The Highland bagpipe

by W. L. Manson

I should think not. He had had quite enough of the fairies. They, however, seem to have had a soft side to pipers, at least we often read of them helping the musicians with their music. The first story which illustrates this comes from one of the Inner Hebrides, and is given in J. F. Campbell’s Tales of the West Highlands, the actual words of the narrator being used. It was told in a houseful of people, all of whom seemed to believe it:—

“There was a piper in this island and he had three sons. The two eldest learned the pipes, and they were coming on famously, but the youngest could not learn at all. At last, one day, he was going about in the evening very sorrowfully, when he saw bruth, a fairy hillock, laid open. (There was one close to the house, which was exactly like the rest of its class. It was afterwards levelled and human bones were found in it.) He went up to the door and stuck his knife into it, because he had heard from old people that if he did that the slaugh could not shut the door. Well, the fairies were very angry, and asked him what he wanted, but he was not a bit afraid. He told them he could not play the pipes a bit, and asked them to help him. They gave him feadan dubh, a black chanter, but he said: ‘That’s no use to me for I don’t know how to play it.’

“Then they came about him and showed him how to move his fingers; that he was to lift that one and lay down that, and when he had been with them a while he thanked them and took out his knife and went away, and the bruth closed after him.

“Now, that man became one of the most famous pipers, and his people were alive until very lately. I am sure you all know that.”

Chorus—“Oh yes, yes indeed. It is certain that there were such people whether they are now or not.”

If all tales be true, the fairies had something to do with the eminent genius of the Mac Crimmons themselves. Once upon a time, to use the proper phrase, there was a great gathering of the clans at Dunvegan Castle. Mac Leod was entertaining the chiefs, and each chief was accompanied by his piper. The chiefs were great and the pipers were great, and somehow it was agreed that there should be a trial of skill among the musicians present—twelve in all. Mac Leod himself directed the proceedings, and one by one the great instrumentalists stepped into the hall and made the rafters dirl with their well-known strains. But Mac Leod became anxious as he noticed that there was no sign of his own piper, the old piper who had served him so long. He sent a boy to search, and the boy returned with the sad news—the piper was hopelessly drunk. The brow of Mac Leod grew dark with anger, for he was not to be humbled in his own household and in the presence of his guests. The tenth piper was tuning up—there was but another, and then his disgrace would be public property. In the desperation of despair Mac Leod seized the boy by the hand and whispered: “You are the twelfth piper, remember your chief’s words.” The boy, Mac Crimmon by name, left the hall, while the feasting and fun went on as merrily as ever, and lay down on the hillside and bemoaned his fate. But his good fairy was not far away. She came right out of the ground, as pretty a little fairy as ever helped poor mortal in desperate plight. She knew his trouble, and did not waste words, but gave the distracted boy a curiously-shaped whistle, and bade him play on it. The youngster would do anything to oblige the kind lady, so he blew on the whistle, and lo! the hills and the rocks re-echoed with the finest music ever heard in Skye. The good fairy disappeared, and the boy ran back to the castle, where the eleventh piper was playing the last notes of his pibroch. The chiefs and the pipers laughed to see the boy step it out into the centre of the assembled company, but their scorn was turned to admiration as compositions played in faultless and brilliant manner poured from the boy’s “pipes.” Thenceforth Mac Crimmon was prince of pipers, and we do not read that ever the good fairy came back to claim any recompense for what she had done; neither have we any explanation of why she gave him a whistle (? a chanter) and not a set of pipes right off.

Another story of the Mac Crimmons, but one that has not many points of resemblance to the other, is told by Lord Archibald Campbell in Records of Argyll. It is from the lips of Hector Mac Lean, of Islay, and tells of how, when Mac Donald of the Isles resided in the palace on Finlagan Isle, in Loch Finlagan, he had a ploughman who, from his large stature, was called the Big Ploughman. This ploughman was out one day at his work, and he had a boy with him driving the horses, as was the custom in those times. The Big Ploughman was seized with hunger, and he said to the boy:

“My good fellow, were it to be got in the ordinary way, or magically, I would take food in the meantime, were I to have it.”

After he had said these words, he and the boy took another turn with the team, till they came to the side of Knockshainta. There was an old grey-haired man by the side of the hill, who had a table covered with all manner of eatables. He asked them to come and partake of what was on the table. The ploughman went, but the boy was frightened, and would not go. After the ploughman had eaten enough, the old man gave him a chanter to play. When he put his fingers to it, he, who had never played before, played as well as any piper that ever was in the island of Islay. A day or two after, Mac Donald heard, in his palace on Island Finlagan, the Big Ploughman playing the Black Chanter. He inquired who it was, and they told him it was the Big Ploughman. When he heard how well the ploughman played there was nothing for it but to get for him the bagpipe of the three drones, and he was Mac Donald’s piper as long as he lived.

Mac Donald went on a trip to the Isle of Skye. He took with him from thence a young man of the name of Mac Crimmon, who was fond of music, and was doing a little at it. He went to the Big Ploughman to learn more music from him than he had already. Mac Crimmon and the ploughman’s daughter began courting and in consequence of the fancy that the girl took to Mac Crimmon—believing that he would marry her—she took the Black Chanter unknown to her father out of the chest, and gave it to Mac Crimmon to try it. When Mac Crimmon tried it he could play as well as the Big Ploughman himself. The girl asked the chanter back, but he entreated her to let him have it for a few days until he should practise a little further on it. A short time after Mac Donald of the Isles went off to Skye, and Mac Crimmon went with him. He did not return the chanter, neither did he come back to marry the Big Ploughman’s daughter. The people of Islay say it was in this way that the music went from Islay to the Isle of Skye.