CONTENTS
| CHAPTER [I] | |
|---|---|
| The Fairies | |
| PAGE | |
Names Given to Fairies | [3] |
The Size of Fairies | [9] |
Fairy Dwellings | [11] |
Fairy Dresses | [14] |
The Defects of Fairies | [15] |
Their Occupations | [15] |
Seasons of Festivity | [16] |
Fairy Raids | [18] |
Circumstances under which Fairies are seen | [21] |
Fairy Food | [21] |
Gifts Bestowed by Fairies | [22] |
The Giving and taking of Loans | [24] |
Eddy Wind | [24] |
Rain and Sunshine, Wind and Rain | [26] |
Fairy Arrows | [26] |
Cattle | [27] |
Horses | [30] |
Dogs | [30] |
Elfin Cats | [32] |
Fairy Theft | [32] |
Stealing Women and Children | [36] |
Changelings | [38] |
Deformities | [39] |
Nurses | [40] |
The Men of Peace | [40] |
The Bean Nighe, or Washing Woman | [42] |
The Song of the Fairy Woman | [44] |
The Glaistig as distinct from the Banshi | [44] |
Elfin Queen | [45] |
Protection against Fairies | [46] |
| CHAPTER [II] | |
| Tales Illustrative of Fairy Superstition | |
Luran | [52] |
The Cup of the Macleods of Raasa | [57] |
The Fairies on Finlay’s Sandbank | [57] |
Pennygown Fairies | [59] |
Ben Lomond Fairies | [60] |
Callum Clark and his Sore Leg | [60] |
The Young Man in the Fairy Knoll | [61] |
Black William the Piper | [65] |
The Harris Woman and her Baking | [66] |
Lifted by the Fairies | [68] |
Fairies Coming to Houses | [73] |
The Lowland Fairies | [76] |
Fairies Stealing Women and Children | [78] |
Ready Wit Repulses the Fairies | [85] |
Kindness to a Neglected Child | [86] |
The Bridegroom’s Burial | [86] |
The Crowing of the Black Cock | [87] |
Throwing the Arrow | [88] |
The Woman Stolen from France | [90] |
Changelings | [90] |
Taking away Cows and Sheep | [92] |
The Dwellings of the Fairies | [93] |
Fairy Assistance | [96] |
The Battle of Trai-Gruinard | [100] |
Duine Sith, Man of Peace | [101] |
Bean Shith, Elle Woman, or Woman of Peace | [102] |
Donald Thrashed by the Fairy Woman | [105] |
Iona Banshi | [107] |
Tiree Banshi | [108] |
Macphie’s Black Dog | [109] |
The Carlin of the Spotted Hill | [122] |
Donald, Son of Patrick | [123] |
The Wife of Ben-y-Ghloe | [125] |
Fairy Women and Deer | [126] |
O’Cronicert’s Fairy Wife | [127] |
The Gruagach Ban | [132] |
Deer Killed and conveyed home at Night | [133] |
Fairies and Goats | [134] |
Fairies and Cows | [134] |
Fairy Cows | [135] |
The Thirsty Ploughman | [137] |
The Fairy Churning | [137] |
Milk Spilt by Dairymaids | [138] |
Fairy Music | [138] |
MacCrimmon | [139] |
Fairy Dogs (‘Cu Sith’) | [141] |
What happens to Dogs Chasing Fairies | [144] |
Fairies and Horses | [146] |
Fairies and the Handmill | [149] |
Fairies and Oatmeal | [150] |
Fairies and Iron | [152] |
Name of the Deity | [153] |
Fairy Gifts | [153] |
Struck by the Fairy Arrow Spade | [154] |
| CHAPTER [III] | |
| Tutelary Beings | |
(I) The Glaistig | [155] |
At Glenduror | [162] |
At Sron-Charmaig | [162] |
At Inverawe House | [164] |
At Dunstaffnage Castle | [164] |
In Tiree | [165] |
At Sleat, Skye | [165] |
In the Island of Coll | [166] |
At Dunolly Castle | [166] |
At Mernaig Castle | [166] |
In Strathglass | [167] |
At Lianachan | [168] |
In Glenorchy | [171] |
M‘Millan of Knap stabbing the Glaistig | [172] |
At Craignish | [173] |
On Garlios, Morvern | [173] |
At Ardnadrochit, Mull | [175] |
On Baugh, Tiree | [176] |
At Strontian | [177] |
On Hianish, Tiree | [177] |
In Ulva | [178] |
In Iona | [179] |
