The Project Gutenberg eBook, Superstitions of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, by John Gregorson Campbell

SUPERSTITIONS OF THE HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS OF SCOTLAND

PUBLISHED BY
JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS, GLASGOW,
Publishers to the University.

MACMILLAN AND CO., LONDON AND NEW YORK.

MCM.

Superstitions
of the
Highlands & Islands of Scotland
Collected entirely from Oral Sources

By
John Gregorson Campbell
Minister of Tiree

Glasgow
James MacLehose and Sons
Publishers to the University
1900

GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO.

EDITOR’S NOTE.

This volume is the result of many years’ labour by the late Rev. John Gregorson Campbell, while minister of Tiree during the years 1861—to 1891.

Much of the material was already collected before Mr. J. F. Campbell of Islay published his Popular Tales of the West Highlands in 1860, and readers of Lord Archibald Campbell’s volumes on Waifs and Strays of Celtic Tradition are already acquainted with the valuable work contributed to that series by the Rev. J. Gregorson Campbell.

It is hoped that this volume on the Superstitions of the Scottish Highlands, full as it is of racy stories, may throw fresh light on an extremely interesting subject.

The MS. of a corresponding work by the same author on Witchcraft and Second-Sight in the West Highlands, is in the editor’s hands, and in the event of the present work meeting with the reception which the editor thinks it deserves, the volume on Witchcraft will be published next year.

Mrs. Wallace, Hynish, Tiree, the author’s sister, has kindly read the proofs.

August, 1900.

PREFACE.

The object aimed at in the following pages is to put before the reader a statement, as complete and accurate as the writer can attain to, of the Superstitions and Antiquities of the Scottish Highlands and Islands. In other words, the writer has endeavoured to gather full materials relating to that subject, and to arrange them in a form that may prove of some scientific value.

In pursuit of this object, it has been deemed advisable to derive information solely from oral sources. Books have been purposely avoided as authorities, and a rule has been laid down, and strictly adhered to, not to accept any statement in print regarding a Highland belief, unless also found current among the people. In the few books there are, having any reference to Gaelic lore, the statements have been so frequently found at variance with popular beliefs that this rule has been a necessity. There are a few honourable exceptions, but in general what is to be found in print on this subject is not trustworthy.

A want of acquaintance with the Gaelic language or with Highland feelings and modes of thought, is usually the cause of error. The writers think in English, and are not careful to eliminate from their statements thoughts derived from English or classical literature, or to keep from confusing with Celtic beliefs ideas derived from foreign sources, and from analogous creeds existing elsewhere. This gives an unconscious tinge to their statements, and (what is more to be regretted) sometimes makes them fill up with extraneous and foreign elements what seems to them gaps or blanks in beliefs they but imperfectly understand.

The writer’s information has been derived from widely separated districts in the North, West, and Central Highlands, and from the Islands. Naturally, the bulk of the information was obtained in Tiree, where the writer had most opportunity of making inquiries, but information from this or any other source has not been accepted without comparison with the same beliefs in other districts. The writer has not been able personally to visit all parts of the Highlands, but his informants have spent their lives in districts far apart. The reader will fall into a mistake who supposes that the whole information is within the belief, or even knowledge, of any one individual, or of any one district.

The beliefs of one district do not differ essentially from those of another. In one or two cases several versions of a tale are given to show to some extent the nature of the variations of popular tradition.

The writer has thankfully to acknowledge, and he cannot but remember with pleasure, the readiness and courtesy, and in very many cases the great intelligence with which his inquiries have been answered. Some of his informants have shown a quickness and retentiveness of memory which he could not but envy, and an appreciation of, and an acquaintance with ancient lore that seemed to him to indicate in those who were strangers to the world of letters powers of mind of a high order.

The objection to books and print as authorities has also been extended to written correspondence. No doubt much that is additional and interesting could be obtained through these channels, but if the account given is to serve any purpose higher than that of mere amusement, strict accuracy is of such importance that all these sources of possible error have been avoided; they cannot be sifted by cross-examination and further inquiry so readily or thoroughly as information obtained by word of mouth. The whole has thus passed through the writer’s own hands directly from what he has found current among the people. Care has been taken that no statement be made conveying an idea different in the slightest from what has been heard. A popular Gaelic saying can be quoted as applicable to the case: “If it be a lie as told by me, it was a lie as told to me” (Ma’s breug bh’uam e, is breug dhomh e). It is as free to another as it has been to the writer, to draw his inferences from the statements given, and it is thought no genuine tale or oral tradition will be found to contradict the statements made in the following pages.

In the translations given of Gaelic, the object aimed at has been to give the corresponding English expression, that is, one conveying the same meaning to the English reader that the Gaelic expression conveys to the Gaelic reader. Accuracy has been looked to on this point rather than grace of diction. Where there is anything striking in the Gaelic idiom the literal meaning is also given. In poetry there is consequently a baldness, to which the original is a stranger; but this, it may be urged, is a fault inherent in all translations, however carefully executed. The transference of ideas from one language to another weakens the force and beauty of an expression; what is racy and witty, or musical and expressive in one, becomes tame and insipid in another. This trite observation is made to deprecate unfavourable opinions being formed of the genius and force of the Gaelic language from the translations given.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.
THE FAIRIES.[1]

In any account of Gaelic superstition and popular belief, the first and most prominent place is to be assigned to the Fairy or Elfin people, or, as they are called both in Irish and Scottish Gaelic, the sìth people, that is, ‘the people of peace,’ the ‘still folk,’ or ‘silently-moving’ people. The antiquity of the belief is shown by its being found among all branches of the Celtic and Teutonic families, and in countries which have not, within historical times, had any communication with each other. If it be not entirely of Celtic origin, there can be no doubt that among the Celtic races it acquired an importance and influence accorded to it nowhere else. Of all the beings, with which fear or fancy peopled the supernatural, the Fairies were the most intimately associated with men’s daily life. In the present day, when popular poetical ideas are extinguished in the universal call for “facts” and by “cold material laws,” it is hard to understand how firm a hold a belief like this had upon men in a more primitive state of society, and how unwillingly it is surrendered.

Throughout the greater part of the Highlands of Scotland the Fairies have become things of the past. A common belief is that they existed once, though they are not now seen. There are others to whom the elves have still a real existence, and who are careful to take precautions against them. The changes, which the Highlands are undergoing, have made the traces of the belief fainter in some districts than in others, and in some there remains but a confused jumbling of all the superstitions. It would be difficult to find a person who knows the whole Fairy creed, but the tales of one district are never contradictory of those of another. They are rather to be taken as supplemental of each other, and it is by comparison and such supplementing that the following statement has been drawn out. It is thought that it will not be found at variance with any genuine Highland Fairy Tale.

The Fairies, according to the Scoto-Celtic belief, are a race of beings, the counterparts of mankind in person, occupations, and pleasures, but unsubstantial and unreal, ordinarily invisible, noiseless in their motions, and having their dwellings underground, in hills and green mounds of rock or earth. They are addicted to visiting the haunts of men, sometimes to give assistance, but more frequently to take away the benefit of their goods and labours, and sometimes even their persons. They may be present in any company, though mortals do not see them. Their interference is never productive of good in the end, and may prove destructive. Men cannot therefore be sufficiently on their guard against them.

NAMES GIVEN TO FAIRIES.

The names by which these dwellers underground are known are mostly derivative from the word sìth (pronounced shee). As a substantive (in which sense it is ordinarily used) sìth means ‘peace,’ and, as an adjective, is applied solely to objects of the supernatural world, particularly to the Fairies and whatever belongs to them. Sound is a natural adjunct of the motions of men, and its entire absence is unearthly, unnatural, not human. The name sìth without doubt refers to the ‘peace’ or silence of Fairy motion, as contrasted with the stir and noise accompanying the movements and actions of men. The German ‘still folk’ is a name of corresponding import. The Fairies come and go with noiseless steps, and their thefts or abductions are done silently and unawares to men. The wayfarer resting beside a stream, on raising his eyes, sees the Fairy woman, unheard in her approach, standing on the opposite bank. Men know the Fairies have visited their houses only by the mysterious disappearance of the substance of their goods, or the sudden and unaccountable death of any of the inmates or of the cattle. Sometimes the elves are seen entering the house, gliding silently round the room, and going out again as noiselessly as they entered. When driven away they do not go off with tramp and noise, and sounds of walking such as men make, or melt into thin air, as spirits do, but fly away noiselessly like birds or hunted deer. They seem to glide or float along rather than to walk. Hence the name sìthche and its synonyms are often applied contemptuously to a person who sneaks about or makes his approach without warning. Sometimes indeed the elves make a rustling noise like that of a gust of wind, or a silk gown, or a sword drawn sharply through the air, and their coming and going has been even indicated by frightful and unearthly shrieks, a pattering as of a flock of sheep, or the louder trampling of a troop of horses. Generally, however, their presence is indicated at most by the cloud of dust raised by the eddy wind, or by some other curious natural phenomenon, by the illumination of their dwellings, the sound of their musical instruments, songs, or speech.

For the same reason sìth is applied not merely to what is Fairy, but to whatever is Fairy-like, unearthly, not of this world. Of this laxer use of the term the following may be given as illustrations:

Breac shìth, ‘Elfin pox,’ hives, are spots that appear on the skin in certain diseases, as hooping-cough, and indicate a highly malignant stage of the malady. They are not ascribed to the Fairies, but are called sìth, because they appear and again disappear as it were ‘silently,’ without obvious cause, and more mysteriously than other symptoms. Cows, said to have been found on the shores of Loscantire in Harris, Scorrybrec in Skye, and on the Island of Bernera, were called cro sìth, ‘fairy cows,’ simply because they were of no mortal breed, but of a kind believed to live under the sea on meillich, seaweed. Animals in the shape of cats, but in reality witches or demons, were called cait shìth, ‘Elfin cats,’ and the Water Horse, which has no connection whatever with the elves, is sometimes called each sìth, unearthly horse. The cuckoo is an eun sìth, a ‘Fairy bird,’ because, as is said, its winter dwelling is underground.

A banner in the possession of the family of Macleod, of Macleod of Skye, is called ‘Macleod’s Fairy Banner’ (Bratach shìth MhicLèoid), on account of the supernatural powers ascribed to it. When unfurled, victory in war (buaidh chogaidh) attends it, and it relieves its followers from imminent danger.[2] Every pregnant woman who sees it is taken in premature labour (a misfortune which happened, it is said, to the English wife of a former chief in consequence of her irrepressible curiosity to see the banner), and every cow casts her calf (cha bhi bean no bo nach tilg a laogh). Others, however, say the name is owing to the magic banner having been got from an Elfin sweetheart.

