Transcriber’s Notes

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations in hyphenation and accents have been standardised except in the Gaelic passages, but all other spelling and punctuation remains unchanged.

EVIL EYE
IN THE
WESTERN HIGHLANDS

BY THE SAME AUTHOR
THE GAMES AND DIVERSIONS OF
ARGYLESHIRE. Demy 8vo, viii.-270 pp.,
cloth, uncut, 10s. 6d. net.

This volume forms No. 47 of the Publications
of the Folk-Lore Society.

EVIL EYE
IN THE
WESTERN HIGHLANDS

BY
R. C. MACLAGAN, M.D.
AUTHOR OF
“THE GAMES AND DIVERSIONS OF ARGYLESHIRE”

LONDON
DAVID NUTT, 57-59 LONG ACRE
1902

Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.
At the Ballantyne Press

CONTENTS

EVIL EYE

INTRODUCTION

The Evil Eye is a superstition arising not from local circumstances, or peculiarity of a great or small division of the human family, but is a result of an original tendency of the human mind. The natural irritation felt at the hostile look of a neighbour, still more of an enemy, is implanted in the breast of all, however much they may be influenced by moral teaching. When we add to this the feeling that some valued possession has attracted the coveteous desire of another, the fear of loss is added to the irritation of mere anger. To some such natural feeling we must ascribe the belief in an Evil Eye.

Theories of an origin more restricted, founded on the fear of loss or damage to particular possessions of individuals guaranteed them by the custom of law, developed in the community of which they form part, scarcely satisfy after inquiry. Where a subsistence can be easily procured the Evil Eye would be little regarded in connection with food, but might naturally develop itself in connection with the relations of the sexes. No doubt the latter, the most interesting to individuals of all passions, causes feelings of hostility between rivals universally, but where the food supply is difficult to procure one would naturally expect that damage from the covetous desires of others, where they seemed to affect the life-preserving store, would become equally important.

In the following study of the belief of an Evil Eye among the Gaelic-speaking peoples of Scotland at the present day, an attempt is made neither to disguise nor to improve upon what those in contact with believers have learned from their mouths. The writer is a believer in the Evil Eye only in so far as it may be a term for the natural selfishness of the human being, as a “tender heart” is a recognised way of speaking of a nature apt to sympathy. Selfishness, natural to all of us, is apt to find expression in our habits, however much we may disguise it by religious or charitable profession. Were it a part of our nature to have for our neighbour the same affection that we have for ourselves, no such superstition as that of the Evil Eye could have arisen. But we are not made that way, and so reformers, in endeavouring to cure this sin, as they consider it, have preached and tried to practise such ordinances as “Thou shalt not covet,” and “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” Truly hard sayings, and in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand with difficulty getting beyond the status of a pious opinion.

Not that that teaching has been without effect; and we may hope that with the extension of communications and the progress gradually being made to that condition of things where

“Man to man the world o’er

Shall brithers be for a’ that,”

the bad e’e may some day in these isles be merely a study for folklorists as Totemism is, and as difficult to find as an auk’s egg.

Right or wrong, the theory here advanced accounts, satisfactorily, as far as the writer can judge, for the present-day widespread belief in Scotland of the power for evil of the glance of the human eye.

As will be seen afterwards, there are those who theorise on the bad heart influencing the eye, the ill effect of the Evil Eye only arising from the glance of the covetous; but this is probably the result of preconceived religious ideas, and of the moral teaching to which its believers have been accustomed. It is not to be wondered at; it would be impossible indeed, but that the teaching of Christianity should have affected and given a direction to this ancient superstition. Thus we find it Christianised to a marked degree, its origin is conceived of as a breaking of the commandment “Thou shalt not covet,” and its cures are mostly connected with a reference to the Deity, and to the Trinity of the Christian. The magic thread with the three knots on it, though heathen in its origin, has surely some connection with the rosary, the aspersion with water, with baptism, and the holy water of the Roman Church. But it is not a superstition introduced with Christianity, it is as native as the heather of our hills, or the sandstone rock of the Coronation Stone.

This statement might be safely enough advanced upon general principles, but we are not without satisfactory literary evidence of what we advance. In the Ossianic “Acallam na Senorach” (The Colloquy with the Ancient Men), the second longest prose composition of the mediæval Irish, a collection (probably made in the late twelfth or thirteenth century) of separate stories united together in one framework, we find the following as related in MSS. of the fifteenth century and later.

The Fiann are on a visit to the King of Munster. The son of the King of Ulster marries the daughter of the King of Munster.

“The damsel bore him a famous and beautiful son named Fer Oc (‘young man’), and in all Ireland there were scarcely one whose shape and vigour and spear-casting were as good as his.”

On a subsequent visit, the three battalions of the Fiann are lost in admiration of the activity and skill of a young man who turns out to be this Fer Oc. “Then was a hunt and a battue held by the three battalions of the Fiann. Howbeit, on that day, owing to Fer Oc (and his superior skill) to none of the Fiann it fell to get first blood of pig or deer. Now when they came home, after finishing the hunt, a sore lung-disease attacked Fer Oc, through the (evil) eyes of the multitude and the envy of the great host, and it killed him, soulless, at the end of nine days.” “He was buried on yonder green-grassed hill,” says Cailte, “and the shining stone that he held when he was at games and diversion is that yonder rising out of his head.”[1] The Gaelic here simply says “tre tsuilib na sochaide” (through the eyes of the multitude), and it will be seen that modern reciters sometimes speak in exactly the same way of the “eye” unqualified, but meaning the Evil Eye. But there is more than this in the story; it is a young man who suffers, and the young are most easily affected. It is a remarkable and handsome youth that suffers, and what attracts the eye, especially beauty, is peculiarly liable to injury, and the statement is made that it was the envious glance which affected the victim. Cormac’s Glossary (an Irish compilation begun in the tenth century, and added to throughout the Middle Ages), preserved in MSS. of the commencement of the fifteenth century, mentions the Evil Eye:—

Milled (spoiling, hurting, (b) i.e. mi shilledh, a mislook, i.e. an evil eye).

Millead i mi shillead i silled olc. [Or as in another MS.]

Milliud quasi mishilliud i drochshilliud.

To this O’Clery adds “no droch amharc,” while O’Donovan’s note at (b) is “the evil eye,” “the injury done by the evil eye.”[2]

[1] Irische Texte. Stokes and Windisch, fourth series, vol i. pp. 232, 234, 161.

[2] Cormac’s Glossary, translated by O’Donovan, edited by Whitley Stokes, p. 107; and Three Irish Glossaries, by W. S., p. 28.

Our business is with the so-called facts of the Evil Eye, and whether or not in this case the philology of the compiler of the Glossary is right, there can be no sort of doubt of the allusion being to the present living belief in the Evil Eye.

Apart from the doing of evil, and causing sickness and death without immediate increase to the possessions of the witch, the effect of the Evil Eye centres round the natural covetousness of the greedy person. Where the owner of an evil eye gets no benefit himself, the effect ascribed is always to diminish what he might envy in the possession of another. It is always the young and toradh of cattle (milk and butter), or the fruits of the labour of the owner that is lessened or destroyed. Whatever the philological root of this word toradh, it must surely be allied with the irregular verb thoir (give); and though there seems at first sight no close relationship between personal beauty and a good churning, yet both of them are highly prized gifts. Toradh means fruit produce; thus Cain’s offering was the toradh of the earth.

The expression used in Kintyre for the power of taking away produce is pisreag. In Arran the word applied to the curative measures is pisearachd. Piseach means increase; thus in Proverbs xviii. 20, where it is said that a man shall be filled with the “increase of his lips,” the Gaelic word used is piseach, and so it comes to mean progeny and good fortune. Piseach ort (Good fortune be yours). Irish Gaelic gives piseog (witchcraft). Surely this is a secondary meaning from the idea of increase and good fortune being in certain cases brought about by charms and witchery. And thus we have found pisearachd explained as the Arran and Kintyre equivalent for geasarachd, of which all the evidence seems to favour its primary signification being connected with spells and charms.

