it is a heavy heart he had in him when he came to the old woman without the son. And the two were lamenting their lot till morning.
Still and all, they were better off than the first time they lost their son, as they had plenty of everything, and could live at their ease.
The Gruagach went away home, and put the fisherman's son in a cave of concealment that he had, bound him hand and foot, and tied hard knots on his neck up to the chin. From above there fell on him drops of poison, and every drop that fell went from the skin to the flesh, from the flesh to the bone, from the bone to the marrow, and he sat there under the poison drops, without meat, drink, or rest.
In the Gruagach's house was a servant-maid, and the fisherman's son had been kind to her the time he was in the place before.
On a day when the Gruagach and his eleven sons were out hunting, the maid was going with a tub of dirty water to throw it into the river that ran by the side of the house. She went through the cave of concealment where the fisherman's son was bound, and he asked of her the wetting of his mouth from the tub.
"Oh! the Gruagach would take the life of me," said she, "when he comes home, if I gave you as much as one drop."