A light, seen among the Hebrides, a sort of St. Elmo’s light or Will-of-the-wisp, is called teine sìth, ‘Fairy light,’ though no one ever blamed the Fairies as the cause of it. In a semi-satirical song, of much merit for its spirit and ease of diction, composed in Tiree to the owner of a crazy skiff that had gone to the Ross of Mull for peats and staid too long, the bard, in a spirited description of the owner’s adventures and seamanship, says:—

“Onward past Greenock,

Like the deer of the cold high hills,

Breasting the rugged ground

With the hunter in pursuit;

She sailed with Fairy motion,[3]

Bounding smoothly in her pride,

Cleaving the green waves,

And passing to windward of the rest.”[4]

This latitude in the use of the word has led some writers on the subject to confound with the Fairies beings having as little connection with them as with mankind. A similar laxness occurs in the use of the English word Fairy. It is made to include kelpies, mermaids, and other supernatural beings, having no connection with the true Fairy, or Elfin race.

The following are the names by which the ‘Folk’ are known in Gaelic. It is observable that every one of the names, when applied to mortals, is contemptuous and disparaging.

Sithche (pronounced sheeche) is the generic and commonest term. It is a noun of common gender, and its plural is sithchean (sheechun). In Graham’s Highlands of Perthshire, a work more than once quoted by Sir Walter Scott, but unreliable as an authority, this word is written shi’ich.

Sireach, plur. sirich, also sibhrich, is a provincial term; an siriche du, ‘the black elf,’ i.e. the veriest elf.

Sithbheire (pronounced sheevere), a masculine noun, is mostly applied to changelings, or the elf substituted for children and animals taken by the Fairies. Applied to men it is very contemptuous.

Siochaire is still more so. Few expressions of scorn are more commonly applied to men than siochaire grannda, “ugly slink.”

Duine sìth (plur. daoine sìth), ‘a man of peace, a noiselessly moving person, a fairy, an elf’; fem. Bean shìth (gen. mna sìth, plur. mnathan sìth, gen. plur. with the article nam ban shìth), ‘a woman of peace, an Elle woman,’ are names that include the whole Fairy race. Bean shìth has become naturalized in English under the form Banshi. The term was introduced from Ireland, but there appears no reason to suppose the Irish belief different from that of the Scottish Highlands. Any seeming difference has arisen since the introduction of the Banshi to the literary world, and from the too free exercise of imagination by book-writers on an imperfectly understood tradition.

The leannan sìth, ‘fairy sweetheart, familiar spirit,’ might be of either sex. The use of this word by the translators of the Bible into Gaelic is made a great handle of by the common people, to prove from Scripture that Fairies actually exist. The Hebrew word so translated is rendered ‘pythons’ by the Vulgate, and ‘consulters of the spirits of the dead’ by modern scholars. Those said to have familiar spirits were probably a class of magicians, who pretended to be media of communication with the spirit world, their ‘familiar’ making himself known by sounds muttered from the ground through the instrumentality, as the Hebrew name denotes, of a skin bottle.

Brughadair, ‘a person from a brugh, or fairy dwelling,’ applied to men, means one who does a stupid or senseless action.

Other names are sluagh, ‘folk, a multitude’; sluagh eutrom, ‘light folk’; and daoine beaga, ‘little men,’ from the number and small size ascribed to the elves.

Daoine Còire, ‘honest folk,’ had its origin in a desire to give no unnecessary offence. The ‘folk’ might be listening, and were pleased when people spoke well of them, and angry when spoken of slightingly. In this respect they are very jealous. A wise man will not unnecessarily expose himself to their attacks, for, ‘Better is a hen’s amity than its enmity’ (S’fhearr sìth ciree na h-aimhreit). The same feeling made the Irish Celt call them daoine matha, ‘good people,’ and the lowland Scot ‘gude neighbours.’

THE SIZE OF FAIRIES.

The difference in size ascribed to the race, though one of the most remarkable features in the superstition, and lying on its surface, has been taken little notice of by writers. At one time the elves are small enough to creep through key-holes, and a single potato is as much as one of them can carry; at another they resemble mankind, with whom they form alliances, and to whom they hire themselves as servants; while some are even said to be above the size of mortals, gigantic hags, in whose lap mortal women are mere infants. In the Highlands the names sithche and daoine sìth are given to all these different sizes alike, little men, elfin youth, elfin dame, and elfin hag, all of whom are not mythical beings of different classes or kinds, but one and the same race, having the same characteristics and dress, living on the same food, staying in the same dwellings, associated in the same actions, and kept away by the same means. The easiest solution of the anomaly is that the fairies had the power of making themselves large or small at pleasure. There is no popular tale, however, which represents them as exercising such a power, nor is it conformable to the rest of their characteristics that it should be ascribed to them. The true belief is that the Fairies are a small race, the men ‘about four feet or so’ in height, and the women in many cases not taller than a little girl (cnapach caileig). Being called ‘little,’ the exaggeration, which popular imagination loves, has diminished them till they appear as elves of different kinds. There is hardly a limit to the popular exaggeration of personal peculiarities. Og, King of Bashan, was a big man, and the Rabbis made his head tower to the regions of perpetual snow, while his feet were parched in the deserts of Arabia. Finmac Coul was reputed strong, at least he thrashed the devil, and made him howl. A weaver in Perthshire, known as ‘the weaver with the nose’ (figheadair na eròine), had a big nose, at least he carried his loom in it. Similarly the ‘little men’ came down to the ‘size of half an ell,’ and even the height of a quart bottle.

The same peculiarity exists in the Teutonic belief. At times the elf is a dwarfish being that enters through key-holes and window-slits; at other times a great tall man. In different localities the Fairies are known as Alfs, Huldra-Folk, Duergar, Trolls, Hill Folk, Little Folk, Still Folk, Pixies, etc. A difference of size, as well as of name, has led to these being described as separate beings, but they have all so much in common with the Celtic Fairies that we must conclude they were originally the same.

FAIRY DWELLINGS.

The Gaelic, as might be expected, abounds in words denoting the diversified features of the scenery in a mountainous country. To this the English language itself bears witness, having adopted so many Gaelic words of the kind, as strath, glen, corrie, ben, knock, dun, etc. From this copiousness it arises that the round green eminences, which were said to be the residences of the Fairies, are known in Gaelic by several names which have no synonym in English.

Sìthein (pron. shï-en) is the name of any place in which the Fairies take up their residence. It is known from the surrounding scenery by the peculiarly green appearance and rounded form. Sometimes in these respects it is very striking, being of so nearly conical a form, and covered with such rich verdure, that a second look is required to satisfy the observers it is not artificial. Its external appearance has led to its being also known by various other names.

Tolman is a small green knoll, or hummock, of earth; bac, a bank of sand or earth; cnoc, knock, Scot. ‘a knowe,’ and its diminutive cnocan, a little knowe; dùn, a rocky mound or heap, such, for instance, as the Castle rock of Edinburgh or Dumbarton, though often neither so steep nor so large; òthan, a green elevation in wet ground; and ùigh, a provincial term of much the same import as tolman. Even lofty hills have been represented as tenanted by Fairies, and the highest point of a hill, having the rounded form, characteristic of Fairy dwellings is called its shï-en (sìthein na beinne). Rocks may be tenanted by the elves, but not caves. The dwellings of the race are below the outside or superficies of the earth, and tales representing the contrary may be looked upon with suspicion as modern.

There is one genuine popular story in which the Fairy dwelling is in the middle of a green plain, without any elevation to mark its site beyond a horse-skull, the eye-sockets of which were used as the Fairy chimney.

These dwellings were tenanted sometimes by a single family only, more frequently by a whole community. The elves were said to change their residences as men do, and, when they saw proper themselves, to remove to distant parts of the country and more desirable haunts. To them, on their arrival in their new home, are ascribed the words:

“Though good the haven we have left,

Better be the haven we have found.”[5]

The Fairy hillock might be passed by the strangers without suspicion of its being tenanted, and cattle were pastured on it unmolested by the “good people.” There is, however, a common story in the Western Isles that a person was tethering his horse or cow for the night on a green tolman when a head appeared out of the ground, and told him to tether the beast somewhere else, as he let rain into “their” house, and had nearly driven the tether-pin into the ear of one of the inmates. Another, who was in the habit of pouring out dirty water at the door, was told by the Fairies to pour it elsewhere, as he was spoiling their furniture. He shifted the door to the back of the house, and prospered ever after. The Fairies were very grateful to any one who kept the shï-en clean, and swept away cow or horse-droppings falling on it. Finding a farmer careful of the roof of their dwelling, keeping it clean, and not breaking the sward with tether-pin or spade, they showed their thankfulness by driving his horses and cattle to the sheltered side of the mound when the night proved stormy. Many believe the Fairies themselves swept the hillock every night, so that in the morning its surface was spotless.

Brugh (brŭ) denotes the Fairy dwelling viewed as it were from the inside—the interiors—but is often used interchangeably with sìthein. It is probably the same word as burgh, borough, or bro’, and its reference is to the number of inmates in the Fairy dwelling.[6]

FAIRY DRESSES.

The Fairies, both Celtic and Teutonic, are dressed in green. In Skye, however, though Fairy women, as elsewhere, are always dressed in that colour, the men wear clothes of any colour like their human neighbours. They are frequently called daoine beaga ruadh, “little red men,” from their clothes having the appearance of being dyed with the lichen called crotal, a common colour of men’s clothes, in the North Hebrides. The coats of Fairy women are shaggy, or ruffled (caiteineach), and their caps curiously fitted or wrinkled. The men are said, but not commonly, to have blue bonnets, and in the song to the murdered Elfin lover, the Elf is said to have a hat bearing “a smell of honied apples.” This is perhaps the only Highland instance of a hat, which is a prominent object in the Teutonic superstition, being ascribed to the Fairies.

THE DEFECTS OF FAIRIES.

Generally some personal defect is ascribed to them, by which they become known to be of no mortal race. In Mull and the neighbourhood they are said to have only one nostril, the other being imperforate (an leth choinnlein aca druid-te). The Elfin smith who made Finmac Coul’s sword, “the son of Lun that never asked a second stroke” (Mac an Luin, nach d’fhàg riamh fuigheal bheum), had but one gloomy eye in his forehead. The Bean shiìh was detected by her extraordinary voracity (a cow at a meal), a frightful front tooth, the entire want of a nostril, a web foot, praeternaturally long breasts, etc. She is also said to be unable to suckle her own children, and hence the Fairy desire to steal nursing women.

THEIR OCCUPATIONS.

The Fairies, as has been already said, are counterparts of mankind. There are children and old people among them; they practise all kinds of trades and handicrafts; they possess cattle, dogs, arms; they require food, clothing, sleep; they are liable to disease, and can be killed. So entire is the resemblance that they have even been betrayed into intoxication. People entering their brughs, have found the inmates engaged in similar occupations to mankind, the women spinning, weaving, grinding meal, baking, cooking, churning, etc., and the men sleeping, dancing, and making merry, or sitting round a fire in the middle of the floor (as a Perthshire informant described it) “like tinkers.” Sometimes the inmates were absent on foraging expeditions or pleasure excursions. The women sing at their work, a common practice in former times with Highland women, and use distaff, spindle, handmills, and such like primitive implements. The men have smithies, in which they make the Fairy arrows and other weapons. Some Fairy families or communities are poorer than others, and borrow meal and other articles of domestic use from each other and from their neighbours of mankind.