Another word which has been used to collectors for eolas (science of its own magical sort) is fiosachd, which the dictionaries give as meaning “foretelling,” “augury.” This seems to be a secondary and limited application of a term meaning possession of fios (knowledge, information).

The popular mixing up of legitimate curative measures, such as come from the administration of drugs, with what undoubtedly is considered illegitimate, namely, the use of charms and sorcery in general, is of course as common as can be in the experience of those in contact with genuine savagery, but it occurs also nearer home. A native of Arran tells how she remembers an old woman, of whom the people were afraid because she was supposed to be a witch. The groundwork of this accusation was that she was to be often seen gathering herbs, and the reciter remembers when she herself was a girl, that, to use her own words, it was “the fright of her life” to meet her in a lonely place, or in the dark.

An inquiry such as this has to be conducted with care. The believer is sensitive to ridicule, and would take as a mortal offence being publicly gibbeted, so as to cause animadversion from others, even when he himself is convinced of the truth of his beliefs and sayings. For this reason we must be excused giving the name and residence of the various reciters. The information has to be drawn in general conversation and incidentally, but every care has been taken to avoid recounting anything in which mala fides is suspected. We consider in many cases things told by a daughter of her mother, or a son of his father, as equally reliable as if detailed by himself when we know they have been recited originally for information of the juniors. Undoubtedly the younger generation are in many cases more critical than their forefathers; but we have no hesitation in maintaining that what will hereafter be set down allows of a fairly perfect appreciation of the belief of the great majority of the less educated class, and of many much above that in the West Highlands, up to the introduction of the School Board as a universal institution. Of course there always were doubters, and the tricks played to take a rise out of a believer by an unbeliever may sometimes figure as accepted evidence of the bad effects of the Evil Eye, when it was a trick played off merely for fun, though in other cases deliberately intended to mislead. Tricks, however, will not carry us back to an original cause, however much they may have helped the maintenance of the belief in superstitious minds. These fail entirely in power of appreciation of the jocular, when what is done is dangerous according to their ideas. A strong believer in the Evil Eye, and of course much afraid of it, in the island of Skye, was one day out among the cows. Two of his neighbours passing, one of them, a bit of a wag, said to his companion: “Bheir mi da sgillinn duit ma theid thu agus do cheann a chuir fodh’n mhart sin agus glaodh ’nach mor an t-uth tha aig a bho” (“I will give you twopence if you will go and put your head under that cow and cry, Hasn’t the cow the big udder?”)

The fellow agreed, and went and bent his head under the cow and shouted out at the top of his voice, calling Rory’s attention to his supposititious admiration of the remarkable development of the cow in question. The man tempted to make the remark was “a little soft.” Rory at once thinking of the Evil Eye, seized his stick and rushed at him, threatening to break his head if he would not at once bless the cow. The suborned perpetrator of the joke, it need scarcely be said, at once took the method demanded to counteract his injudicious praise. How many of us are, not in the belief of the Evil Eye, but in other beliefs, just as touchy as our friend Rory.

The stick may be good enough for a defence of superstition, but ridicule is the proper method of attack.

A young intelligent lady was lately in a house in the village of Golspie, the occupant of which, mourning over the dying of her fowls, said she suspected it was the result of the Evil Eye of Mrs. X., a neighbour. The next day, being in the same house, another neighbour came in carrying a growing plant, which she presented to the complainer, saying: “Mrs. X. told me that you had your eye on this, and ever since it has done no good; the leaves have been withering and falling off. Now!—there it is to you! keep it.”

The person superstitious enough to believe in the force of the Evil Eye may well be expected to have his superstitious faculty developed in other directions. A child took ill, and its parents believed it was the Evil Eye of a certain woman which had done the harm. With the view of bringing her to confess her doings, or in any case to punish her, they procured a square of turf, and having stuck a lot of pins in it, they placed it on the fire. This action, one of the forms of the so-called corp creadha, was intended to do personal injury to the suspected party. There was no evidence of it having had any effect whatever.

EVIL EYE

After the long existence in this country of Christianity, while we talk composedly of the superstitions of the heathen and of other Christian nations, we are apt to forget our own, or if we speak of them, we look on them pityingly as peculiar to some individuals of whose opinion we reckon little. In towns, and among those who read many books, the constant friction of man against man hinders the survival of a belief in such a thing as the Evil Eye, now that a certain quantity of education is common property. Where the incidents of life are less crowded, and individual experiences are rarer and at longer intervals, that is, in country districts and especially in the more mountainous and less closely populated, the Evil Eye has yet in Scotland many believers, and consequently considerable influence. Such a remark as the following, made to a minister, is not so rare as one might suppose: “Nae doot whatever Mac had the Evil Eye, that’s certain. I have known many cases when a calf, or even a cow, died the day after he looked at her.” Another said of the same: “I was once in the dairy when he came in. ‘You should not have let that bad man in,’ said Nancy MacIntyre to me. ‘Why?’ said I. ‘Because he has an Evil Eye,’ said she. Now, I will not say that this was true, but this I know, that on that very day one of the cows bursted, and died from eating clover. What do ye say to that?”

Another sample is the following: A farmer’s son, whose father had lost a horse, was thus addressed by a neighbour, “You had a horse that was ill, is it better?” “Oh no, it is dead.” “You are unfortunate this year. Isn’t that four that have died on you?” “Yes, but we know now what was wrong with them.” “Weel, that’s well; ye’ll know what to do should any more take ill. What was wrong with them?” “They were air-an-cronachadh” (harmed). “Such nonsense! there is nothing of that now.” The lad did not agree with this, said they knew who did it, and the lad’s interrogator’s mother-in-law joined in the conversation, agreeing as to the correctness of the diagnosis; and the doubter rejoined, “Well, if you are all against me, I may stop.”

An Argyllshire islander says:—

“Tha buideachas uile air falbh anis agus is math gu bheil, oir be ni olc a bha ann. Ach, ma dh’fhalbh sin, tha rud eile nach d’fhalbh fathast, agus ‘se sin cronachadh. Chunnaic m’i ann mo thigh fein mucuircean, agus thainig ban-choimhearsnach a steach latha, agus thubhairt i gum bu mhuc ciatach a bha’n sin. ‘Tha i gle mhath,’ fhreagair mi fhein. Well, chaidh am boireannach a mach, agus cha robh i tiota air falbh, nur a thug a mhuc an aon sgreach aisde agus air dol mun cuairt dith, thuit i air an urlar. Le so, thainig D. ‘ac A. a stigh, agus fheoraich e ‘Co an t-aon mu dheireadh a chunnaic a mhuc?’ Dh’ innis mi fhein dha, gum be a leithid so ‘a bhean. ‘Mata’ ars esan, ‘s ise rinn an t-olc. Ach ma tha uillidh sam bi lar ruit, cha chreid mi gum bi mise fada ga cuir ceirt. Fhuair mi dha uillidh nam piocach, agus ghabh e a mhuc eadar a dha chois, agus thaom e lan copa dheth na beul. Thug a mhuc reibhig, agus shaoil mi fhein gu robh i air chuthach ach ann a’ mionaid a dh’uine, bha i ceirt gu leoir; Nis, nach be sud an droch bhean?”

(“Witchcraft is all gone now, and it is well it is, for it was a bad thing. But if that is gone, there is another thing that has not gone yet, and that is Cronachadh. I saw a breeding sow in my own house, and one day a neighbour came in, and she said that that was a splendid sow. I answered that she was very good. Well, the woman went out, and she was no time away when the sow gave such a scream, and going round about she fell on the floor. With this D. Mac A. came in, and he asked who was the last person that had seen the sow. I told him it was such and such a woman. ‘Well,’ said he, ‘it was she that did the harm, but if you have any oil beside you, I believe I shall not be long putting her right.’ I got saithe oil for him, and he took the sow between his two legs, and poured a cupful into her mouth. She screamed, and I thought she was mad, but in a minute’s time she was all right. Now, wasn’t that the bad woman?”)

A young fellow who had received a liberal education, in fact, a probationer of the Church, the son of a self-made man, fairly well-to-do, avowed his own belief in the Evil Eye. He said in effect: “As sure as you and I are sitting here there is an Evil Eye in it. I know that when I was in Harris, and our M. an infant, there was a certain woman who used to come in pretty often, the sister-in-law of H., you know, and my wife, who you know is not one to tell a lie or speak about these things, told me that every time that woman came in she would be praising the child, and the child was always unwell after it.”

We thus see, though we know that ministers of the Church are by their profession kept in the dark on matters of which they would express unbelief, yet that where a superstition is ingrained in a parishioner it is not concealed from the minister. Ministers may be misled by putting their own interpretation on the form in which the information comes to them. A clergyman in one of the Western Islands said: “I have observed that there is still a strong belief in blighting from the Evil Eye among the people in the parish of K. A respectable and intelligent man whom I visited often during a season of sickness, once and again, when talking about his illness, made the remark ‘fhuair mi cronachadh.’ I always misunderstood what the man meant by cronachadh, taking it in the sense of reproof, and therefore thinking that what was meant was that the sufferer was placed under chastisement by a dispensation of Providence. At last, however, I learned from a third person that the sick man was strongly impressed with the belief that his illness was caused by some evil-intentioned person who had wished him ill.” This suggests witchcraft as much as or even more than the Evil Eye; but the two things run into each other more or less. We have already seen one Gaelic reciter maintaining that witchcraft, buidseachas, did not now exist, but the Evil Eye did. Compare that with this from a native of Uist:—

“Ma ta bha buidseashas ann. Chaidh mi fhein aon latha gu tigh coimhearsnaich airson coileach oig, agus bha laogh aca ceangailte aig cul an doruis. Cha robh mi fada san tigh gus an d’thainig nighean a steach. ’Nuair a fhuair mise an t-eun, dh’fhalbh mi, agus cha robh mi ach beagan uine air falbh ’nuair a dh’fhas an laogh tinn. Chuir muinntir an tighe fios thun boireannach a bha ’n sin, aig an robh sgil mu bhuidseachas, mar bhiodh daoine ’g radh, ga h-iarruidh a thighinn a dh’-amhairc an laogh. Thainig am boireannach, ach ma thainig, bha an laogh marbh mus d’thainig i. Co luath ’s a dh’amhairc i air thubhairt i riutha air an spot gum b’e ’n “suill” a dh’aobhraich am bas. Agus air bharrachd air sin, dh’innis i dhoibh co rinn an gonadh. So mar thubhairt i. “Nach robh dithist bhoireannaich agaibh an so am eigin an diugh?” Agus ’nuair a fhreagair iad gun robh, thubhairt ise. “Bha h-aon diubh soilleir, agus an te eile dorcha. Bha shawl glas air an te shoilleir, agus b’bise a dh’oibrich am buidseachas.”

“Nis bha sin gle fhior, oir bha an nighean a thainig a steach nur bha mise san tigh soilleir, agus bha shawl glas oirre cuideachd.”

“Indeed, witchery was in it. I myself went one day to a neighbour’s house for a young cock, and they had a calf tied behind the door. I was not long in the house till a girl came in. When I got the bird I went away, and I was only a short time away when the calf became unwell. The people of the house sent word to a woman that was there, who had skill of witchery, as people would be saying, asking her to come to look at the calf. The woman came, but if (she) came, the calf was dead before she came. As soon as she looked on it, she said to them on the spot, that it was the ‘Eye’ that caused the death. And more than that, she told them who had done the mischief (wounding). Here is how she said: ‘Have you not had two women here sometime to-day?’ and when they answered that there had been, she said: ‘One of them was fair and the other dark. There was a grey shawl on the fair one, and it was she that wrought the witchery.’ Now that was quite true, for the girl that came in when I was in the house was fair, and there was a grey shawl on her.”

A woman of about sixty-five, a reader of history and Gaelic publications, remembers when the belief in the Evil Eye was so common in Islay, that when any disease came among a person’s cattle, it gave rise at once to a strong suspicion that they had been air an cronachadh. The disease was called “dosgach.” When one would come with the news of disease or death among a neighbour’s cattle, the person to whom it was told would say, “Mach an dosgach a so”; or, “Mach a so an droch sgeul” (“Away the plague from here;” or, “Away the evil news from here.”) At the same time, suiting the action to the words, he would tear some piece off the clothes he had on at the time and throw it into the fire. This was supposed to prevent the evil from coming his way.

Indeed there are very many who still act on the belief expressed in the following, by an old distillery workman, uneducated, but naturally shrewd, though we would say credulous: “They will be saying to me that we have no mention of cronachadh in the Bible, and they will be putting it down my throat, but I tell them that it is there. Both the Evil Eye and Witchcraft were in it from the beginning, and they will be in it till the end.”

We may mention here that there is a very strong belief among many of the influence of the “wish” for good or evil. “B. McL. affirms that if she wishes ill to any person ill is sure to follow, and if she wishes well good will come of it. She maintained that a person, lately dangerously ill, owed her recovery to her good wishes.” A person has only to maintain this view, and the superstitious will probably find reasons for believing that it is true. This, however, opens the question of the guidhe (imprecation or intercession, as the case may be), and there are not a few who are applied to to make guidhes of both sorts.

We must consider the meaning of the terms used.

In South Argyllshire the common expression regarding a person or thing affected is that it is air a chronachadh, or, as another in Northern Argyll expressed it, air a chronachen. Cron means a fault or defect, and the verb used seems to be an expression of the opinion that something is wrong with the object, the usual meaning of the word being best translated “reproved,” or “rebuked”; the speaker, as it were, finding some fault in the person or thing spoken to, he sees that it is faulty, and says so. In the case of a person with an Evil Eye, he actually causes defect to the object. Now the same would be true of black magic; thus, air a chronachadh is as apposite to a person affected by witchcraft as by the Evil Eye. It is necessary therefore to distinguish, when one hears of a case of cronachadh, whether it is by mischievous intention or not; and this is done sometimes by the reciter. Thus, a person consulted to cure an animal affected, when telling who it was that was to blame for the evil, said: “Well, ’se duine le ceann dubh a chronaich do bho leis an droch shuil” (“Well, it is a man with a black head that has injured your cow, with the Evil Eye”).

In many districts this expression would merely convey the idea of rebuke (Tyree, Lewis, Dornoch, Kiltearn). In these places the expression usually is Luidh droch shuil air (An evil eye rested on him). In Easter Ross, a person desirous of avoiding reflections would say: “Cha’n eil mi cuir mo shuil ann” (“I am not putting my eye in it”). Even in Arisaig in Southern Inverness-shire, marching with Argyllshire, they use this expression only.

We have already given above, from Uist, an instance in which the speaker simply called it “the Eye,” neither qualifying it as good or bad.

The rapidity of the action is sometimes expressed thus:—A healer called in, said in one case: “Teum do bho, a bhean,” equivalent to saying, “Your cow is bitten or stung,” the word teum being also applied to something snatched. The operation of the Evil Eye in Uist is described by a parallel phrase, air a ghonadh (stabbed), an expression which has been used in Kintyre as synonymous with cronachadh, though there it generally expresses pain felt either bodily or mentally.

An elderly woman, a native of Duthill, Inverness-shire, while stating that there were “plenty of people round about us here who have got the Evil Eye and hurt both cattle and people with it,” gave the following as the expressions used when mentioning it:—

Thuit droch shuil air (An evil eye fell on him).

Ghabh an droch shuil e (The evil eye took him).

Laidh droch shuil air (An evil eye settled on him).

Bhuail droch shuil e (An evil eye struck him).

In the part of Ireland nearest to Scotland at any rate, and so far as the writer knows also in other places, the expression used in English is “blinked.” The readiest conclusion come to as to what is wrong with a sick cow is that “she has been blinked.” Blinked milk, therefore, is milk which yields no butter. Blinked beer, beer which has become sour.

All these expressions, then, of the action of an suil dona, the common expression in part of Inverness-shire, which, seeing “Donas” is the Devil, we might translate the “diabolical eye,” evidently point to the fact that a mere look will do the damage; so the remark of the Islay man, “Ni an fheadhainn aig am bheil an t-suil so cron air beathach neo duine ged nach dean iad ach amhairc orra” (“Those who have this eye will do injury to beast or person, though they do nothing but look on them”), expresses clearly what seems to have been the original notion conveyed in the expressions used.

A strange charm for the closure of the eye was expressed in Arran by the following saying: “Cronachadh air do shuil, cac eun air muin sin” (“Ill on your eye, birds’ excrement on the back of that”). This was an old practice, according to the reciter, who is a woman of about eighty. The account she gave was as follows:—Her father had bought some cattle at the market. “They were fine beasts, and the servantman and I, then a young girl, were driving them home. When we were passing King’s Cross a man stood and looked keenly at them. The servantman did not like this, and turning towards him said the words recited.” They were avowedly used to save the cattle from being hurt by the man’s eye, and as the old lady said, “Whether that saved them or no I could not tell, but in any case we reached home safely and no harm came to the cows.”

The Islay expression already quoted, Mach an dosgach, contains within it the suggestion of evil coming to the unprotected, Dosgadh (calamity, misfortune), etymologically having the signification, without protection.[3] Subsequently we will find that no grown person need be unprotected if he will take a very small amount of trouble.

[3] Macbain, “Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language.“

Another Arran formula used in connection with the Evil Eye, and said to be protective, was mentioned in an account of a shepherd who lived in the island, said to have an Evil Eye. He could hurt cattle, and also cure the effect of the Evil Eye of another. The reciter said he was a queer fellow, and remembers him at the first Cattle Show ever he (reciter) attended, and being frightened by being addressed, with other boys, for being in his road: “Mach a sin leibh. Cha’n ann airson an itheadh a tha iad” (“Out of that with you. They are not for eating”), said the shepherd, as he drove his cattle. His mentioning eating recalled to the boys’ minds his Evil Eye, and the following formula to be repeated in cases of cronachadh. “Ma dh’itheas iad thu, gun sgeith iad thu, agus gun garbh sgeith iad thu” (“If they eat you, may they vomit you, and roughly vomit you”). This seems to be chaff from non-believers to believers, possibly also the case with the formula above, more than a thing really said with a belief in its curative power.

LOCALITY OF BELIEF

There is a considerable difference between some wandering folklorist happening on a superstitious survival in some ancient crone or secluded corner, and in the general acceptation by many, if not by a majority, of some belief regarded by the more instructed as to be so classed.

The belief in the Evil Eye in the West of Scotland comes decidedly under the latter category. Interrogatories show that it exists in Caithness, Sutherland, Ross-shire, Inverness-shire, Elgin, Argyll, Perthshire, in the Lewis, Harris, both Uists, Barra, Skye, Tiree, Islay, the Isle of Man, Arran, and Antrim in Ireland. A wide enough field this. Of course there are many unbelievers, of all classes nearly, though the less the education, the more frequent the evidences of belief. An attempt to state a proportion of believers as against unbelievers is quite out of the question. One witness will tell you it was common enough in his youth, or very common, but in speaking of the present day, reliable witnesses will say, perhaps, most usually “pretty common,” or “quite common,” not unfrequently, however, “very common,” or, as one unbeliever said, “you hear of them often enough.” A cautious man, when you try to get exact information as to the potency of the belief, will answer that it is “strongly” held by some, and of this there can be no sort of doubt; and it is much more common than most people think.

Though we are treating of the Highlands and Islands, it must not be supposed that the “ill e’e” is a Highland speciality, speaking of Scotland alone, of course. It may with perfect sincerity be said, with all due caution, that it is “pretty common” among Lowlanders also.

SOCIAL POSITION OF BELIEVERS

The persons among whom this belief is most usual are undoubtedly to be found principally among the agricultural and fishing population, though it is not unknown, by any means, even in such a town as Oban, where a reciter of Evil Eye incidents says “it is pretty common.” When one speaks of a farmer in many parts of the Low Country, one naturally thinks of well-educated men with comparatively large holdings, and such men, of course, are to be met with in the Highlands in appreciable numbers. There is no evidence that these have faith in the Evil Eye; but the smaller farmers, doing their own work with assistance, are often deeply imbued. A native of Kintyre says, “I know a respectable farmer who, when anything goes wrong with his horses, is quite in the habit of suspecting that it is injury by the Evil Eye, and will send at once for a certain woman in the neighbourhood, who is supposed to be able to cure in cases of cronachadh.”

So lately as July 1898, in one of the islands a child was unwell. The doctor was there and the minister was there, but still the child was getting worse. At length the parents concluded that it was a case of cronachadh, and a man who practises as a professional in cases of that kind was sent for. On arriving he confirmed them in their suspicion, and told them that it was a woman with brown hair that had done the harm. The reciter (a minister’s wife) did not know what means he took to cure the child, but whatever they were they were not successful. The child died.

Most of our beliefs are inherited, and so it is, perhaps, no wonder if one comes upon a young man, a probationer of the Church who has gone through his curriculum of study, and yet believes in the Evil Eye. No evidence, however, is forthcoming of a licensed medical man having any belief in it. It must be admitted that the greater part of the information is got from women, and if believers were polled, the majority would be found of the less stern sex.

From the small farmer downwards, among all owners of stock, and this includes chickens and the pig, believers are frequent.

In some places there is but little secrecy as to those who have the Evil Eye, or at least are supposed to have it. We refrain from publishing the full names, so that if by any chance those spoken of see this they may not be offended; but this is a sample of a common style of remark: “Tha, tha, tha droch shuil aig Anna nic E. Nach robh Mrs. MacT. ag innseadh dhomh fhein nach bu mhor nach robh aon da clann marbh le droch shuil a’ bhoirionnach sin uair. Bha e air a chronachadh leatha, agus bhitheadh e marbh ach airson Anna T.” (“Yes, yes, Ann McE. has an Evil Eye. Was not Mrs. MacT. telling myself that one of her children was once nearly dead through the Evil Eye of that woman. He was injured by her, and would have been dead had it not been for Ann T.”) Ann T. was a practitioner of eolas.

DESCRIPTION OF POSSESSORS OF EVIL EYE

Anybody may have the Evil Eye, but that certain people suggest the Evil Eye to others from their appearance must be admitted. A minister, himself a son of the manse, who has had Highland surroundings all his early life, bears witness, “The possession was more frequently ascribed to females than to males, and for the most part to elderly women.” Another minister, an older man than the former, says of the Evil Eye: “They were chiefly women that were suspected, and were generally much disliked in the communities.” These two reciters were as far apart as Arran and Ross-shire.

Was the Evil Eye ascribed to them because they were disliked, or were they disliked because they had the Evil Eye? Women do not improve in appearance with age, nor men either, for the matter of that, and one of our reciters, in describing a case of cronachadh, said that the operator was “a bad-looking woman at any rate, and had a queer look.” In Knapdale we hear of one who was “a decent enough looking woman, but there was this about her, people always suspected her of having some evil power, and nobody liked to refuse her if she asked anything.” Another of the accused was “strange in her dress, and spoke in an imperious manner.”