In Ross, Mull | [179] |
In Corry-na-Henchor | [180] |
Mac-Ian Year | [181] |
At Erray, Mull | [183] |
(II) The Gruagach | [184] |
(III) Brownie | [186] |
Gunna | [189] |
The Old Man of the Barn | [190] |
| CHAPTER [IV] | |
| The Urisk, The Blue Men, and The Mermaid | |
The Urisk | [195] |
The Blue Men | [199] |
The Mermaid | [201] |
| CHAPTER [V] | |
| The Water-Horse | |
Farmers and Water-Horses | [204] |
Mac-Fir Arois | [205] |
The Talking Horse at Cru-Loch | [207] |
Island of Coll | [208] |
The Nine Children at Sunart | [208] |
Killing the Raasay Water-Horse | [209] |
The Water-Horse at Loch Cuaich | [210] |
The Water-Horse at Tiree | [211] |
Water-Horse and Women | [212] |
The Water-Horse at Loch Basibol, Tiree | [214] |
The Kelpie | [215] |
The Water-Bull | [216] |
The King Otter | [216] |
Biasd na Srogaig | [217] |
The Big Beast of Lochawe | [218] |
| CHAPTER [VI] | |
| Superstitions about Animals | |
Lamprey—Sea Serpent—Gigelorum—Lavellan—BernicleGoose—Eels—Whale—Herring—Flounder—Lobster—Serpents—Ratsand Mice—Cormorant—Magpie—Beetles—Emmet—Skip-Jack | [219]-228 |
| CHAPTER [VII] | |
| Miscellaneous Superstitions | |
Gisvagun, Eapagun, Upagun | [229] |
The Right-Hand Turn (Deiseal) | [229] |
Rising and Dressing | [230] |
Clothes | [231] |
Houses and Lands | [231] |
Baking | [232] |
Removal Cheese (Mulchag Imrich) | [234] |
Leg Cake (Bonnach Lurgainn) | [234] |
Giving Fire out of the House | [234] |
Thunder | [235] |
Theft | [236] |
Salt | [236] |
Combing the Hair | [236] |
Bird Nests | [237] |
Hen’s First Egg | [237] |
Euphemisms | [237] |
Boat Language | [239] |
Fresh Meat | [240] |
Killing those too long alive | [240] |
Funerals | [241] |
The Watch of the Graveyard (Faire Chlaidh) | [242] |
Cill Challum Chille | [242] |
Suicides | [242] |
Murder | [243] |
The Harvest Old Wife (a Chailleach) | [243] |
La u Bhrochain mhòr (Big Porridge Day) | [244] |
Fires on Headlands | [244] |
Stances | [244] |
Names | [245] |
Delivery of Cattle and Horses | [245] |
Trades | [246] |
Iron | [246] |
Empty Shells | [247] |
Protection against Evil Spirits | [247] |
Misnaming a Person | [248] |
Gaining Straw (Sop Seile) | [248] |
Propitious Times | [248] |
Unlucky Actions | [249] |
| CHAPTER [VIII] | |
| Augury | |
At Outset of a Journey | [253] |
Unlucky to look back | [255] |
| CHAPTER [IX] | |
| Premonitions and Divination | |
Premonitions (Meamna) | [258] |
Trial (Deuchainn) | [259] |
Divination (Fiosachd) | [262] |
Shoulder-blade Reading (Slinneineachd) | [263] |
Palmistry (Dearnadaireachd) | [266] |
Divination by Tea, or Cup-reading (LeughadhChupaichean) | [266] |
| CHAPTER [X] | |
| Dreams and Prophecies | |
Dreams (Bruadar) | [268] |
Prophecies (Fàisneachd) | [269] |
The Lady of Lawers | [274] |
| CHAPTER [XI] | |
| Imprecations, Spells, and the Black Art | |
Imprecation (Guidhe) | [277] |
Spells (Geasan no Geasaibh) | [281] |
The Black Art | [285] |
| CHAPTER [XII] | |
| The Devil | |
Card Playing | [292] |
Red Book of Appin | [292] |
Coming for the Dying | [295] |
Making the Devil your Slave | [296] |
Coming Misfortune | [298] |
The Gaïck Catastrophe (Mort Ghàthaig) | [300] |
The Bundle of Fern | [303] |
The Pig in the Indigo Pot | [303] |
Among the Tailors | [304] |
Taghairm, or “Giving his Supper to the Devil” | [304] |
Glas Ghairm—Power of Opening Locks | [311] |
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.