FESTIVITIES.

There are stated seasons of festivity which are observed with much splendour in the larger dwellings. The brugh is illumined, the tables glitter with gold and silver vessels, and the door is thrown open to all comers. Any of the human race entering on these occasions are hospitably and heartily welcomed; food and drink are offered them, and their health is pledged. Everything in the dwelling seems magnificent beyond description, and mortals are so enraptured they forget everything but the enjoyment of the moment. Joining in the festivities, they lose all thought as to the passage of time. The food is the most sumptuous, the clothing the most gorgeous ever seen, the music the sweetest ever heard, the dance the sprightliest ever trod. The whole dwelling is lustrous with magic splendour.

All this magnificence, however, and enjoyment are nothing but semblance and illusion of the senses. Mankind, with all their cares, and toils, and sorrows, have an infinitely more desirable lot, and the man is greatly to be pitied whom the Elves get power over, so that he exchanges his human lot and labour for their society or pleasures. Wise people recommend that, in the circumstances, a man should not utter a word till he comes out again, nor, on any account, taste Fairy food or drink. If he abstains he is very likely before long dismissed, but if he indulges he straightway loses the will and the power ever to return to the society of men. He becomes insensible to the passage of time, and may stay, without knowing it, for years, and even ages, in the brugh. Many, who thus forgot themselves, are among the Fairies to this day. Should they ever again return to the open air, and their enchantment be broken, the Fairy grandeur and pleasure prove an empty show, worthless, and fraught with danger. The food becomes disgusting refuse, and the pleasures a shocking waste of time.

The Elves are great adepts in music and dancing, and a great part of their time seems to be spent in the practice of these accomplishments. The changeling has often been detected by his fondness for them. Though in appearance an ill-conditioned and helpless brat, he has been known, when he thought himself unobserved, to play the pipes with surpassing skill, and dance with superhuman activity. Elfin music is more melodious than human skill and instruments can produce, and there are many songs and tunes which are said to have been originally learned from the Fairies. The only musical instrument of the Elves is the bagpipes, and some of the most celebrated pipers in Scotland are said to have learned their music from them.

FAIRY RAIDS.

The Gaelic belief recognizes no Fairyland or realm different from the earth’s surface on which men live and move. The dwellings are underground, but it is on the natural face of the earth the Fairies find their sustenance, pasture their cattle, and on which they forage and roam.

The seasons on which their festivities are held are the last night of every quarter (h-uile latha ceann ràidhe), particularly the nights before Beltane, the first of summer, and Hallowmas, the first of winter. On these nights, on Fridays, and on the last night of the year, they are given to leaving home, and taking away whomsoever of the human race they find helpless, or unguarded or unwary. They may be encountered any time, but on these stated occasions men are to be particularly on their guard against them.

On Fridays they obtrusively enter houses, and have even the impudence, it is said, to lift the lid off the pot to see what the family have on the fire for dinner. Any Fairy story, told on this day, should be prefixed by saying, ‘a blessing attend their departing and travelling! this day is Friday and they will not hear us’ (Beannachd nan siubhal ’s nan isneachd! ’se ’n diugh Di-haoine ’s cha chluinn iad sinn). This prevents Fairy ill-will coming upon the narrator for anything he may chance to say. No one should call the day by its proper name of Friday (Di-haoine), but ‘the day of yonder town’ (latha bhatl’ ud thall). The Fairies do not like to hear the day mentioned, and if anyone is so unlucky as to use the proper name, their wrath is directed elsewhere by the bystander adding ‘on the cattle of yonder town’ (air cro a bhail’ ud thall), or ‘on the farm of So-and-so,’ mentioning anyone he may have a dislike to. The fear of Fairy wrath also prevented the sharpening of knives on this day.

They are said to come always from the west. They are admitted into houses, however well guarded otherwise, by the little hand-made cake, the last of the baking (bonnach beag boise), called the Fallaid bannock, unless there has been a hole put through it with the finger, or a piece is broken off it, or a live coal is put on the top of it;[7] by the water in which men’s feet have been washed; by the fire, unless it be properly ‘raked’ (smàladh), i.e. covered up to keep it alive for the night; or by the band of the spinning wheel, if left stretched on the wheel.

The reason assigned for taking water into the house at night was that the Fairies would suck the sleeper’s blood if they found no water in to quench their thirst. The water in which feet were washed, unless thrown out, or a burning peat were put in it, let them in, and was used by them to plash about in (gan loireadh fhéin ann) all night. Unless the band was taken off the spinning wheel, particularly on the Saturday evenings, they came after the inmates of the house had retired to rest and used the wheel. Sounds of busy work were heard, but in the morning no work was found done, and possibly the wheel was disarranged.[8]

On the last night of the year they are kept out by decorating the house with holly; and the last handful of corn reaped should be dressed up as a Harvest Maiden (Maighdean Bhuan), and hung up in the farmer’s house to aid in keeping them out till next harvest.

WHEN SEEN.

There seems to be no definite rule as to the circumstances under which the Fairies are to be seen. A person whose eye has been touched with Fairy water can see them whenever they are present; the seer, possessed of second sight, often saw them when others did not; and on nights on which the shï-en is open the chance passer-by sees them rejoicing in their underground dwellings. A favourite time for their encounters with men seems to be the dusk and wild stormy nights of mist and driving rain, when the streams are swollen and ‘the roar of the torrent is heard on the hill.’ They are also apt to appear when spoken of and when a desire is expressed for their assistance; when proper precautions are omitted and those whose weakness and helplessness call for watchfulness and care, are neglected; when their power is contemned and when a sordid and churlish spirit is entertained. Often, without fault or effort, in places the most unexpected, mortals have been startled by their appearance, cries, or music.

FOOD.

Fairy food consists principally of things intended for human food, of which the Elves take the toradh, i.e. the substance, fruit, or benefit, leaving the semblance or appearance to men themselves. In this manner they take cows, sheep, goats, meal, sowens, the produce of the land, etc. Cattle falling over rocks are particularly liable to being taken by them, and milk spilt in coming from the dairy is theirs by right. They have, of food peculiar to themselves and not acquired from men, the root of silver weed (brisgein), the stalks of heather (cuiseagan an fhraoich), the milk of the red deer hinds and of goats, weeds gathered in the fields, and barleymeal. The brisgein is a root plentifully turned up by the plough in spring, and ranked in olden times as the ‘seventh bread.’ Its inferior quality and its being found underground, are probably the cause of its being assigned to the Fairies. It is a question whether the stalks of heather are the tops or the stems of the plant. Neither contain much sap or nourishment. The Banshi Fairy, or Elle woman, has been seen by hunters milking the hinds, just as women milk cows.

Those who partake of Fairy food are as hungry after their repast as before it. In appearance it is most sumptuous and inviting, but on grace being said turns out to be horse-dung. Some, in their haste to partake of the gorgeous viands, were only disenchanted when ‘returning thanks.’

GIFTS BESTOWED BY FAIRIES.

The Fairies can bestow almost any gift upon their favourites—great skill in music and in work of all kinds—give them cows and even children stolen for the purpose from others, leave them good fortune, keep cattle from wandering into their crops at night, assist them in spring and harvest work, etc. Sometimes their marvellous skill is communicated to mortals, sometimes they come in person to assist. If a smith, wright, or other tradesman catches them working with the tools of his trade (a thing they are addicted to doing) he can compel them to bestow on him the Ceaird Chomuinn, or association craft, that is to come to his assistance whenever he wants them. Work left near their hillocks over night has been found finished in the morning, and they have been forced by men, entering their dwellings for the purpose, to tell the cure for diseases defying human skill.

In every instance, however, the benefit of the gift goes ultimately to the Fairies themselves, or (as it is put in the Gaelic expression) ‘the fruit of it goes into their own bodies’ (Theid an toradh nan cuirp fhéin). Their gifts have evil influence connected with them, and, however inviting at first, are productive of bad luck in the end. No wise man will desire either their company or their kindness. When they come to a house to assist at any work, the sooner they are got rid of the better. If they are hired as servants their wages at first appear trifling, but will ultimately ruin their employer. It is unfortunate even to encounter any of the race, but to consort with them is disastrous in the extreme.

LOANS.

‘The giving and taking of loans,’ according to the proverb, ‘always prevailed in the world’ (Bha toirt is gabhail an iasad dol riamh feadh an t-saoghail), and the custom is one to which the ‘good neighbours’ are no strangers.

They are universally represented as borrowing meal, from each other and from men. In the latter case when they returned a loan, as they always honestly did, the return was in barleymeal, two measures for one of oatmeal; and this, on being kept in a place by itself, proved inexhaustible, provided the bottom of the vessel in which it was stored was never made to appear, no question was asked, and no blessing was pronounced over it. It would then neither vanish nor become horse-dung!

When a loan is returned to them, they accept only the fair equivalent of what they have lent, neither less nor more. If more is offered they take offence, and never give an opportunity for the same insult again.

We hear also of their borrowing a kettle or cauldron, and, under the power of a rhyme uttered by the lender at the time of giving it, sending it back before morning.

EDDY WIND.

When ‘the folk’ leave home in companies, they travel in eddies of wind. In this climate these eddies are among the most curious of natural phenomena. On calm summer days they go past, whirling about straws and dust, and as not another breath of air is moving at the time their cause is sufficiently puzzling. In Gaelic the eddy is known as ‘the people’s puff of wind’ (oiteag sluaigh), and its motion ‘travelling on tall grass stems’ (falbh air chuiseagan treòrach). By throwing one’s left (or toisgeul) shoe at it, the Fairies are made to drop whatever they may be taking away—men, women, children, or animals. The same result is attained by throwing one’s bonnet, saying, ‘this is yours, that’s mine’ (Is leatsa so, is leamsa sin), or a naked knife, or earth from a mole-hill.

In these eddies, people going on a journey at night have been ‘lifted,’ and spent the night careering through the skies. On returning to the earth, though they came to the house last left, they were too stupefied to recognize either the house or its inmates. Others, through Fairy despite, have wandered about all night on foot, failing to reach their intended destination though quite near it, and perhaps in the morning finding themselves on the top of a distant hill, or in some inaccessible place to which they could never have made their way alone. Even in daylight some were carried in the Elfin eddy from one island to another, in great terror lest they should fall into the sea.

RAIN AND SUNSHINE, WIND AND RAIN.

When there is rain with sunshine, the ‘little people,’ according to a popular rhyme, are at their meat,

“Rain and sun,

Little people at their meat.”

When wind and rain come from opposite directions (which may for an instant be possible in a sudden shift of wind), by throwing some horse-dung against the wind, the Fairies are brought down in a shower!

FAIRY ARROWS, ETC.

Natural objects of a curious appearance, or bearing a fanciful resemblance to articles used by men, are also associated with the Fairies. The reedmace plant is called ‘the distaff of the Fairy women’ (cuigeal nam ban shìth), the foxglove the ‘thimble of the Fairy old women’ (miaran nan cailleacha sìth), though more commonly ‘the thimble of dead old women’ (m. nan cailleacha marbh). A substance, found on the shores of the Hebrides, like a stone, red (ruadh), and half dark (lith dhorcha), holed, is called ‘Elf’s blood’ (fuil siochaire).[9]

The Fairy arrow (Saighead shìth) owes its name to a similar fancy. It is known also as ‘Fairy flint’ (spor shìth), and consists of a triangular piece of flint, bearing the appearance of an arrow head. It probably originally formed part of the rude armoury of the savages of the stone period. Popular imagination, struck by its curious form, and ignorant of its origin, ascribed it to the Fairies. It was said to be frequently shot at the hunter, to whom the Elves have a special aversion, because he kills the hinds, on the milk of which they live. They could not throw it themselves, but compelled some mortal (duine saoghailte) who was being carried about in their company to throw it for them. If the person aimed at was a friend, the thrower managed to miss his aim, and the Fairy arrow proved innocuous. It was found lying beside the object of Fairy wrath, and was kept as a valuable preservation in future against similar dangers, and for rubbing to wounds (suathadh ri creuchdun). The man or beast struck by it became paralyzed, and to all appearance died shortly after. In reality they were taken away by the elves, and only their appearance remained. Its point being blunt was an indication that it had done harm.

The Fairy spade (caibe sìth) is a smooth, slippery, black stone, in shape ‘like the sole of a shoe.’ It was put in water, given to sick people and cattle.

CATTLE.

Everywhere in the Highlands, the red-deer are associated with the Fairies, and in some districts, as Lochaber and Mull, are said to be their only cattle. This association is sufficiently accounted for by the Fairy-like appearance and habits of the deer. In its native haunts, in remote and misty corries, where solitude has her most undisturbed abode, its beauty and grace of form, combined with its dislike to the presence of man, and even of the animals man has tamed, amply entitle it to the name of sìth. Timid and easily startled by every appearance and noise, it is said to be unmoved by the presence of the Fairies. Popular belief also says that no deer is found dead with age, and that its horns, which it sheds every year, are not found, because hid by the Fairies. In their transformations it was peculiar for the Fairy women to assume the shape of the red-deer, and in that guise they were often encountered by the hunter. The elves have a particular dislike to those who kill the hinds, and, on finding them in lonely places, delight in throwing elf-bolts at them. When a dead deer is carried home at night the Fairies lay their weight on the bearer’s back, till he feels as if he had a house for a burden. On a penknife, however, being stuck in the deer it becomes very light. There are occasional allusions to the Fairy women having herds of deer. The Carlin Wife of the Spotted Hill (Cailleach Beinne Bhric horò), who, according to a popular rhyme, was ‘large and broad and tall,’ had a herd which she would not allow to descend to the beach, and which ‘loved the water-cresses by the fountain high in the hills better than the black weeds of the shore.’ The old women of Ben-y-Ghloe, in Perthshire, and of Clibrich, in Sutherlandshire,[10] seem to have been sìth women of the same sort. ‘I never,’ said an old man (he was upwards of eighty years of age) in the Island of Mull, questioned some years ago on the subject, ‘heard of the Fairies having cows, but I always heard that deer were their cattle.’

In other parts of the Highlands, as in Skye, though the Fairies are said to keep company with the deer, they have cows like those of men. When one of them appears among a herd of cattle the whole fold of them grows frantic, and follows lowing wildly. The strange animal disappears by entering a rock or knoll, and the others, unless intercepted, follow and are never more seen. The Fairy cow is dun (odhar) and ‘hummel,’ or hornless. In Skye, however, Fairy cattle are said to be speckled and red (crodh breac ruadh), and to be able to cross the sea. It is not on every place that they graze. There were not above ten such spots in all Skye. The field of Annat (achadh na h-annaid), in the Braes of Portree, is one. When the cattle came home at night from pasture, the following were the words used by the Fairy woman, standing on Dun Gerra-sheddar (Dùn Ghearra-seadar), near Portree, as she counted her charge:

“Crooked one, dun one,

Little wing grizzled,

Black cow, white cow,

Little bull black-head,

My milch kine have come home,

O dear! that the herdsman would come!”

HORSES.

In the Highland creed the Fairies but rarely have horses. In Perthshire they have been seen on a market day riding about on white horses; in Tiree two Fairy ladies were met riding on what seemed to be horses, but in reality were ragweeds; and in Skye the elves have galloped the farm horses at full speed and in dangerous places, sitting with their faces to the tails.

When horses neigh at night it is because they are ridden by the Fairies, and pressed too hard. The neigh is one of distress, and if the hearer exclaims aloud, “Your saddle and pillion be upon you” (Do shrathair ’s do phillein ort) the Fairies tumble to the ground.

DOGS.

The Fairy dog (cu sìth) is as large as a two-year-old stirk, a dark green colour, with ears of deep green. It is of a lighter colour towards the feet. In some cases it has a long tail rolled up in a coil on its back, but others have the tail flat and plaited like the straw rug of a pack-saddle. Bran, the famous dog that Finmac Coul had, was of Elfin breed, and from the description given of it by popular tradition, decidedly parti-coloured:

“Bran had yellow feet,

Its two sides black and belly white;

Green was the back of the hunting hound,

Its two pointed ears blood-red.”

Bran had a venomous shoe (Bròg nimhe), with which it killed whatever living creature it struck, and when at full speed, and ‘like its father’ (dol ri athair), was seen as three dogs, intercepting the deer at three passes.

The Fairy hound was kept tied as a watch dog in the brugh, but at times accompanied the women on their expeditions or roamed about alone, making its lairs in clefts of the rocks. Its motion was silent and gliding, and its bark a rude clamour (blaodh). It went in a straight line, and its bay has been last heard, by those who listened for it, far out at sea. Its immense footmarks, as large as the spread of the human hand, have been found next day traced in the mud, in the snow, or on the sands. Others say it makes a noise like a horse galloping, and its bay is like that of another dog, only louder. There is a considerable interval between each bark, and at the third (it only barks thrice) the terror-struck hearer is overtaken and destroyed, unless he has by that time reached a place of safety.

Ordinary dogs have a mortal aversion to the Fairies, and give chase whenever the elves are sighted. On coming back, the hair is found to be scraped off their bodies, all except the ears, and they die soon after.

CATS.

Elfin cats (cait shìth) are explained to be of a wild, not a domesticated, breed, to be as large as dogs, of a black colour, with a white spot on the breast, and to have arched backs and erect bristles (crotach agus mùrlach). Many maintain these wild cats have no connection with the Fairies, but are witches in disguise.

FAIRY THEFT.

The elves have got a worse name for stealing than they deserve. So far as taking things without the knowledge or consent of the owners is concerned, the accusation is well-founded; they neither ask nor obtain leave, but there are important respects in which their depredations differ from the pilferings committed among men by jail-birds and other dishonest people.

The Fairies do not take their booty away bodily; they only take what is called in Gaelic its toradh, i.e. its substance, virtue, fruit, or benefit. The outward appearance is left, but the reality is gone. Thus, when a cow is elf-taken, it appears to its owner only as suddenly smitten by some strange disease (chaidh am beathach ud a ghonadh). In reality the cow is gone, and only its semblance remains, animated it may be by an Elf, who receives all the attentions paid to the sick cow, but gives nothing in return. The seeming cow lies on its side, and cannot be made to rise. It consumes the provender laid before it, but does not yield milk or grow fat. In some cases it gives plenty of milk, but milk that yields no butter. If taken up a hill, and rolled down the incline, it disappears altogether. If it dies, its flesh ought not to be eaten—it is not beef, but a stock of alder wood, an aged Elf, or some trashy substitute. Similarly when the toradh of land is taken, there remains the appearance of a crop, but a crop without benefit to man or beast—the ears are unfilled, the grain is without weight, the fodder without nourishment.

A still more important point of difference is, that the Fairies only take away what men deserve to lose. When mortals make a secret of (cleth), or grumble (ceasad) over, what they have, the Fairies get the benefit, and the owner is a poor man, in the midst of his abundance. When (to use an illustration the writer has more than once heard) a farmer speaks disparagingly of his crop, and, though it be heavy, tries to conceal his good fortune, the Fairies take away the benefit of his increase. The advantage goes away mysteriously ‘in pins and needles’ (na phrìneachan ’s na shnàdun), ‘in alum and madder’ (na alm ’s na mhadair), as the saying is, and the farmer gains nothing from his crop. Particularly articles of food, the possession of which men denied with oaths (air a thiomnadh), became Fairy property.

The elves are also blamed for lifting with them articles mislaid. These are generally restored as mysteriously and unaccountably as they were taken away. Thus, a woman blamed the elves for taking her thimble. It was placed beside her, and when looked for could not be found. Some time after she was sitting alone on the hillside and found the thimble in her lap. This confirmed her belief in its being the Fairies that took it away. In a like mysterious manner a person’s bonnet might be whipped off his head, or the pot for supper be lifted off the fire, and left by invisible hands on the middle of the floor.

The accusation of taking milk is unjust. It is brought against the elves only in books, and never in the popular creed. The Fairies take cows, sheep, goats, horses, and it may be the substance or benefit (toradh) of butter and cheese, but not milk.

Many devices were employed to thwart Fairy inroads. A burning ember (eibhleag) was put into ‘sowens’ (cabhruich), one of the weakest and most unsubstantial articles of human food and very liable to Fairy attack. It was left there till the dish was ready for boiling, i.e. about three days after. A sieve should not be allowed out of the house after dark, and no meal unless it be sprinkled with salt. Otherwise, the Fairies may, by means of them, take the substance out of the whole farm produce. For the same reason a hole should be put with the finger in the little cake (bonnach beag ’s toll ann), made with the remnant of the meal after a baking, and when given to children, as it usually is, a piece should be broken off it. A nail driven into a cow, killed by falling over a precipice, was supposed by the more superstitious to keep the elves away.

One of the most curious thefts ascribed to them was that of querns,[11] or handmills (Bra, Brathuinn). To keep them away these handy and useful implements should be turned deiseal, i.e. with the right hand turn, as sunwise. What is curious in the belief is, that the handmill is said to have been originally got from the Fairies themselves. Its sounds have often been heard by the belated peasant, as it was being worked inside some grassy knoll, and songs, sung by the Fairy women employed at it, have been learned.

STEALING WOMEN AND CHILDREN.

Most frequently it was women, not yet risen from childbed, and their babes that the Fairies abducted. On every occasion of a birth, therefore, the utmost anxiety prevailed to guard the mother and child from their attacks. It is said that the Fairy women are unable to suckle their own children, and hence their desire to secure a human wet-nurse. This, however, does not explain why they want the children, nor indeed is it universally a part of the creed.

