As a boy, Finn is said to have entered into the ______ of an old man, Finn Eger, who had been waiting seven years for the Salmon of Lynn Feic. ______ after arriving, the youth succeeds in catching the fish _____ his elder had failed. The old man takes charge of the catch nevertheless. The young Finn is told to watch the fish while it roasts with the ______ condition that he does not eat any of it.

But the boy, being young, hungry and ________, disobeys the command. He reaches into the fire to assuage his gnawing hunger, burning his hand in the ______. As he put his thumb into his mouth to soothe the pain, he __________ became ________ of all knowledge, thereby becoming the symbolic successor of Finn Eger.

In this myth the wonderful fish ______ appears as a ______ common to Celtic otherworld tales. It is “the magic food,” writes Nitze, “whereby a hero is made _______, and which enables him to be re-born.”