Quam sacrando fremunt plorantque per aera turbae
Spiritum quoniam verbis nolendo tiramur.
Hanc quicumque gerit gradiens ubicumque locorum
Aspicitur nusquam; caveat tamen ire per altum
Solis splendorem, quia tunc sua cernitur umbra.’[309]
Here the legend is not only considerably enriched, but it has recovered much of its original tone. Michael Scot again appears rather as the mighty mage than as the adroit juggler which Dante had represented him to be. One would say Folengo had read the spell of Cordova, where a circle similar to that described by him is actually proposed. The use of magical images too, on which he insists, is the very art which the Arabian author of the Picatrix professes to teach.
These then, or such as these, must have been the ‘old wives’ tales’ spoken of by Dempster, who says that store of them passed current in his day.[310] He was, like Michael Scot himself, a Scotsman long resident in Italy, who taught in the universities of Pisa and Bologna at the commencement of the seventeenth century:[311] an origin and situation very favourable to the knowledge of these stories, both in their Italian and Scottish form. That they had at an early period become part of the romantic heritage of Scotland seems very certain. An anonymous author supplies us with the Italian view of the matter when he says that the great magician taught the Scots his art to such a degree ‘that they will not take a step without some magical practice,’ and adds that he introduced into Scotland the fashion of ‘white hose, and gowns with the sleeves sewed together.’[312]
Perhaps the best known of these Scottish tales is that which relates how Michael Scot had a particular spirit as his familiar, and describes the difficulty he felt in discovering new tasks for his supernatural servant. Sir Walter Scott says that this story had made so deep an impression, that in his day any ancient work of unknown origin was ascribed by the country people either to Sir William Wallace, Michael Scot, or the devil himself.[313] But, as commonly told, the legend refers to certain outstanding features of the country which are natural and not artificial; a fact which may possibly account for its persistence and survival in this form and not in the others. Michael is said to have commanded his spirit to divide Eildon Hill into three.[314] The feat was accomplished in a single night, but, the magician’s instructions being very precise, and the spirit finding one of the peaks he had formed greater, and another less than the mean, accommodated the matter very skilfully by transferring what seems like a spadeful of earth, still visible as a distinct prominence on the sky-line of the hill. Next night brought the need for another task, and Michael gave orders that the river Tweed should be bound in its course by a curb of stone. The remarkable basaltic dyke which crosses the bed of the stream near Ednam is said to have been the result of this command. On the third night, finding his familiar still keen for employment, Scot bade him go spin ropes of sand at the river mouth. This task proved so difficult as to relieve the magician from further embarrassment. It is said to be still in progress, and the successive attempts and failures of the spirit are pointed out as every tide casts up, or receding, uncovers, the ever-shifting sands of Berwick bar.
Another Scottish story, borrowed perhaps from the relations between Michael Scot and Frederick II., and possibly suggested by the philosopher’s journey in 1230, speaks of a high commission he once held from the King of Scotland.[315] Some Frenchmen, it is said, had commenced pirates, and had plundered Scottish ships. The King chose Michael as his ambassador, sending him to Paris to demand justice and redress. The magician, however, made none of the ordinary preparations for so considerable a journey, but opened his Book of Might and read a spell therein; whereupon his familiar appeared in the form of a black horse, just as Folengo describes him. In this shape the demon carried his rider through the air with incredible speed. When the channel lay beneath them, he asked Michael what words the old wives in Scotland muttered ere they went to sleep. A less adroit wizard would have simply repeated the Paternoster, and thus furnished the excuse sought by the demon, who would then have hurled his rider into the sea. Michael, however, contented himself by sternly replying; ‘What is that to thee? Mount Diabolus, and fly;’ and, the demon being thus outwitted and compelled, they presently arrived in Paris. Finding the French King unwilling to hear his representations, Scot asked him to delay giving a final refusal till he should have heard the horse stamp three times. At the first hoof-stroke, all the bells in Paris rang. At the second, three towers in the palace fell; and the horse had raised his foot to stamp once more, when the King cried, ‘Hold,’ and yielded him to do as his cousin of Scotland desired.
A more trivial and domestic tale is that which relates how Michael met and overcame the Witch of Falsehope.[316] He was then residing at Oakwood Tower, and, hearing much talk of this woman’s craft, he set forth one day to prove her. The witch was cunning, and denied that she had any skill in the black art, but, when Scot absently laid his staff of power upon the table, she caught it to her and used it upon him with such effect that he became a hare; in which shape he was hotly coursed by his own hounds. Taking refuge in a drain, he had just time to reverse the spell and resume his own form before the hunt reached his hiding-place. Thus Michael returned to Oakwood with a high impression of his neighbour’s skill and malice, and fully resolved to have his revenge at the first opportunity. This occurred next harvest, when, under pretext of sport, he sent his servant to the witch’s house to beg some bread for the hounds. Met with the refusal that was expected, the man acted upon his master’s instructions by privately fixing to the door a scroll containing, amid magical characters, the following rhyme: