His mountains be scaling;
Sitting sadly I sorrow,
Heavy hearted and ailing.”
Tradition says that John Garbh of Raasay was drowned through the machinations of a witch. She bore him a grudge, and while the boat was at sea she sat in her hut rocking a basin of milk in which there was a clam shell to represent the boat. When she sank the clam shell the boat sank, the story being that a crow alighted on the gunwale, and that Mac Leod, in trying to kill it with his sword, cut the boat to the waters’ edge. There are several improbable things about this tradition, not the least obvious of which is the impossibility of knowing how the boat sank when no one was left to tell the tale. However, it is a tradition—that much at least is true.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Some Well-Known Gatherings.
“Ye voices of Cona, of high swelling power,
Ye bards who can sing of her olden time,
On whose spirits arise the blue panoplied throng
Of her ancient hosts, who are mighty and strong,