It is curious to note that, having quoted all the descriptions of individuals we have, the criticisms should all be levelled at women; but it must not be supposed that men are at all exempt. The writer was amused, and not a little astonished, to hear that an old gentleman, a connection of his own, a large farmer and not unknown beyond his own district, certainly not a greedy man, and a pleasant companion, was among some as notorious for his Evil Eye as for his knowledge of his business. He was a Low Country man by descent, ignorant of Gaelic, and surrounded by Gaelic-speaking Highlanders, some of whom however, proprietors and taxmen, were said to be as bad as himself.

The only diagnostic mark that has been mentioned, physically demonstrating a possessor, was got from an Islay woman, who said that she had always heard that a person whose eyes are of a different colour has the Evil Eye. This seems explicable enough; if one were a nice bright blue eye or a deep and gentle brown one, and the other paler and less expressive, their best friends might say that they had a “bad eye.” All the parti-coloured eyes in Scotland would not account for a tenth part of the results accredited to evil eyes.

Small are the changes in the ideas of men in some respects, even after long intervals.

In the old Irish saga, entitled the Sack of Da Derga’s Hostel, describing events which occurred, according to the Irish analysts, either B.C. 31, or A.D. 43:[4] “When they were there they saw a lone woman coming to the door of the hostel, after sunset, and seeking to be let in. As long as a weaver’s beam was each of her two shins, and they were as dark as the back of a stag-beetle. A greyish, woolly mantle she wore. Her lower hair used to reach as far as her knee. Her lips were on one side of her head. She came and put one of her shoulders against the door-post of the house, casting the Evil Eye on the King and the youths who surrounded him in the hostel.”[5]

[4] Translated by Whitley Stokes, Revue Celtique, vol. xxii. p. 12.

[5] Whitley Stokes, Revue Celtique, xxii. pp. 57-59. The existing redaction of within saga is certainly as old as the tenth century.

The Gaelic word translated by Stokes here “casting the Evil Eye” is in the original Gaelic “oc admilliud ind rig,” literally to this day “hurting or spoiling the king,” cronachadh, in fact. It says nothing of incantations or magical observances, and the translation given seems thoroughly justified. The description of Cailb, Samon, Sinand (she was the possessor of many names), of course imaginatively exaggerates her ugliness, but her evil looks, with her black fire-burned shins, is just what one would expect to hear of an old woman credited with the Evil Eye nowadays, though it is not now common to expose so much leg as to show the effect of toasting it at the fire.

One can easily fancy that the warriors of Ireland would have no pleasure in encountering Cailb. A like objection is common in the present day in regard to persons with an Evil Eye.

A Western Islander says: “People would be blaming J. B., but there was one worse than her. Nobody who ever met M. McA. when on his way to fish, would go on, for it was believed that no fish would be got after meeting her.” The reciter himself and another man were on their way to fish when they met this woman. The other suggested that there was no use going now, for they would not get anything, that was sure. The reciter said that he grudged turning back, although he believed his companion was right; but not to waste time, and to avoid the chance of other mischief, they both returned home.

“J. McE. was said to have the Evil Eye, and no one liked to meet her if they were going on important business, especially to fish; some would even turn back if they met her.”

OBJECTION TO MEETING AN EVIL EYE

Another informant, speaking of a woman with an Evil Eye and who consequently was unlucky to meet, said: “Three fishermen met her, and one of them proposed that they should turn back; it was no use going on, they would get nothing. The others persisted and overruled him. They were for a while unsuccessful, and he who had proposed returning was very impatient, and kept grumbling and saying they should have returned home. They did catch a few at last.”

Speaking of those who were supposed to take the milk and butter from other people’s cows, an educated Arran man said: “This class were looked upon as being unlucky to meet on the road, and people tried to avoid them, especially if they were going on any particular business.”

One would suppose that it would be exceedingly unpleasant to have the reputation of an Evil Eye, consequently it is resented, but precautions are taken sometimes, even before the accusation is made, to hinder the report arising about individuals. In one village, where twice a week a number of fishermen pass, the women and girls of the village try to keep out of sight of the men on their way to the fishing-ground, lest, if by chance a fisher should see one of them and he was unlucky immediately thereafter, he would report to the rest his want of luck and whom he had met, and she would be marked as one of the unlucky.

The reciter of this was an intelligent domestic servant, twenty-four years old, a reliable girl, brought up by respectable grandparents.

A Kintyre reciter, an educated woman of about thirty, informs us of a woman, a believer in the Evil Eye, living beside her father, and who does not conceal the fact that she looks with some suspicion upon certain of her acquaintances should they come her way, particularly should she be engaged in churning. Her neighbours, knowing this, are careful to avoid going to her house if she has a churning on hand. Suspected persons do not learn their own infirmity merely by being looked at askance.

A clergyman in one of the southern islands informs us: “It is said that in cases where injury has been done by the Evil Eye, a remedy is to charge the suspected party firmly and distinctly to his (or her) face with having done it. When a little boy, a cow belonging to his grandmother had lately calved, and a neighbour woman came one day and went to see the cow. She was considered to be a respectable person, even a good woman, but was believed to possess the Evil Eye. She was no time away when the cow became very unwell, although there had been nothing wrong with her up till then. There was considerable excitement, and they were sure that the cow would die, and just as sure it was the woman’s Evil Eye that had injured her. Another woman was sent for, supposed to be knowing in these matters, and the case submitted to her. She confirmed them in their suspicions, and advised, as the best remedy, that she who had done the mischief should be confronted and plainly told to her face that they believed her to be to blame. This was agreed to and carried out at once, with the result, as it was believed, that whatever power she had obtained over the cow to hurt her was broken, and in a very short time the cow was as well as she had ever been.”

An Arran woman tells us the same thing in some detail, but she says the injury can only be repaired by the doer of the mischief taking upon himself the evil done to the other, and illustrates it by the following story:—A tramp who was supposed to have a bad eye, and even suspected of witchcraft, made a request to Mrs. Mac—— which she refused. The woman being angered, left in a rage. She was no time away when they noticed that there was something wrong with the child, and when the husband came from his work his wife told him of the woman having been there, and her belief that she had injured their child. The man said the woman was still in the neighbourhood, and he would bring her back. He did so. They then charged her to her face with having hurt the child, and said she must now heal her. The woman did not try to deny this, but said: “Tha e gle chruaidh gum feumainnsa an cron a rinn mi air an leanabh agaibh a ghabhail orm fein, ach na’n d’thug sibhse bonn airgeid dhomhsa an ait’ an olann a thug sibh dhomh, cha do thachair so do’n leanabh” (“It’s very hard that I should require to take on myself the injury I have done your child, but if you had given me a silver coin instead of the wool you gave me, this had not happened to the child”).

She had to cure the child, however. What had happened to it was that its mouth kept always open, and it could not catch the breast. The reciter did not say that the malady of the open mouth stuck to the woman, but being somewhat notorious, and a different incident being told of her by another reciter, the latter remarked that “she had an ungainly face, and that if ever there was a witch in Arran, he thought that woman would pass for one.”

AVOIDING SUSPICION OF EVIL EYE

People have not always the candour to accuse the suspected.

A lady engaged in teaching gives the following information: “You would hear of Mrs. McG.? She is making a great noise because, as she says, the milk is being taken from her cow, and not long ago her horse and some other beast of hers died, and she thinks it is because they were air an cronachadh by some person. She blamed a girl that was keeping house with a neighbour, and she went to the girl’s sister and said to her to say to her sister not to be taking away the milk from her cow.” This was not supposed to be a case of witchcraft.

So far we have been dealing with women, but it must not be supposed that such accusations are rarely made against men.

A small farmer, Alexander ——, having got into difficulties, lost his farm. A neighbour, better able to stock it, entered into possession. Soon, however, a cow died, and it was concluded that it was a case of cronachadh, an opinion in which its owner agreed, declaring: “Well, cho fad’s bhios bo bheo agam, cha dean mise rithist namhaid de Alasdair” (“Well, as long as I have a living cow I will not again make an enemy of Alexander”).

Men are also as cautious to avoid suspicion as women. Recently a servant-girl in Islay, having the charge of attending to the feeding of a pig, requested a man who had never been suspected of possessing a hurtful eye to look at the pig to see how it was thriving. The man refused, adding quite seriously that he did not like to look at a beast that way, in case of any harm being done. When she persisted that there could be no harm, he replied that not long ago M. McL. had a litter of young pigs, and a man came that way and was looking at them one evening, and the next morning they were all dead.

The reasons ascribed for the action of some are doubtless influenced by the reciter’s own beliefs. Thus, it was often said of a gentleman farmer in Rothiemurchus, well known in the countryside, that he would never praise any beast of his own, and this was supposed to be owing to his belief that he himself had an Evil Eye. It does not seem to have occurred to his neighbours that it was native modesty.

To show the hold that belief in an Evil Eye has on certain minds, a native of Ross-shire tells how he went to see a neighbour, who asked his assistance in putting a ring in the nose of a pig to prevent it rooting. “There was another neighbour of his there too, who had come forward when he saw us, one W. M., an intelligent man, and one that I would never have thought would give in to these superstitions; but he was a man that believed in the Evil Eye, although nobody suspected him of having it himself.” Accidentally the pig’s leg was broken. It was understood to belong to the wife of the man who proposed to ring it, who said:—

“Man, what will we say to the wife? But come away in and see what she has got to say.” When we went in the wife asked us if we had got the ring in the pig, and her man answered, “No, and I am sorry to tell you the pig has broken her leg.”

“How did that happen?” she asked, and her husband said, out of pure fun, “Oh, I don’t know, unless W. M.’s eye has fallen upon her.” That was enough. Up W. got in a wild rage, and said he would not sit under such a suspicion, and off he marched, terribly offended.

At the time of writing a reciter, a woman, admits that at K. in A. a man is living whom his neighbours believe to have the Evil Eye, and people not only do not like to meet him, but go out of their way to avoid him when going on important matters. It is told of him that a donkey belonging to a woman kicked his horse. The donkey’s owner expressed a hope that he would not come to know of it, lest he should hurt her beast. Her fear was justified, as it turned out, for the man saw the donkey kick the horse, and however he managed it, people believed that he put cronachadh on the donkey, for it turned ill and shortly died.

ACTION OF EVIL EYE INDEPENDENT OF POSSESSOR

It must be difficult, one would think, for any reasonably kindly-intentioned person to accept as proved that they had an Evil Eye. But a distinction is made between possessing an Evil Eye and doing mischief with it. A native of Glen Urquhart, Inverness-shire, among others says that there it is understood a person may possess an Evil Eye and do mischief with it without intending it, and without knowing that he has done it. When a person knows that he has an Evil Eye, and does mischief with it intentionally, the ill-doing is usually supposed to be more or less connected with witchcraft.

Many believe the injury from the Evil Eye is quite independent of the will of the possessor. A farmer, a believer, said: “When we were in the old place more than thirty years ago, there was a man living upon the hill who would often be helping the farmers round about when they were throng. He had the Evil Eye; but he could not help it. He would be sorry for it himself; many a one would be scolding him for hurting their beasts.”

Another says: “Cronachadh is still in it, and those that have got the Evil Eye cannot help it. They sometimes do harm with their eye when they do not intend it, and even when they do not know that they are doing it.”

This seems a thoroughly rooted idea in Islay, and a Tiree man informs us that there it is also thought that injury by an Evil Eye is involuntary on the part of the person who has such an eye, and not necessarily malicious or intended.

This is also met with as a belief in Arran, and a reciter there tells of a minister in the Parish of Kilmory who had the Evil Eye in spite of himself, and if he looked on his own cattle or horses they were sure to be ill after. Other cases are mentioned, and one of our reciters told how a man, while resident in the south of the island, and fond of fine cattle, in the place where he was well known and respected had never been suspected of the Evil Eye, but removing to the Whiting Bay district, where he was among strangers, suspicion of the Evil Eye attached to him and remained with him to the day of his death.

In these two last cases, in speculating upon the cause of the accusation, it seems quite probable that the minister, being occupied with his own special duties, rarely regarded the state of his beasts, and only took notice of them under exceptional circumstances, and coincidence had connected his inspection of them and their illnesses. The other evidently was an amateur with an eye to beauty in others’ cattle, and probably had unfortunately expressed approval before subsequent misfortune. One notorious incident was undoubtedly enough to set the report going, and all know the results of giving a lie half-an-hour’s start.

EVIL EYE TAKES EFFECT EVEN ON THINGS NOT SEEN

There is one simple way of keeping your property safe from the Evil Eye: viz., by not letting it be known that you have what may be affected. A certain D. MacF., who knew that his neighbour was crediting his Evil Eye with having spoiled a churning, was standing in the back-yard when the woman who suspected him was milking her cow. She, having finished, should have passed him with her milk to carry it in by the door, but on seeing him she started, and instead of coming forward, passed the pitcher of milk in by a little window on the back wall of the house, and then walked forward and went in at the door, passing MacF. He concluded that her object was to keep the milk out of his sight lest he should hurt it. MacF. disavows the possession of any power of the kind.

Another reciter mentions that a certain Calum Ban, having the name of the Evil Eye, others kept things out of his sight for fear that he might hurt them.

The mere preventing the eye resting on the thing to be affected would, however, have been quite insufficient, according to one reciter, a native of Bernera (Harris). She told of one, recognised as possessing an Evil Eye, that he was sure to covet everything in the possession of his neighbours, and consequently “those nearest R. were very unfortunate.” His influence was understood to extend beyond what he actually saw, and therefore even hearing about things was kept from him. On one occasion the young daughter of R.’s neighbour set eggs under two hens, and being considered “lucky,” having usually been successful, she expected two good broods. In the interval she mentioned what she had done in the hearing of R.’s daughter. When the time came not a single chicken appeared out of the two settings. Her mother then said she would put eggs below the hens, but warned all in the house to be sure and not tell that they were there. This was done, the hens being kept carefully concealed, and full and thriving broods were got.

An old man now dead, a crofter who could read, who was strongly superstitious, telling his stories with great gusto, and reliable, is the authority for the following, which shows how the superstitions of others were played on. In the time when ploughs were made of wood of a home manufacture, the farmer in Octofad brought home a new one. One day, using the new plough, coming round at the end of a furrow, the plough was broken in two. The man between the stilts and the man leading the horses threw the blame of the carelessness on one another. At last the latter proposed that if the ploughman would leave to him to tell the old man (the farmer) how it happened, and if he would not say a word at all in the matter, he believed that he would be able to put it past (a chuir seachad) right enough. The ploughman agreed. They took the horses home, and when the farmer made his appearance looking displeased (coslas gu math crosda air), the lad began his tale. “De ach am beist duine sin tha ann C. aig am bheil an droch shuil. Thainig e an rathad far an robh sin a treabhadh, agus on a bhios a shuil aige anns gach ni a chi e, thoisich e air a bhi moladh nan each agus a chrann; agus cha robh e tiota air falbh, nuair a chaidh a’ chrann ann an da leth.” (“What but that beast of a man that is in C., who has the Evil Eye. He came the way where we were ploughing, and since he will have his eye in everything he sees, he began praising the horses and the plough, and he was no time gone when the plough went in two halves.”)

The lad’s forecast was correct. His master’s eye lost its gloom, and shaking his hand to them, he said: “Never mind, never mind; put in the horses, and do not say a word about it to anybody in case he may do more harm. If the horses are safe, we will not be long in dressing the plough.”

It is perfectly clear that an interesting instance of the influence of the Evil Eye was established here, so far as the farmer was concerned, and doubtless the belief in it generally owes not a little to equally fanciful stories.

MORAL SOURCE OF THE EVIL EYE

Though the action of the Evil Eye is accepted as involuntary, in the majority of cases, this is not the accepted doctrine in all districts. From Ross-shire (Strathpeffer) a reciter says:—

“It is a power which they are in some cases supposed to exercise involuntarily, but oftener intentionally and with mischievous design.”

From somewhat the same locality, Dores (near Inverness), a reciter “thinks that the involuntary kind that is often met with in certain other parts of the Highlands is not recognised, but in every case in which injury arises from an Evil Eye, it is to be referred to active covetousness and greed of gain at other people’s expense.” But even in Kintyre, where the involuntary action is accepted, a native tells us: “I believe in what people call the Evil Eye, and I have known very many who believed in it just as much as I do; not that every man has it, for there are only some that I would be afraid of. If I see a man that thinks highly of what belongs to himself, and would not exchange it with any man, that is the man I would like to have dealings with, for although he might do injury to himself, or to any living thing he might possess, he would do no harm to another. If I saw a man envying everything he saw, and thinking what belonged to other people was better than what belonged to himself, I would be afraid of that man, and if I had cattle I would not like him to come among them, for if he came I would be sure something would happen.”

A Mull woman said: “Cronachadh is quite common. It is done usually by a person that has an Evil Eye. It is just an eye with great greed and envy.”

An Islay man says: “Tha cronachadh ann. Se ‘n droch cridhe tha dol thun na sul, agus a’ deanadh droch suil.” (“Cronachadh exists. It is the evil heart going to the eye and causing an Evil Eye.”) The suggestion thus is that an Evil Eye is but the result of the natural man who has not rooted out of his nature what is forbidden in the Tenth Commandment, and so a native of Ross-shire (Tarbat) shows how strong the belief was that mischief might come “through the Evil Eye or ill wish of another.” A certain aunt of his formed a strong dislike to him when he was a boy, simply because it was known that his grandfather favoured him to the disadvantage of this aunt, as she thought, and he well remembered how anxious his mother was for a long time, lest the aunt’s known ill-will should cause some blight to come on him.

The following from Islay shows that though the belief there that it is involuntary is strongly held, those who have the power may exercise it deliberately. “There was a woman in Islay who had a sow that had a litter of young pigs. One morning a neighbour came to her, and seeing the teapot at the fire, asked if she would give her a drop of the tea. This was given to her. She then said, ‘You have fine young pigs there.’ ‘Yes, but they are all sold,’ answered the other. With that the visitor turned towards the door to go, and said, ‘Well, you sold a pig to me that died.’ That was all that passed, and she went her way; but the following morning two of the pigs were dead, and the owner was quite certain that the woman had done the mischief. The reciter who gives the information is of the same opinion, and he adds that it was an unkind thing to do on a poor woman.”

The strength of the Evil Eye, according to some, is to be gauged by the following remark by an old man: “B’abhaist gu’m biodh e air a radh le sean daoine, gun sgoilteadh an t-suil sanntach eadhon na creagan fein o cheile.” (“It used to be said by old people that the greedy eye would split asunder the very rocks.”)

Another says cronachadh is just envy, and it is said that envy will break the very stones. A man who wishes to have everything for himself will do harm to whatever he sees.

THINGS THAT SPECIALLY ATTRACT

A woman of twenty-eight, whose information is quite reliable, the daughter of a respectable man in one of the inner islands, remembers when young people talked a great deal about these things, and many were very much afraid of them. “The idea was that it was always the best and prettiest of beast or body that was most liable to be injured by a bad eye. Her youngest brother was awfully pretty when a child. They used to have him dressed in a red frock and white pinny, and with his fair skin, fair curly hair, and red cheeks, he was the nicest-looking child in all the place. Many a time, when my father would take him out, the neighbours would be warning him to take good care lest some one might do the child harm, and some would advise my father to go in and take the frock and pinny off him, so that he might not draw one’s attention so much.”

From Ross-shire we hear the same thing. A native “remembers when he was young, people believed in the Evil Eye and were afraid of it.” It was supposed that pretty children were specially liable to be injured by it, and it was a common device with some mothers, in circumstances where there was any suspicion of danger, to take care that at least some article of the child’s dress would be at fault, either in respect of neatness or cleanness, or better still, to have one of the child’s stockings turned outside in when being worn. These were supposed to form a protection to the child against injury.

The reciter remembers quite well a woman who in her own person and house was the pink of neatness, but full of superstition, and he cannot remember ever having seen her children without something untidy about them. Always a stocking or something else wrong on, and this was done intentionally by their mother to keep away the Evil Eye.

A native of Bernera (Harris) testified: “When a person appears well dressed and good-looking, it is supposed that she is in danger of being affected by the Evil Eye. A recommendation in such a case is to wear some article of clothing with the wrong side out, as a preventative of harm.”

An old man of eighty-seven, uneducated, but full of information, somewhat difficult to understand from the loss of his teeth and the weakness of his voice, telling his experiences in the most pathetic manner, said: “Bu nighean a’ cheud duine cloinne bha riomh agam, agus bha deigh mhor agam oirre. Ach de thachair, ach latha bha ‘n sin, bha i amach aig taobh an tighe, agus bha neach a’ dol seachad aig an robh droch shuil, agus chaidh an droch shuil anns an leanabh, agus bha i air a chronachadh. O’n am sin chaidh an creatur air a h-ais co mor gus aig a cheann mu dheireadh cha robh i air a cumail beo ach le beagan fion a bha air a chuir ann a beul le spain ti.” (“The first one of my family was a daughter. She was a pretty child, and I was very fond of her. But what happened but a day that was there, she was out at the side of the house and a person passed who had an Evil Eye, and the Evil Eye went into the child and she was injured. From that time the creature went back so much, until at last she was only kept alive by a little wine put into her mouth with a teaspoon.”)

“When people had occasion to go to farmer R.’s house, having children with them, they contrived to put some attractive article of clothing on the children, so that the gay clothes might divert his eye from the wearers and save them from injury.”

A native of Knockando (Elgin) says that there is an impression that the young, either of man or beast, are very liable to receive injury from an Evil Eye fastening upon them, if that should be the first eye that sees them after their birth. This belief makes people take great care often to secure that any one supposed to possess an Evil Eye will not be the first to see an infant immediately after birth, or any other young animal.

Using short texts separated from the context leads undoubtedly to misapprehensions on the part of the unlearned. In Isaiah xiii. 18, he says of the Medes, alluding to physical injury alone, “their eye shall not spare children.” That text has influenced not a few.

Without any suspicion of the owner of a beast having the Evil Eye himself, his desire to retain it is supposed to render it specially liable to the evil influence of any one possessed of the power. A Kinlochbervie man remembers well how very common, in his youth, was belief in the Evil Eye, and vividly recalls the terror his mother had when any unknown vagrant came the way, lest, being possessed of an Evil Eye, he might leave a blight on the house or anything belonging to it. She would give almost anything they might ask so as to get them away in a good mood.

