In the evening the man left the house to go out to the fishing. As soon as he had gone the woman took a notion in her head to bake, as she had only the heel o’ the loaf left for breakfast. Now, Themselves can’t stand lazy ways, and baking after sunset is the one thing they won’t abide. She who does so will meet their revenge—something is sure to be taken by them, but seldom worse than some of the live stock. Well, the woman set to work to bake some barley bread and flour cake. First, she went out to get gorse to put under the griddle, slipping the bolt on the door as she came in, that none of the neighbours would catch her and cry shame on her for baking after sunset. She got some meal out of the barrel and put it on the round table, and put salt and water on it, and then she kneaded the meal and clapped a cake out as thin as sixpence with her hands. But she was only a middling poor baker, one of the sort that has to use a knife to make the cake of a right round. She had turned the cake twice, and taken it off, and brushed the griddle with a white goose wing ready for the next cake which she was busy cutting round with her knife. Just at that moment there was heard the sound of something heavy lumbering up to the door. After a few seconds SOMETHING fumbled at the sneg of the door, then SOMETHING knocked high up on the door, and a voice like the thick, gruff voice of a giant was heard saying, ‘Open, open for me.’ She made no answer. Again there was a loud knock and a big hoarse voice was heard which cried: ‘Woman of the house, open for me.’ Then the door burst open and behold ye, what should she see but a great, big ugly beast of a Buggane rushing in mad with rage. Without as much as a ‘By your leave,’ he made one grab at her, and clutched hold of her by her apron and swung her on his shoulder, and away with him. Before she knew where she was he rushed her across the fields and down the hill, till he brought her to the top of the Spooyt Vooar, the big waterfall of Glen Meay. As the Buggane tore down the hill, the woman felt the ground tremble under his feet, and the noise of the waterfall filled her ears. And, there in front of her, she saw the stream turn to white spray as it came leaping down the rocks. As the Buggane swung her in the air to throw her into the deep pool, she thought that her last hour had come. Then all at once she remembered the knife that she held in her hand! Quick as thought she cut the string of her apron and down she tumbled to the ground, rolling over and over down the hill. And before he knew where he was the Buggane, with the speed he had on him, pitched forward head first down the rushing Spooyt Vooar. As he went head over heels and down to the bottom of the pool with a souse you’d have heard half a mile away, she heard him give a roar out of him:
Rumbyl, rumbyl, sambyl,
I thought I had a lazy Dirt,
And I have but the edge of her skirt.
And that was the last that was seen of that fellow!
HOW THE MANX CAT LOST HER TAIL
When Noah was calling the animals into the Ark, there was one cat who was out mousing and took no notice when he was calling to her. She was a good mouser, but this time she had trouble to find a mouse and she took a notion that she wouldn’t go into the Ark without one.
So at last, when Noah had all the animals safe inside, and he saw the rain beginning to fall, and no sign of her coming in, he said:
‘Who’s out is out, and who’s in is in!’ And with that he was just closing the door when the cat came running up, half drowned—that’s why cats hate the water—and just squeezed in, in time. But Noah had slammed the door as she ran in and it cut off her tail, so she got in without it, and that is why Manx cats have no tails to this day. That cat said: