Evil eye in the western Highlands

by Robert Craig Maclagan

The mere expression of admiration should be avoided by those who wish to escape the accusation of the Evil Eye. A youngish woman says, “You have seen my cousin J.’s third boy. He was the finest and nicest looking of all the children. When six months old he was a very pretty child. One day a woman came into the house; the baby was on his mother’s arm, and the visitor began to praise the child, and praised it very much. She was hardly away when a man came, and he began to praise the child as the woman had done. After he went away like a shot the baby took ill. They did not know what was the matter with him, or what to do, for he was growing worse. He continued in that way for some days. At last granny said she was sure he had been air a chronachadh, and advised the mother to consult a woman who was supposed to have knowledge to cure such cases. J. was not willing to go at first, but granny insisted that it would do no harm at any rate to go and speak to the woman. She went, but did not tell anybody at the time, for of course they would be speaking about it. As soon as she told the woman why she had come, the woman told her that the child had been injured by the Evil Eye, and she described exactly the man and woman who had done the harm, although my cousin had not mentioned man or woman to her. Was it not wonderful how she knew the very ones that had done it?” She cured the child. The above happened in one of the islands.

The following is from Ross-shire (Tarbat): “One of my sisters was blighted by a woman who lived beside them. She was well known for her uncanny ways. The way the thing happened was this: The little girl was tied on an elder sister’s back, and they were sent out for a walk. They had not gone far when the woman in question came forward, and putting the shawl back from the child’s face said, ‘What a pretty little girl! which of them is this?’ When the children returned their mother found that the young one was very ill, and on questioning the elder girl, she said that they had met this woman and repeated what she had said. Mother at once suspected what was the matter, sent for the woman, and charged her with having hurt her child. She protested that she had not done the child any injury, but the elder girl spoke up and said, ‘Yes, you looked at her and said she was pretty, and did not bless her.’ The woman admitted this, and that if she had done any harm to the child she was sorry for it, but it could be sorted if wrong had been done. She operated a charm, and the child was soon as brisk as ever.”

A domestic servant relates that a woman who lived in Kil C. had a first-rate cow that was giving a large quantity of milk. One evening when she was milking another woman came into the byre and began praising the cow, and expressing her amazement at the quantity of milk she gave. No more was thought of this, till at next milking the cow did not give so much, and continued to get worse. It became evident that she had been injured by the person who had praised her so much.

A Campbeltown man says, “I am sure I do not know about these things, for I have never seen anything of it myself, but I mind my neighbour over there, D. M., saying to me one day not long ago, that a woman was going past some time before that, and she began to praise one of his cows, saying what a grand udder she had and such fine teats. No doubt the cow was good, he said, and a fine milker, but after that day her milk went from her.”

A married woman of about forty-five “believes firmly in the existence of the Evil Eye,” and relates as a proof: Mrs. McD., a neighbour, told her lately that she was churning. The butter was actually on the churn when Mrs. B. came in, and looking into the churn began to praise the stuff, and said how well off she was to be getting such beautiful butter. She just stayed a minute or two and then went away. After she was gone the butter scattered on the churn, and do what she would she could not get it to gather again. All she could get was froth, and it continued that way with her for several churnings.

A girl of twenty-four, a domestic servant, a crofter’s daughter with a good School Board education, said, “Cronachadh is still in it. My mother was churning not long ago at all, and that woman Mrs. C. came in, and looking into the churn said, ‘Oh! what a lot of butter!’ Well, the butter went off, and though my mother churned and churned she did not get a bit of that churning, nor for a churning or two after that. We believed that the butter had been taken away.”

A woman who admits that she is a firm believer in the Evil Eye, tells of the following case within her own knowledge. Two women were living beside each other, and she knew them both personally. Each had a pig, and they were striving whose pig should be fattest. One of them had a cow, the other had not. The one that had the cow was giving her pig lots of milk. It was growing fast and surpassing the other. One day the neighbour came in, and while they were looking at it and saying how well it was thriving, she remarked, “Cha’n iongantach a mhuc agadsa bhi cho math on is e sin an seorsa biadh tha thu toirt dith.” (“No wonder your pig is so good, since that is the kind of food you are giving to her.”) After a little while the woman left, but was not long gone when the pig took ill, and when it was apparently getting no better they sent to Gortan-na-lag for one living there believed to have knowledge. When he came and saw the pig he said they had been too late in sending for him, and told them at once that it had been air a cronachadh, and he showed them who had done the mischief.

A cailleach, notorious as having the Evil Eye, was calling in the house of an acquaintance of the reciter, and when she was leaving she praised a fine hen that was in the yard. It was one of her best hens, and the woman praised it very much. That very day what happened but this hen was taken in dead, and the woman declared she could never get out of her mind that it had been a case of Evil Eye blight.

A LOOK DOES IT

The belief in an Evil Eye having arisen, it is perfectly clear that a mere look, quite unaccompanied by any other action, would soon be considered a quite sufficient cause of the mischief such an eye would occasion. A gamekeeper’s wife, a “canty body,” as she is described, told how some lads on a Sunday, who had watched a mare and foal grazing for some time, were credited with damaging the foal, because shortly after they left it lay kicking on the ground and would not suck.