The first care was not to leave a woman alone during her confinement. A house full of women gathered and watched for three days, in some places for eight. Various additional precautions against the Fairies were taken in various localities. A row of iron nails were driven into the front board of the bed; the smoothing iron or a reaping hook was placed under it and in the window; an old shoe was put in the fire; the door posts were sprinkled with maistir, urine kept for washing purposes—a liquid extremely offensive to the Fairies; the Bible was opened, and the breath blown across it in the face of the woman in childbed; mystic words of threads were placed about the bed; and, when leaving at the end of the three days, the midwife left a little cake of oatmeal with a hole in it in the front of the bed. The father’s shirt wrapped round the new-born babe was esteemed a preservative, and if the marriage gown was thrown over the wife she could be recovered if, notwithstanding, or from neglect of these precautions, she were taken away. The name of the Deity solemnly pronounced over the child in baptism was an additional protection. If the Fairies were seen, water in which an ember was extinguished, or the burning peats themselves, thrown at them, drove them away. Even quick wit and readiness of reply in the mother has sent them off.[12]

It is not to be supposed that these precautions were universally known or practised. In that case such a thing as an elf-struck child would be unknown. The gathering of women and the placing of iron about the bed seem to have been common, but the burning of old shoes was confined to the Western Isles. If it existed elsewhere, its memory has been forgotten. That it is an old part of the creed is evident from the dislike of the Fairies to strong smells, being also part of the Teutonic creed. The blowing of the breath across the Bible existed in Sunart, part of the west of Inverness-shire.

CHANGELINGS.

When they succeeded in their felonious attempts, the elves left instead of the mother, and bearing her semblance, a stock of wood (stoc maide), and in place of the infant an old mannikin of their own race. The child grew up a peevish misshapen brat, ever crying and complaining. It was known, however, to be a changeling by the skilful in such matters, from the large quantities of water it drank—a tubful before morning, if left beside it—its large teeth, its inordinate appetite, its fondness for music and its powers of dancing, its unnatural precocity, or from some unguarded remark as to its own age. It is to the aged elf, left in the place of child or beast, that the name sithbheire (pron. sheevere) is properly given, and as may well be supposed, to say of one who has an ancient manner or look, ‘he is but a sithbheire,’ or ‘he is only one that came from a brugh,’ is an expression of considerable contempt. When a person does a senseless action, it is said of him, that he has been ‘taken out of himself’ (air a thoirt as), that is, taken away by the Fairies.

The changeling was converted into the stock of a tree by saying a powerful rhyme over him, or by sticking him with a knife. He could be driven away by running at him with a red-hot ploughshare; by getting between him and the bed and threatening him with a drawn sword; by leaving him out on the hillside, and paying no attention to his shrieking and screaming; by putting him sitting on a gridiron, or in a creel, with a fire below; by sprinkling him well out of the maistir tub; or by dropping him into the river. There can be no doubt these modes of treatment would rid a house of any disagreeable visitor, at least of the human race.

The story of the changeling, who was detected by means of egg-shells, seems in some form or other to be as widespread as the superstition itself. Empty egg-shells are ranged round the hearth, and the changeling, when he finds the house quiet and thinks himself unobserved, gets up from bed and examines them. Finding them empty, he is heard to remark sententiously, as he peers into each, “this is but a wind-bag (chaneil a’ so ach balg fàs); I am so many hundred years old, and I never saw the like of this.”

DEFORMITIES.

Many of the deformities in children are attributed to the Fairies. When a child is incautiously left alone by its mother, for however short a time, the Fairies may come and give its little legs such a twist as will leave it hopelessly lame ever after. To give them their due, however, they sometimes took care of children whom they found forgotten, and even of grown up people sleeping incautiously in dangerous places.

NURSES.

The elves have children of their own, and require the services of midwives like the human race. ‘Howdies,’ as they are called, taken in the way of their profession to the Fairy dwelling, found on coming out that the time they had stayed was incredibly longer or shorter than they imagined, and none of them was ever the better ultimately of her adventure.

THE MEN OF PEACE.

The Gaelic sìthche, like the English elf, has two ideas, almost amounting to two meanings, attached to it. In the plural, sìthchean, it conveys the idea of a diminutive race, travelling in eddy winds, lifting men from the ground, stealing, and entering houses in companies; while in the singular, sìthche, the idea conveyed is that of one who approaches mankind in dimensions. The ‘man and woman of peace’ hire themselves to the human race for a day’s work or a term of service, and contract marriages with it. The elfin youth (Gille sìth) has enormous strength, that of a dozen men it is said, and the elfin women (or Banshis) are remarkably handsome. The aged of the race were generally the reverse, in point of beauty, especially those of them substituted for Fairy-abducted children and animals.

Mortals should have nothing to do with any of the race. No good comes out of the unnatural connection. However enchanting at first, the end is disaster and death. When, therefore, the sìthche is first met, it is recommended by the prudent to pass by without noticing; or, if obliged or incautious enough to speak, and pressed to make an appointment, to give fair words, saying, ‘If I promise that, I will fulfil it’ (ma gheallas mi sin, co-gheallaidh mi e), still sufficiently near houses to attract the attention of the dogs. They immediately give chase, and the Fairy flies away.

The Gille sìth (or Elfin youth) is very solicitous about his offspring when his mortal mistress bears him children, and the love that women have to him as their lover or familiar spirit (leannan sìth) is unnaturally passionate. The Elfin mistress is not always so secure of the affections of her human lover. He may get tired of her and leave her. On meeting her first he is put under spells to keep appointments with her in future every night. If he dares for one night to neglect his appointment, she gives him such a sound thrashing the first time she gets hold of him that he never neglects it again. She disappears at the cock-crowing. While he remains faithful to her, she assists him at his trade as farmer, shepherd, etc., makes him presents of clothes, tells him when he is to die, and even when he is to leave her and get married. She gives Sian a magic belt or other charm, to protect him in danger. If offended, however, her lover is in danger of his life. The children of these alliances are said to be the urisks.

Those who have taken Elfin women for wives have found a sad termination to their mesalliance. The defect or peculiarity of the fair enchantress, which her lover at first had treated as of no consequence, proves his ruin. Her voracity thins his herds, he gets tired of her or angry with her, and in an unguarded moment reproaches her with her origin. She disappears, taking with her the children and the fortune she brought him. The gorgeous palace, fit for the entertainment of kings, vanishes, and he finds himself again in his old black dilapidated hut, with a pool of rain-drippings from the roof in the middle of the floor.

THE BEAN NIGHE, OR WASHING WOMAN.

At times the Fairy woman (Bean shìth) is seen in lonely places, beside a pool or stream, washing the linen of those soon to die, and folding and beating it with her hands on a stone in the middle of the water. She is then known as the Bean-nighe, or washing woman; and her being seen is a sure sign that death is near.

In Mull and Tiree she is said to have praeternaturally long breasts, which are in the way as she stoops at her washing. She throws them over her shoulders, and they hang down her back. Whoever sees her must not turn away, but steal up behind and endeavour to approach her unawares. When he is near enough he is to catch one of her breasts, and, putting it to his mouth, call herself to witness that she is his first nursing or foster-mother (muime cìche). She answers that he has need of that being the case, and will then communicate whatever knowledge he desires. If she says the shirt she is washing is that of an enemy he allows the washing to go on, and that man’s death follows; if it be that of her captor or any of his friends, she is put a stop to.

In Skye the Bean-nighe is said to be squat in figure (tiughiosal), or not unlike a ‘small pitiful child’ (paisde beag brònach). If a person caught her she told all that would befall him in after life. She answered all his questions, but he must answer hers. Men did not like to tell what she said. Women dying in childbed were looked upon as dying prematurely, and it was believed that unless all the clothes left by them were washed they would have to wash them themselves till the natural period of their death. It was women ‘dreeing this weird’ who were the washing women. If the person hearing them at work beating their clothes (slacartaich) caught them before being observed, he could not be heard by them; but if they saw him first, he lost the power of his limbs (lùgh).

In the highlands of Perthshire the washing woman is represented as small and round, and dressed in pretty green. She spreads by moonlight the linen winding sheets of those soon to die, and is caught by getting between her and the stream.

She can also be caught and mastered and made to communicate her information at the point of the sword. Oscar, son of the poet Ossian, met her on his way to the Cairbre’s feast, at which the dispute arose which led to his death. She was encountered by Hugh of the Little Head on the evening before his last battle, and left him as her parting gift (fàgail), that he should become the frightful apparition he did after death, the most celebrated in the West Highlands.

SONG.

The song of the Fairy woman foreboded great calamity, and men did not like to hear it. Scott calls it

“The fatal Banshi’s boding scream,”

but it was not a scream, only a wailing murmur (torman mulaid) of unearthly sweetness and melancholy.

GLAISTIG.

The Banshi is sometimes confounded with the Glaistig, the apparition of a woman, acting as tutelary guardian of the site to which she is attached. Many people use Banshi and Glaistig as convertible terms, and the confusion thence arising extends largely to books. The true Glaistig is a woman of human race, who has been put under enchantments, and to whom a Fairy nature has been given. She wears a green dress, like Fairy women, but her face is wan and grey, whence her name Glaistig, from glas, grey. She differs also in haunting castles and the folds of the cattle, and confining herself to servant’s work.

ELFIN QUEEN.

The Banshi is, without doubt, the original of the Queen of Elfland, mentioned in ballads of the South of Scotland. The Elfin Queen met Thomas of Ercildoune by the Eildon tree, and took him to her enchanted realm, where he was kept for seven years. She gave him the power of foretelling the future, ‘the tongue that never lied.’ At first she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, but when he next looked—

“The hair that hung upon her head,

The half was black, the half was grey,

And all the rich clothing was away

That he before saw in that stead;

Her eyes seemed out that were so grey,

And all her body like the lead.”

In Gaelic tales seven years is a common period of detention among the Fairies, the leannan sìth communicates to her lover the knowledge of future events, and in the end is looked upon by him with aversion. There is no mention, however, of Fairyland, or of an Elfin King or Queen, and but rarely of Fairies riding. True Thomas, who is as well known in Highland lore as he is in the Lowlands, is said to be still among the Fairies, and to attend every market on the look-out for suitable horses. When he has made up his complement he will appear again among men, and a great battle will be fought on the Clyde.

PROTECTION AGAINST FAIRIES.

