Robert, filled with remorse at what he had done, buried the body of his victim, which had drifted to the shores of the lake, and told nobody what had taken place. But for many years, much to the surprise of the family, no swans came to Closeburn.
Much later, when the matter had been almost forgotten, a single swan returned, but, unlike the earlier visitants, it was shy to wildness, and upon its breast was seen a blood-red stain.
People shook their heads and said this phantom swan boded the family no good, and their prognostications came true, for though the swan with the bleeding breast came more rarely than the others had done, every time it appeared it heralded misfortune. First the sudden death of the Lord of Closeburn occurred at home and then one of his relatives was lost in a shipwreck. And again at the third nuptials of Sir Thomas Kirkpatrick, the first baronet of that name, his son and heir Roger, who was in good health at the time, caught sight of the swan, and in full conviction that the warning was meant to tell of impending evil, he went home duly despondent. His father rallied him on his mood, which he said proceeded from a jealous dislike of his new stepmother. But Roger answered, "Perhaps before long, you too may be sorrowing," and that very night he gave up the ghost.
Since then, tradition says, that the mystic wounded swan has never been seen at Closeburn, and the tragic revenge has been completely fulfilled.
According to the account of Sir Walter Scott, supernatural appearances announce death to the ancient Highland family of the MacLeans of Lochbuy. The spirit of an ancestor who was slain in battle is heard to gallop along a stony bank and then to ride thrice around the family residence ringing his fairy bridle and thus intimating the approaching calamity. The reference to this legend occurs in "The Lady of the Lake."
Sounds, too, had come in midnight blast,
Of charging steeds, careering fast
Along Benharrow's shingly side,
Where mortal horseman ne'er might ride.
A fox is an unusual animal to be responsible for a death-warning, except perhaps in Japan, where so many superstitions cling round this creature, but the Irish family of Gormanston is haunted by a small congregation of foxes whenever the head of the house is about to die.
Before the death of the twelfth viscount, in 1860, foxes were seen round about and even in the house for some days. A few hours before his death, "three foxes were playing about and making a noise close to the house, and just in front of the cloisters, which are yew-trees planted and trailed in that shape." They wandered about the grounds in pairs and sat under the viscount's window, barking and howling all night. Next morning they were crouching in the grass in the front of the house. Although they had access to the poultry yard, it was certainly strange that they never touched any of the birds. As soon as the funeral was over the animals disappeared suddenly.
When the succeeding viscount died, in 1876, the foxes were seen again, appearing constantly under the bedroom window, especially when the sick viscount was supposed to have taken a turn for the better, which, however, proved to be a false hope, for he passed away soon afterwards.
On the occasion of the death of the fourteenth Viscount Gormanston the coachman and gardener saw two foxes near the chapel and five or six more round the front of the house, and several were barking in the cloisters. Lord Gormanston's son, the Hon. Mr. Preston, watched beside his father's body which lay in the chapel, and on one occasion, about three in the morning, he "became conscious of a slight noise, which seemed to be that of a number of people walking stealthily around the chapel on the gravel walk. He went to the side door, listened, and heard outside a continuous and insistent snuffling or sniffing noise, accompanied by whimperings and scratchings at the door. On opening it, he saw a full-grown fox sitting on the path within four feet of him. Just in the shadow was another, while he could hear several more moving close by in the darkness. He then went to the end door, opposite the altar, and on opening it found two more foxes, one so close that he could have touched it with his foot. On shutting the door the noises continued till 5 a.m., when they suddenly ceased."[145]