Ossian Collection > Poems of Oisin, bard of Erin

CONVERSION OF OISIN. 197
This sight inspired Oisin with fear lest he should
go to the same place : he said, " O Patrick of the
sweet mouth, bring a hatchet with a broad edge,
and do not leave the least part of me uncut, for I
have long been a sinner against God." He
fainted, and the clergy were afraid he had died :
however, he soon recovered and said, " If all the
sea were ink, and all the feathers of the birds of
the air were pens, all the green earth paper, and
all the sons and daughters of Eve were writers, it
would be impossible for them to describe the tenth
part of the horrors of hell."
Then Oisin asked for baptism : Patrick began
the ceremony, and, whilst he was stooping down,
the spear* that was in his hand pierced the foot
of Oisin, and the ground became red with blood.
Patrick said, " Oisin, you are hurt, and I am
soiTy for it." Oisin ; " I thought it was part of
baptism for the spear to go through my foot : I
make an offering to God of all that suffering, in
hopes that He will relieve the giants who are in
the house of pains." Patrick said, " It is like
=i^ By the spear we must understand crozier : Patrick is
often mentioned in the old Irish legends as " the small
clerk of the blunt spear." A similar accident is said to have
happened to Aongus, king of Munster, whilst he was being
baptized by St. Patrick. See Keating s Hist, of Ireland,
part II. p. 13,