The great protection against the Elfin race (and this is perhaps the most noticeable point in the whole superstition) is Iron, or preferably steel (Cruaidh). The metal in any form—a sword, a knife, a pair of scissors, a needle, a nail, a ring, a bar, a piece of reaping-hook, a gun-barrel, a fish-hook (and tales will be given illustrative of all these)—is all-powerful. On entering a Fairy dwelling, a piece of steel, a knife, needle, or fish-hook, stuck in the door, takes from the Elves the power of closing it till the intruder comes out again. A knife stuck in a deer carried home at night keeps them from laying their weight on the animal. A knife or nail in one’s pocket prevents his being ‘lifted’ at night. Nails in the front bench of the bed keep Elves from women ‘in the straw,’ and their babes. As additional safe-guards, the smoothing-iron should be put below the bed, and the reaping-hook in the window. A nail in the carcase of a bull that fell over a rock was believed to preserve its flesh from them. Playing the Jew’s harp (tromb) kept the Elfin women at a distance from the hunter, because the tongue of the instrument is of steel. So also a shoemaker’s awl in the door-post of his bothy kept a Glaistig from entering.

Fire thrown into water in which the feet have been washed takes away the power of the water to admit the Fairies into the house at night; a burning peat put in sowens to hasten their fermenting (greasadh gortachadh) kept the substance in them till ready to boil. Martin (West Isl.) says fire was carried round lying-in women, and round about children before they were christened, to keep mother and infant from the power of evil spirits. When the Fairies were seen coming in at the door burning embers thrown towards them drove them away.

Another safe-guard is oatmeal. When it is sprinkled on one’s clothes or carried in the pocket no Fairy will venture near, and it was usual with people going on journeys after nightfall to adopt the precaution of taking some with them. In Mull and Tiree the pockets of boys going any distance after nightfall were filled with oatmeal by their anxious mothers, and old men are remembered who sprinkled themselves with it when going on a night journey. In Skye, oatmeal was not looked upon as proper Fairy food, and it was said if a person wanted to see the Fairies he should not take oatmeal with him; if he did he would not be able to see them. When ‘the folk’ take a loan of meal they do not appear to have any objections to oatmeal. The meal returned, however, was always barleymeal.

Oatmeal, taken out of the house after dark, was sprinkled with salt, and unless this was done, the Fairies might through its instrumentality take the substance out of the farmer’s whole grain. To keep them from getting the benefit of meal itself, housewives, when baking oatmeal bannocks, made a little thick cake with the last of the meal, between their palms (not kneading it like the rest of the bannocks), for the youngsters to put a hole through it with the forefinger. This palm bannock (bonnach boise) is not to be toasted on the gridiron, but placed to the fire leaning against a stone (leac nam bonnach), well-known where a ‘griddle’ is not available. Once the Fairies were overtaken carrying with them the benefit (toradh) of the farm in a large thick cake, with the handle of the quern (sgonnan na brà) stuck through it, and forming a pole on which it was carried. This cannot occur when the last bannock baked (Bonnach fallaid) is a little cake with a hole in it (Bonnach beag ’s toll ann).[13]

Maistir, or stale urine, kept for the scouring of blankets and other cloth, when sprinkled on the cattle and on the door-posts and walls of the house, kept the Fairies, and indeed every mischief, at a distance. This sprinkling was done regularly on the last evening of every quarter of the year (h-uile latha ceann ràidhe).

Plants of great power were the Mòthan (Sagina procumbens, trailing pearlwort) and Achlasan Challum-chille (Hypericum pulcrum, St. John’s wort). The former protected its possessor from fire and the attacks of the Fairy women. The latter warded off fevers, and kept the Fairies from taking people away in their sleep. There are rhymes which must be said when these plants are pulled.

Stories representing the Bible as a protection must be of a recent date. It is not so long since a copy of the Bible was not available in the Highlands for that or any other purpose. When the Book did become accessible, it is not surprising that, as in other places, a blind unmeaning reverence should accumulate round it.

Such are the main features of the superstition of the Sìthchean, the still-folk, the noiseless people, as it existed, and in some degree still exists, in the Highlands, and particularly in the Islands of Scotland. There is a clear line of demarcation between it and every other Highland superstition, though the distinction has not always been observed by writers on the subject. The following Fairy characteristics deserve to be particularly noticed.

It was peculiar to the Fairy women to assume the shape of deer; while witches became mice, hares, cats, gulls, or black sheep, and the devil a he-goat or gentleman with a horse’s or pig’s foot. A running stream could not be crossed by evil spirits, ghosts, and apparitions, but made no difference to the Fairies. If all tales be true, they could give a dip in the passing to those they were carrying away; and the stone, on which the “Washing Woman” folded the shirts of the doomed, was in the middle of water. Witches took the milk from cows; the Fairies had cattle of their own; and when they attacked the farmer’s dairy, it was to take away the cows themselves, i.e. the cow in appearance remained, but its benefit (the real cow) was gone. The Elves have even the impertinence at times to drive back the cow at night to pasture on the corn of the person from whom they have stolen it. The phrenzy with which Fairy women afflicted men was only a wandering madness (φοιταλεα μανια), which made them roam about restlessly, without knowing what they were doing, or leave home at night to hold appointments with the Elfin women themselves; by druidism (druidheachd) men were driven from their kindred, and made to imagine themselves undergoing marvellous adventures and changing shape. Dogs crouched, or leapt at their master’s throat, in the presence of evil spirits, but they gave chase to the Fairies. Night alone was frequented by the powers of darkness, and they fled at the cock-crowing; the Fairies were encountered in the day-time as well. There was no intermarriage between men and the other beings of superstition, but women were courted and taken away by Fairy men, and men courted Fairy women (or rather were courted by them), married, and took them to their houses. A well-marked characteristic is the tinge of the ludicrous that pervades the creed. The Fairy is an object of contempt as well as of fear, and, though the latter be the prevailing feeling, there is observably a desire to make the Elves contemptible and ridiculous. A person should not unnecessarily provoke the anger of those who cannot retaliate, much less of a race so ready to take offence and so sure to retaliate as the Fairies. In revenge for this species of terror, the imagination loves to depict the Elves in positions and doing actions that provoke a smile. The part of the belief which relates to the Banshi is comparatively free from this feeling, but the ‘little people’ and changelings come in for a full share of it. Perhaps this part of the superstition is not entirely to be explained as the recoil of the mind from the oppression of a belief in invisible beings that may be cognizant of men’s affairs and only wait for an opportunity to exert an evil influence over them, but its existence is striking.

CHAPTER II.
TALES ILLUSTRATIVE OF FAIRY SUPERSTITION.

LURAN.

This is a tale, diffused in different forms, over the whole West Highlands. Versions of it have been heard from Skye, Ardnamurchan, Lochaber, Craignish, Mull, Tiree, differing but slightly from each other.

The Charmed Hill (Beinn Shianta), from its height, greenness, or pointed summit, forms a conspicuous object on the Ardnamurchan coast, at the north entrance of the Sound of Mull. On ‘the shoulder’ of this hill, were two hamlets, Sgìnid and Corryvulin, the lands attached to which, now forming part of a large sheep farm, were at one time occupied in common by three tenants, one of whom was named Luran Black (Luran Mac-ille-dhui). One particular season a cow of Luran’s was found unaccountably dead each morning. Suspicion fell on the tenants of the Culver (an cuilibheir), a green knoll in Corryvulin, having the reputation of being tenanted by the Fairies. Luran resolved to watch his cattle for a night, and ascertain the cause of his mysterious losses. Before long he saw the Culver opening, and a host of little people pouring out. They surrounded a grey cow (mart glas) belonging to him and drove it into the knoll. Not one busied himself in doing this more than Luran himself; he was, according to the Gaelic expression, ‘as one and as two’ (mar a h-aon ’s mar a dhà) in his exertions. The cow was killed and skinned. An old Elf, a tailor sitting in the upper part of the brugh, with a needle in the right lappel of his coat, was forcibly caught hold of, stuffed into the cow’s hide, and sewn up. He was then taken to the door and rolled down the slope. Festivities commenced, and whoever might be on the floor dancing, Luran was sure to be. He was ‘as one and as two’ at the dance, as he had been at driving the cow. A number of gorgeous cups and dishes were put on the table, and Luran, resolving to make up for the loss of the grey cow, watched his opportunity and made off with one of the cups (còrn). The Fairies observed him and started in pursuit. He heard one of them remark:

“Not swift would be Luran

If it were not the hardness of his bread.”[14]

His pursuers were likely to overtake him, when a friendly voice called out:

“Luran, Luran Black,

Betake thee to the black stones of the shore.”[15]

Below high water mark, no Fairy, ghost, or demon can come, and, acting on the friendly advice, Luran reached the shore, and keeping below tide mark made his way home in safety. He heard the outcries of the person who had called out to him (probably a former acquaintance who had been taken by ‘the people’) being belaboured by the Fairies for his ill-timed officiousness. Next morning, the grey cow was found lying dead with its feet in the air, at the foot of the Culver, and Luran said that a needle would be found in its right shoulder. On this proving to be the case, he allowed none of the flesh to be eaten, and threw it out of the house.

One of the fields, tilled in common by Luran and two neighbours, was every year, when ripe, reaped by the Fairies in one night, and the benefit of the crop disappeared. An old man was consulted, and he undertook to watch the crop. He saw the shïen of Corryvulin open, and a troop of people coming out. There was an old man at their head, who put the company in order, some to shear, some to bind the sheaves, and some to make stooks. On the word of command being given, the field was reaped in a wonderfully short time. The watcher, calling aloud, counted the reapers. The Fairies never troubled the field again.

Their persecution of Luran did not, however, cease. While on his way to Inveraray Castle, with his Fairy cup, he was lifted mysteriously with his treasure out of the boat, in which he was taking his passage, and was never seen or heard of after.

According to another Ardnamurchan version, Luran was a butler boy in Mingarry Castle. One night he entered a Fairy dwelling, and found the company within feasting and making merry. A shining cup, called an cupa cearrarach, was produced, and whatever liquor the person having it in his hand wished for and named, came up within it. Whenever a dainty appeared on the table, Luran was asked, “Did you ever see the like of that in Mingarry Castle?” At last, the butler boy wished the cup to be full of water, and throwing its contents on the lights, and extinguishing them, ran away with it in his hand. The Fairies gave chase. Some one among them called out to Luran to make for the shore. He reached the friendly shelter, and made his way below high-water mark to the castle, which he entered by a stair leading to the sea. The cup remained long in Mingarry Castle, but was at last lost in a boat that sank at Mail Point (Rutha Mhàil).

A Tiree version of the tale says that Luran entered an open Fairy dwelling (brugh), where he found the inmates asleep, and a large cauldron, or copper, standing on the floor. He took up the kettle, and made off with it. When going out at the door, the cauldron struck one of the door-posts, and made a ringing noise. The Fairies, sixteen men in number, started out of sleep, and gave chase. As they pressed on Luran, one of them (probably a friend who had at one time been ‘taken’) called out, “Luran, Luran, make for the black stones of the shore.” He did so, and made his escape. It was then the Fairies remarked: “Luran would be swift if it were not the hardness of his bread. If Luran had warm milk and soft barley bread, not one among the sixteen of us could catch him.”

