the cry of seabirds; and then the mirth of the banquet hall, the clash of drinking horns and songs of battle. When he finished, a shout went up as loud as winter waves breaking on the shore, and nobody knew whom to declare the winner, the chief bard of Ireland or the Skald of the north.

In the middle of the argument came the cry that another competitor had climbed the mound, and there, in view of everyone, stood Fergus, the huntsman’s son. All eyes were on him, but none so eagerly as the princess’s. He touched the harp gently, and there stole out a sound as low and soft as a summer breeze through the trees. Then came the rustle of birds in the branches, the drowsy murmur of streams hidden deep in the woods, and all the fairy echoes that whisper when the leaves hang still in the noonday heat; then notes as cool and soft as summer rain falling on parched grass; then the blackbird’s song, as clear as it sounds in the long, quiet evening; and then, in one sweet, merry burst, all the countless voices that greet the break of day. The lark singing and soaring above him sank down, silent and still, onto his shoulder, and birds came flocking out of all the woods and made a fluttering canopy over his head.

When he stopped playing, no shout went up, for the music held every heart spellbound long after the strings were still. When he came down from the mound, everyone knew there was no need to name the winner, and all were glad that the handsome Fenian champion had kept the bards of Ireland first. Only the princess was sad, and she wished more than ever that she had never made her hateful vow.

Fergus took no interest in the other contests, and he slipped away to the forest glade, sad at heart, for he knew he could not hope to beat the rider of the white steed of the plains in the morning’s race. All night he lay awake under the branches thinking not of his victory but of the princess, who seemed as far from him as ever. In the morning he wandered aimlessly through the woods. A deer bounded out of a thicket and reminded him of his happy boyhood, and as he followed it wistfully with his eyes, it vanished, and in its place stood the wild horse of the mountains.

“I told you I’d do you a good turn,” said the Pooka, “for the kindness you and yours showed me that wild winter’s night. The day is passing, and you have no time to lose. The white steed of the plains is coming to the starting post. Jump on my back, and don’t forget: faint heart never won fair lady.”

In half a second Fergus was astride the Pooka, whose shaggy coat at once turned as glossy as silk, and just as the king was about to declare that no horse would race the white steed of the plains, the Pooka galloped up in front of the royal enclosure with Fergus on his back. The crowd let out a thunderous shout that scattered the birds from the sky, and in the ladies’ enclosure a rustle of bright scarves waved in the air. At the stroke of the shields the horses shot from the post as swift as swallows, but before the white steed of the plains was halfway round, Fergus and the wild horse of the mountains had passed the winning post, to such cheers as had never been heard on the plains of Tara. Fergus hardly heeded them, for his eyes were fixed on the princess, and a wild hope stirred in him that his look was not unwelcome to her. But the princess was sad and sorry for her vow, for she believed it was beyond his power to bring her a rainbow robe fine enough to fit in the palm of her soft white hand.

That night Fergus went to the forest, not so sad this time, for a faint hope had come into his heart. He lay down under the branches with his feet towards the rustling stream, and the princess’s smiles brightened his dreams as the rising sun brightens the forest glades. In the morning he was hardly surprised to see the little old woman with the shuttle standing before him.

“You think you have won her already,” said the little woman, “and so you have. Her heart is all yours, and I half think my trouble will be wasted, for if you had no wedding robe at all to give her, she would rather have you this minute than all the kings of Ireland or all the princes and kings and chiefs in the whole world. But you and your father and mother were kind to me on a wild winter’s night, and I’d never let your mother’s son go without a wedding robe fit for the greatest princess who ever set nations fighting for her beauty. Go and pick me a handful of wild forest flowers, and I’ll weave you a wedding robe of all the colours of the rainbow, as sweet and fragrant as the princess’s own red lips.”

Joyfully Fergus gathered the flowers and brought them to her, and in the twinkling of an eye she wove with her little shuttle a wedding robe of all the colours of the rainbow, as light as fairy dew, as soft as the princess’s hand, as fragrant as her little red mouth, and so small it would pass through the eye of a needle.

“Go now, Fergus,” she said, “and luck go with you. But in the days of your greatness, when you are married to the princess, be as kind to the poor, with as open a heart and as open a door, as you were when you were only a poor huntsman’s son.”

Fergus took the robe to Tara. It was the last day of the fair, all the contests were over, and the bards were about to sing their farewell to the memory of the great queen. Just as the chief bard was going to climb the mound, Fergus galloped into the enclosure with a troop of mounted Fenian warriors and rode up to the queen’s pavilion. Holding up the shimmering, many-coloured robe, he said, “O Queen and King of Ireland, I claim the princess as my bride. You, O king, have judged that I won the contest of the bards and the race against the white steed of the plains. It is for the princess to say whether the robe I give her will fit in the hollow of her small white hand.”

“Yes,” said the king. “You are the victor in the contests. Let the princess say whether you have met the last condition.”

The princess took the robe from Fergus and closed her fingers over it so that not a scrap of it could be seen. “Yes, O king,” she said, “he has met the last condition. But my heart went out to the handsome champion of the Feni while every one of those conditions was still unmet. I was willing then, and I am ready now, to be the bride of the huntsman’s son.”

About this story

“The Huntsman’s Son” is the last story in Edmund Leamy’s Irish Fairy Tales, which was republished in Dublin in 1906 in his memory. Its preface says the book had long been out of print and that Leamy, who loved children, wrote with a child listener in mind.

The Pooka, the wild horse of the mountains, is the shaggy, fire-breathing guest who becomes Fergus’s racehorse.

Read the original: Edmund Leamy, Irish Fairy Tales (Project Gutenberg #29311, The Huntsman’s Son)

Best for ages 9–12 — a warm Irish tale of kindness repaid, with a fairy harp, a Pooka racehorse and a magic robe.

The reward carries an obligation forward

Fergus opens the door, but the welcome belongs to the whole household: his parents urge him to admit the travellers and his mother provides the food. By the third knock he acts without waiting to be told. The repeated scene shows him learning a practice of hospitality before he ever becomes a celebrated champion.

His training earns his place among the Feni and his spear victory; the harp, horse and robe then supply abilities he cannot provide alone. The old woman’s final request is therefore central: increased status should not close the door that was open in poverty. Maureen’s final speech also separates affection from achievement. She wanted Fergus before the tests were complete, and states her own willingness.

Separate skill, help and choice

For joining the Feni, throwing the spear, playing the harp, winning the race and presenting the robe, mark what Fergus contributes and who else contributes. Finish with Maureen’s answer: why can neither a victory nor a magical gift speak that answer for her?

Leamy’s Tara is a literary setting populated by legendary warriors and magical visitors. The richly described fair is part of that imagined heroic world, not a dated record of a particular gathering.

Questions to ask

• Who were the three strangers who came to the hut on the stormy night?
• What three things did the princess ask of anyone who wanted to marry her?
• How did each of the three strangers repay the family’s kindness?

You may also like

• The House in the Lake — another of Edmund Leamy’s Irish fairy tales
• The Golden Spears — another of Edmund Leamy’s Irish fairy tales
• The Enchanted Cave — another tale of a hero at Tara from Leamy