According to the Lochaber story, the Fairies stole a white cow from a farmer, and every night took it back again to pasture on his corn. He chased them with his dog Luran, but they threw bread behind them, which the dog loitered to devour, so that it never overtook the white cow. The Fairies were heard saying among themselves, “Swift would be Luran if it were not the hardness of his bread. If Luran got bread singed and twice turned, it would catch the white cow.” The field where this occurred is known as the Field of the White Cow (acha na bò bàin), above Brackletter, in Lochaber.

According to a Skye version, the Fairies came to take with them the benefit (toradh) of the farmer’s land, but his dog Luran drove them away. One night they were overheard saying, “Swift would be Luran if it were not the hardness of his bread. If thin porridge were Luran’s food, deer would not overtake Luran.” Next day thin porridge, or ‘crowdie,’ was given to Luran, and it ate too much, and could not run at all. The Fairies got away, laughing heartily at the success of their trick.

In Craignish, Argyllshire, Luran was a dog, old, and unable to devour quickly the bread thrown it by the Fairies. There are, no doubt, many other versions of the story current, but these are sufficient to show the want of uniformity in popular tales of this kind.

THE CUP OF THE MACLEODS OF RAASA.

In Raasa, a man, named Hugh, entered a Fairy dwelling where there was feasting going on. The Fairies welcomed him heartily, and pledged his health. “Here’s to you, Hugh,” “I drink to you, Hugh” (cleoch ort, Eoghain), was to be heard on every side. He was offered drink in a fine glittering cup. When he got the cup in his hands he ran off with it. The Fairies let loose one of their dogs after him. He made his escape, and heard the Fairies calling back the dog by its name of “Farvann” (Farbhann! Farbhann!). The cup long remained in the possession of the Macleods of Raasa.

THE FAIRIES ON FINLAY’S SANDBANK.

The sandbank of this name (Bac Fhionnlaidh) on the farm of Ballevulin, in Tiree, was at one time a noted Fairy residence, but has since been blown level with the ground. It caused surprise to many that no traces of the Fairies were found in it. Its Fairy tenants were at one time in the habit of sending every evening to the house of a smith in the neighbourhood for the loan of a kettle (iasad coire). The smith, when giving it, always said:

“A smith’s due is coals,

And to send cold iron out;

A cauldron’s due is a bone,

And to come safe back.”[16]

Under the power of this rhyme the cauldron was restored safely before morning. One evening the smith was from home, and his wife, when the Fairies came for the usual loan, never thought of saying the rhyme. In consequence the cauldron was not returned. On finding this out the smith scolded savagely, and his wife, irritated by his reproaches, rushed away for the kettle. She found the brugh open, went in, and (as is recommended in such cases), without saying a word, snatched up the cauldron and made off with it. When going out at the door she heard one of the Fairies calling out:

“Thou dumb sharp one, thou dumb sharp,

That came from the land of the dead,

And drove the cauldron from the brugh—

Undo the Knot, and lose the Rough.”[17]

She succeeded in getting home before the Rough, the Fairy dog, overtook her, and the Fairies never again came for the loan of the kettle.

This story is given, in a slightly different form, by Mr. Campbell, in his Tales of the West Highlands (Vol. ii., p. 44), and the scene is laid in Sanntrai, an island near Barra. The above version was heard in Tiree by the writer, several years before he saw Mr. Campbell’s book. There is no reason to suppose the story belongs originally either to Tiree or Barra. It is but an illustration of the tendency of popular tales to localize themselves where they are told.

PENNYGOWN FAIRIES.

A green mound, near the village of Pennygown (Peigh’nn-a-ghobhann), in the Parish of Salen, Mull, was at one time occupied by a benevolent company of Fairies. People had only to leave at night on the hillock the materials for any work they wanted done, as wool to be spun, thread for weaving, etc., telling what was wanted, and before morning the work was finished. One night a wag left the wood of a fishing-net buoy, a short, thick piece of wood, with a request to have it made into a ship’s mast. The Fairies were heard toiling all night, and singing, “Short life and ill-luck attend the man who asked us to make a long ship’s big mast from the wood of a fishing-net buoy.”[18] In the morning the work was not done, and these Fairies never after did anything for any one.

BEN LOMOND FAIRIES.

A company of Fairies lived near the Green Loch (Lochan Uaine), on Ben Lomond. Whatever was left overnight near the loch—cloth, wool, or thread—was dyed by them of any desired colour before morning. A specimen of the desired colour had to be left at the same time. A person left a quantity of undyed thread, and a piece of black and white twisted thread along with it, to show that he wanted part of the hank black and part white. The Fairies thought the pattern was to be followed, and the work done at one and the same dyeing. Not being able to do this, they never dyed any more.

CALLUM CLARK AND HIS SORE LEG.

Some six generations ago there lived at Port Vista (Port Bhissta), in Tiree, a dark, fierce man, known as Big Malcolm Clark (Callum mòr mac-a-Chleirich). He was a very strong man, and in his brutal violence produced the death of several people. Tradition also says of him that he killed a water-horse, and fought a Banshi with a horse-rib at the long hollow, covered in winter with water, called the Léig. In this encounter his own little finger was broken. When sharpening knives, old women in Tiree said, “Friday in Clark’s town” (Di-haoine am baile mhic-a-Chleirich), with the object of making him and his the objects of Fairy wrath. One evening, as he was driving a tether-pin into a hillock, a head was popped up out of the ground, and told him to take some other place for securing his beast, as he was letting the rain into ‘their’ dwelling. Some time after this he had a painfully sore leg (bha i gu dòruinneach doirbh). He went to the shï-en, where the head had appeared, and, finding it open, entered in search of a cure for his leg. The Fairies told him to put ‘earth on the earth’ (Cuir an talamh air an talamh). He applied every kind of earth he could think of to the leg, but without effect. At the end of three months he went again to the hillock, and when entering put steel (cruaidh) in the door. He was told to go out, but he would not, nor would he withdraw the steel till told the proper remedy. At last he was told to apply the red clay of a small loch in the neighbourhood (criadh ruadh Lochan ni’h fhonhairle). He did so, and the leg was cured.

THE YOUNG MAN IN THE FAIRY KNOLL.

Two young men, coming home after nightfall on Hallowe’en, each with a jar of whisky on his back, heard music by the roadside, and, seeing a dwelling open and illuminated, and dancing and merriment going on within, entered. One of them joined the dancers, without as much as waiting to lay down the burden he was carrying. The other, suspecting the place and company, stuck a needle in the door as he entered, and got away when he liked. That day twelvemonths he came back for his companion, and found him still dancing with the jar of whisky on his back. Though more than half-dead with fatigue, the enchanted dancer begged to be allowed to finish the reel. When brought to the open-air he was only skin and bone.

This tale is localized in the Ferintosh district, and at the Slope of Big Stones (Leathad nan Clacha mòra) in Harris. In Argyllshire people say it happened in the north. In the Ferintosh story only one of the young men entered the brugh, and the door immediately closed. The other lay under suspicion of having murdered his companion, but, by advice of an old man, went to the same place on the same night the following year, and by putting steel in the door of the Fairy dwelling, which he found open, recovered his companion. In the Harris story, the young men were a bridegroom and his brother-in-law, bringing home whisky for the marriage.

Two young men in Iona were coming in the evening from fishing on the rocks. On their way, when passing, they found the shï-en of that island open, and entered. One of them joined the dancers, without waiting to lay down the string of fish he had in his hand. The other stuck a fish-hook in the door, and when he wished made his escape. He came back for his companion that day twelvemonths, and found him still dancing with the string of fish in his hand. On taking him to the open air the fish dropped from the string, rotten.

Donald, who at one time carried on foot the mails from Tobermory, in Mull, to Grass Point Ferry (Ru-an-fhiarain), where the mail service crosses to the mainland, was a good deal given to drink, and consequently to loitering by the way. He once lay down to have a quiet sleep near a Fairy-haunted rock above Drimfin. He saw the rock open, and a flood of light pouring out at the door. A little man came to him and said in English, “Come in to the ball, Donald,” but Donald fled, and never stopped till he reached the houses at Tobermory, two miles off. He said he heard the whizz and rustling of the Fairies after him the whole way. The incident caused a good deal of talk in the neighbourhood, and Donald and his fright were made the subject of some doggerel verse, in which the Fairy invitation is thus given:

“Rise, rise, rise, Donald,

Rise, Donald, was the call,

Rise up now, Donald,

Come in, Donald, to the ball.”

It is well known that Highland Fairies, who speak English, are the most dangerous of any.

A young man was sent for the loan of a sieve, and, mistaking his way, entered a brugh, which was that evening open. He found there two women grinding at a handmill, two women baking, and a mixed party dancing on the floor. He was invited to sit down, “Farquhar MacNeill, be seated” (Fhearchair ’ie Neill, bi ’d shuidhe). He thought he would first have a reel with the dancers. He forgot all about the sieve, and lost all desire to leave the company he was in. One night he accompanied the band among whom he had fallen on one of its expeditions, and after careering through the skies, stuck in the roof of a house. Looking down the chimney (fàr-leus), he saw a woman dandling a child, and, struck with the sight, exclaimed, “God bless you” (Dia gu d’bheannachadh). Whenever he pronounced the Holy Name he was disenchanted, and tumbled down the chimney! On coming to himself he went in search of his relatives. No one could tell him anything about them. At last he saw, thatching a house, an old man, so grey and thin he took him for a patch of mist resting on the house-top. He went and made inquiries of him. The old man knew nothing of the parties asked for, but said perhaps his father did. Amazed, the young man asked him if his father was alive, and on being told he was, and where to find him, entered the house. He there found a very venerable man sitting in a chair by the fire, twisting a straw-rope for the thatching of the house (snìomh sìomain). This man also, on being questioned, said he knew nothing of the people, but perhaps his father did. The father referred to was lying in bed, a little shrunken man, and he in like manner referred to his father. This remote ancestor, being too weak to stand, was found in a purse (sporran) suspended at the end of the bed. On being taken out and questioned, the wizened creature said, “I did not know the people myself, but I often heard my father speaking of them.” On hearing this the young man crumbled in pieces, and fell down a bundle of bones (cual chnàmh).

The incident of the very aged people forms part of some versions of the story, “How the Great Description (a man’s name) was put to Death” (Mar a chaidh an Tuairisgeul mòr a chur gu bàs). Another form is that a stranger came to a house, and at the door found an old man crying, because his father had thrashed him. He went in, and asking the father why he had thrashed his aged son, was told it was because the grandfather had been there the day before, and the fellow had not the manners to put his hand in his bonnet to him!

BLACK WILLIAM THE PIPER.

William M‘Kenzie was weaver to the Laird of Barcaldine. He and a friend were going home with two gallons of whisky in jars strapped on their backs. They saw a hillock open and illuminated, and entered. William’s companion stuck a knife in the door when entering. They found inside an old man playing the bagpipes, and a company of dancers on the floor. William danced one reel, and then another, till his companion got tired waiting, and left. When, after several days, M‘Kenzie did not turn up, the other was accused of having murdered him, and was advised, if his story was true, to get spades and dig into the hillock for his missing friend. A year’s delay was given, and when the hillock was entered M‘Kenzie was found still dancing on the floor. After this adventure he became the chief weaver in the district; he did more work in a shorter time than any other. At the first throw of the shuttle he said, “I and another one are here” (mise ’s fear eile so!). He also began to make pipes, but though a better weaver and piper than he had been before, he never prospered. He became known as “Black William of the Pipes” (Uilleam du na pìoba).

It is said in Sutherlandshire that a weaver, getting a shuttle from the Fairies, can go through three times as much work as another man. (Cf. Tale of M‘Crimmon, p. 139.)

THE HARRIS WOMAN AND HER BAKING.

A woman in Harris was passing Creag Mhanuis, a rock having on its face the appearance of a door, which she saw opening, and a woman dressed in green standing before it, who called to her to come in to see a sick person. The woman was very unwilling to go, but was compelled, and went in without taking any precaution. She found herself among a large company, for whom she was immediately to begin baking bread, and was told that when the quantity of meal, not very large, given her was entirely used, she would be allowed to go away. She began to bake, and made all possible haste to finish the work, but the more she strove the less appearance there was of the labour being finished, and her courage failed when day after day passed, leaving her where she began. At last, after a long time, the whole company left for the outer world, leaving her, as she thought, alone. When the last tramp of their footsteps could no longer be heard, she was startled by hearing a groan. On looking through an opening which she found in the side of the dwelling, she saw a bed-ridden old man, who, on seeing her head in the opening, said, “What sent you here?” “I did not come by my own will,” she replied. “I was made to come to attend to a sick person.” He then asked what work was given her to do. She told him, and how the baking was never likely to be finished. He said she must begin again, and that she was not to put the dusting meal (an fhallaid) at any time back among the baking. She did as he told her, when she found her stock of meal soon exhausted, and she got out and away before the others returned, much to their discomfiture.

A woman in Skye was taken to see a sick person in a dùn, and after attending to her patient, she saw a number of women in green dresses coming in and getting a loan of meal. They took the meal from a skin bag (balgan), which seemed as if it would never be exhausted. The woman asked to be sent home, and was promised to be allowed to go, on baking the meal left in the bag, and spinning a tuft of wool on a distaff handed to her. She baked away, but could not exhaust the meal bag; and spun, but seemed never nearer the end of her task. A woman came in, and advised her to “put the remnant of the meal she baked into the little bag, and to spin the tuft upon the distaff as the sheep bites the hillock”[19]—i.e., to draw the wool in small tufts, like sheep bites, from the distaff. On doing this, the task was soon finished, the Fairies saying, “A blessing rest on you, but a curse on the mouth that taught you.”[20] On coming out, the woman found she had been in the dùn for seven years.

LIFTED BY THE FAIRIES.

Black Donald of the Multitude (Dòmhnull du an t-sluaigh), as he was ever afterwards known, was ploughing on the farm of Baile-pheutrais, in the island of Tiree, when a heavy shower came on from the west. In these days it required at least two persons to work a plough, one to hold it, and one to lead the horses. Donald’s companion took shelter to the lee of the team. When the shower passed, Donald himself was nowhere to be found, nor was he seen again till evening. He then came from an easterly direction, with his coat on his arm. He said the Fairies had taken him in an Eddy wind to the islands to the north—Coll, Skye, etc. In proof of this, he told that a person (naming him) was dead in Coll, and people would be across next day for whiskey for the funeral to Kennovay, a village on the other side of Bally-pheutrais, where smuggling was carried on at the time. This turned out to be the case. Donald said he had done no harm while away, except that the Fairies had made him throw an arrow at, and kill, a speckled cow in Skye. When crossing the sea he was in great terror lest he should fall.

Nial Scrob (Neil the Scrub), a native of Uist, was on certain days lifted by the Fairies and taken to Tiree, and other islands of the Hebrides, at least so he said himself. Once he came to Saälun, a village near the north-east end of Tiree, and at the fourth house in the village was made to throw the Fairy arrow. There is an old saying—

“Shut the north window,

And quickly close the window to the south;

And shut the window facing west,

Evil never came from the east.”[21]

And the west window was this night left open. The arrow came through the open window, and struck on the shoulder a handsome, strong, healthy woman of the name of M‘Lean, who sat singing cheerfully at her work. Her hand fell powerless by her side, and before morning she was dead. Neil afterwards told that he was the party whom the Fairies had compelled to do the mischief. In this, and similar stories, it must be understood that, according to popular belief, the woman was taken away by the Fairies, and may still be among them; only her semblance remained and was buried.

About twenty years ago a cooper, employed on board a ship, was landed at Martin’s Isle (Eilein Mhàrtiunn), near Coigeach, in Ross-shire, to cut brooms. He traversed the islet, and then somehow fell asleep. He felt as if something were pushing him, and, on awakening, found himself in the island of Rona, ten miles off. He cut the brooms, and a shower of rain coming on, again fell asleep. On awaking he found himself back in Martin’s Isle. He could only, it is argued, have been transported back and forward by the Fairies.

A seer gifted with the second sight (taibhseis), resident at Bousd, in the east end of Coll, was frequently lifted by Fairies, that staid in a hillock in his neighbourhood. On one occasion they took him to the sea-girt rock, called Eileirig, and after diverting themselves with him for an hour or two took him home again. So he said himself.

A man who went to fish on Saturday afternoon at a rock in Kinnavara hill (Beinn Chinn-a-Bharra), the extreme west point of Tiree, did not make his appearance at home until six o’clock the following morning. He said that after leaving the rock the evening before, he remembered nothing but passing a number of beaches. The white beaches of Tiree, from the surrounding land being a dead level, are at night the most noticeable features in the scenery. On coming to his senses, he found himself on the top of the Dùn at Caolis in the extreme east end of the island, twelve miles from his starting point.

A few years ago, a man in Lismore, travelling at night with a web of cloth on his shoulder, lost his way, walked on all night without knowing where he was going, and in the morning was found among rocks, where he could never have made his way alone. He could give no account of himself, and his wanderings were universally ascribed to the Fairies.

Red Donald of the Fairies (Dòmhnull ruadh nan sìthehean), as he was called (and the name stuck to him all his life), used when a boy to see the Fairies. Being herd at the Spital (an Spideal) above Dalnacardoch in Perthshire, he was taken by them to his father’s house at Ardlàraich in Rannoch, a distance of a dozen miles, through the night. In the morning he was found sitting at the fireside, and as the door was barred, he must have been let in by the chimney.

An old man in Achabeg, Morvern, went one night on a gossiping visit (céilidh) to a neighbour’s house. It was winter time, and a river near the place was in flood, which, in the case of a mountain torrent, means that it was impassable. The old man did not return home that night, and next morning was found near the shï-en of Luran na leaghadh in Sasory, some distance across the river. He could give no account of how he got there, only that when on his way home a storm came about him, and on coming to himself he was where they had found him.

When Dr. M‘Laurin was tenant of Invererragan, near Connal Ferry in Benderloch, at the end of last century, “Calum Clever,” who derived his name from his skill in singing tunes and expedition in travelling (gifts given him by the Fairies), stayed with him whole nights. The doctor sent him to Fort William with a letter, telling him to procure the assistance of “his own people” and be back with an immediate answer. Calum asked as much time as one game at shinty (aon taghal air a bhall) would take, and was back in the evening before the game was finished. He never could have travelled the distance without Fairy aid.

FAIRIES COMING TO HOUSES.

Ewen, son of Allister Og, was shepherd in the Dell of Banks (Coira Bhaeaidh), at the south end of Loch Ericht (Loch Eireachd), and stayed alone in a bothy far away from other houses. In the evenings he put the porridge for his supper out to cool on the top of the double wall (anainn) of the hut. On successive evenings he found it pitted and pecked all round on the margin, as if by little birds or heavy rain-drops. He watched, and saw little people coming and pecking at his porridge. He made little dishes and spoons of wood, and left them beside his own dish. The Fairies, understanding his meaning, took to using these, and let the big dish alone. At last they became quite familiar with Ewen, entered the hut, and stayed whole evenings with him. One evening a woman came with them. There was no dish for her, and she sat on the other side of the house, saying never a word, but grinning and making faces at the shepherd whenever he looked her way. Ewen at last asked her, “Are you always like that, my lively maid?”[22] Owing to the absurdity of the question, or Ewen’s failure to understand that the grinning was a hint for food, the Fairies never came again.

The Elves came to a house at night, and finding it closed, called upon ‘Feet-water’ (uisge nan cas) i.e., water in which the feet had been washed, to come and open the door. The water answered from somewhere near, that it could not, as it had been poured out. They called on the Band of the Spinning Wheel to open the door, but it answered it could not, as it had been thrown off the wheel. They called upon Little Cake, but it could not move, as there was a hole through it and a live coal on the top of it. They called upon the ‘raking’ coal (smàladh an teine), but the fire had been secured in a proper manner, to keep it alive all night. This is a tale not localized anywhere, but universally known.

A man observed a band of people dressed in green coming toward the house, and recognising them to be Fairies, ran in great terror, shut and barred the door, and hid himself below the bed. The Fairies, however, came through the keyhole, and danced on the floor, singing. The song extended to several verses, to the effect that no kind of house could keep out the Fairies, not a turf house (tigh phloc), nor a stone house (tigh cloiche), etc.

The Fairies staying in Dunruilg came to assist a farmer in the vicinity in weaving and preparing cloth, and, after finishing the work in a wonderfully short space of time, called for more work. To get rid of his officious assistants, the farmer called outside the door that Dunruilg was on fire.[23] The Fairies immediately rushed out in great haste, and never came back. Of this story several versions are given in the Tales of the West Highlands (ii. 52-4). In some form or other it is extensively known, and in every locality the scene is laid in its own neighbourhood. In Mull the Fairy residence is said to have been the bold headland in the south-west of the island known as Tun Bhuirg. Some say the Elves were brought to the house by two old women, who were tired spinning, and incautiously said they wished all the people in Tòn Bhuirg were there to assist. According to others, the Elves were in the habit of coming to Tàpull House in the Ross of Mull, and their excessive zeal made them very unwelcome. In Skye the event is said to have occurred at Dùn Bhuirbh. There are two places of the name, one in Lyndale, and one in Beinn-an-ùine, near Druimuighe, above Portree. The rhyme they had when they came to Tapull is known as “The rhyme of the goodman of Tapull’s servants” (Rann gillean fir Thàbuill).

“Let me comb, card, tease, spin,

Get a weaving loom quick,

Water for fulling on the fire,

Work, work, work.”[24]

The cry they raised when going away, in the Skye version, runs:

“Dunsuirv on fire,

Without dog or man,

My balls of thread

And my bags of meal.”[25]

A man, on the farm of Kennovay in Tiree, saw the Fairies about twelve o’clock at night enter the house, glide round the room, and go out again. They said and did nothing.

THE LOWLAND FAIRIES.