STRANGERS SPECIALLY LIABLE TO BE ACCUSED OF THE POSSESSION OF THE EVIL EYE

Acquaintances might be divided into two classes. The Evil Eyes and the Non-Evil Eyes. Precautions should be taken against the former, and with them it was safe to class strangers. The daughter of a tradesman, a clever, intelligent woman, a farmer’s wife, whose husband’s people and her own mother are very superstitious, having moved from one district to another, her new neighbours, not long after she had came to live beside them, lost a number of geese. The owners made a great “ado,” and the position they took up relative to our reciter, the suspected one, was: “Faicibh fein an droch shuil tha aice. Cha deachaidh na geoidh air seachran riomh roimhe, ach ghabh iad fuath ‘nuair a’ dh’ amhairc ise orra.” (“See for yourself the Evil Eye she had; the geese never before wandered, but took fright when she looked at them.”)

The owners of these geese seem to have had a very lively faith in the Evil Eye. The collector having mentioned the experience to another neighbour, she said: “That’s not so bad as I got. I went to inquire for a friend if they would sell a goose. They said they would not sell, and there was no harm in that; but shortly after all the geese flew away, and if I did not catch it. They were in a fearful rage, blaming me for putting my Evil Eye in them. Another time their hens ceased laying, and they blamed my eye for that also.”

It is scarcely to be wondered at, the jealous ascription of the Evil Eye to strangers, though Highland publications speak largely of the noble characteristics of Highlanders at large, and the writer is the last man to deny them credit due. It must be confessed there is a large quantity of a ‘parochial’ feeling of jealousy in the Highlands generally. It is not necessary to go into the question whether this is or is not the modern aspect of previous district quarrels. Tramps trade upon this fear of strangers in other Gaelic places than the Scottish Highlands. A minister relates the following, which came under his own observation in Antrim. A tramp was passing a house, and he went and asked the housewife for a drink of milk. She said she had no milk, but the tramp was sure she had, but did not want to part with it. He said, “Oh, very well, I’ll take a drink of water, and let what will happen to the cows.” This was enough; she was sure that this was a challenge that he would have the milk in spite of her, so she repented and gave him as good a drink of milk as he could wish for, no doubt in this way escaping evil consequences.

PEOPLE SHOULD GIVE WHEN ASKED

The danger of refusing a request is great, not so much from the purely Christian-charity point of view, as from that of escaping the Evil Eye. A native of Knapdale, a believer, tells of a woman notorious in that neighbourhood. She went to a farmer for a barrel of potatoes, which he refused her. No more was said, but she had not long gone when the best horse he had fell down and could not rise. It was foaming at the mouth. A man skilled in counteracting the Evil Eye was consulted, and declared that the horse had been injured by it. Having been informed by the farmer that he had refused to give a barrel of potatoes to the woman, he said it was that that had done the harm. His advice was a little peculiar, not in that he recommended the sending the potatoes to the woman, but that they should be sent on the injured horse, with evidently a view to its cure. The potatoes were got into a bag, the bag lifted on the horse’s back, and away it went quite briskly, and they were delivered at the woman’s house, and thereafter the horse was quite well.

Drovers are not, of course, complete strangers in the districts in which they do business, but as a class they are looked on with some suspicion. Thus we are told, “Some drovers are possessed of the Evil Eye, and in consequence it is reckoned foolish not to sell any animals to them if they appear anxious to have them.” The reciter’s father had a good cow, and some drovers coming about wanted to buy her. His father refused to sell. The drovers persisted, but still met with a refusal. At last the drovers left, but shortly after the cow sickened, died, and nothing remained of her value to the owner but her skin.

A parallel case was mentioned as happening in Islay. “I remember it was a few days before the market a man came the way and wanted to buy a beast from A. McI. The drover was very anxious to get it, but they would not sell. The drover left, and before the sun went down that evening that beast was dead and buried. The reciter of this, a man of about fifty and a good workman, living by himself, is a piper, and possibly the addition of the beast’s hurried burial may be the result of a natural tendency to ‘blow,’ as they say. Anyhow, the piper said that it was believed that it was the drover’s eye that had killed the cow.”

Another reciter tells that a farmer in Islay had two good horses which some dealers wished to buy. The farmer would not sell either, and the following day one of them died. It was believed to be a case of Evil Eye.

The risk of refusing purchasers is not solely in the case of drovers. “Many are of opinion that it is risky for a person to refuse to sell any animal he may have to any one who shows a great desire to purchase it; some would sell at a sacrifice rather than run the risk. A native of Killean, Kintyre, tells of a fine cow his father had, and on which the family set a considerable value. A man who had known something about the cow came all the way from Campbeltown purposely to buy her, but the owner declined to sell her. “If he did, he hardly got any good of her thereafter, for in a short time she became unwell, and lingering for a time, died. The neighbours thought it was a real case of Evil Eye.”

From the mainland of Argyllshire a lady relates: “An uncle had a farm five miles from Oban. A neighbour on his way to attend a funeral, thinking her uncle might drive along with him, called. As he was passing the cow-fold the calves were being let out to their mothers, and one of the cows had a beautiful calf. The neighbour fixed his eyes on them and kept looking at and admiring them. He then asked her uncle if he would sell him the calf, but the proprietor refused, saying he did not intend to sell either cow or calf. That very week the calf was dead, and they never doubted but that it was the man’s Evil Eye that had killed it.”

A native of Applecross in Ross-shire told he had bought a fine horse, but before the purchase another man had been looking at it and been very anxious to have it, and praised it as a splendid beast. It was not long in the reciter’s possession until it had some complaint from which it died. The people—the reciter does not himself say he shares the feeling—believe that it was killed by the Evil Eye, for it had been known to everybody how anxious the disappointed man had been to get it, and how highly he had spoken of it.

SYMPTOMS IN ANIMALS ASCRIBED TO EFFECT OF EVIL EYE

One naturally asks what are the symptoms which, when present in animals, have given rise to the supposition that they were affected by the Evil Eye.

A woman gives the following account of what happened to her mother. She had been married very young, and was sitting by the fire suckling her first child with her breasts bare. The child had fallen asleep on her left arm. “My mother heard something behind her, and when she turned her head, there was a tall, grey-haired, ill-favoured-looking woman standing. My mother got up hurriedly, and having a great deal of milk, the milk spouted from her right breast into the fire. The cailleach gave an unpleasant laugh and said, ‘The milk has gone along with the pee.’ My mother answered pleasantly enough, ‘Oh no, the milk and pee will be all right,’ and gave the cailleach what she wanted. She was a Tiree cailleach, and they were all looked upon as being bad ones. The next time my mother was going to give her baby a drink she found she had not a drop of milk for him. The baby was crying, and when he would cry she would cry too, and what was to be done? This state of things lasted for a day, and my father then went for assistance from a person supposed to be skilled.”

The expression used by the Tiree woman was understood by the reciter to mean the milk that should have nourished the child was to turn into water in the mother’s system, and be so discharged.

Yawning has been ascribed to the effect of the Evil Eye.

An Islay man said: “Bha piuthair aig an te nach maireann agus bha i cho boidheach ’sa chunnaic sibh riomh. Aon uair thainig boireannach a stigh agus thoiseach i air a chaileag a mholadh gu ro mhor. Well, cha robh a bhean sin ach gann air dol amach nur a thoiseach a chaileag air meunanaich, agus cha robh fad gus an robh i cho dona agus gun robh iad a saoilsinn gum bitheadh i air falbh.”

(“My late wife had a sister, and she was as pretty as ever you saw. Once a woman came in and commenced praising the girl excessively. Well, scarcely was that woman gone out of the house when the girl began to yawn, and it was not long till she was so bad that they thought that she would be away (die).”)

In the case of a child which was quite quiet and looking well, with the mother sitting nursing it, a neighbouring woman, who is not much liked in the place, came in. She sat a little while, and was no time away until the child began to cry. It cried long and bitterly, and its mother got into a fearful state, protesting of the other woman: “Co fior’s tha mi beo, chronaich i mo phaisde” (“As true as I am alive she injured my child”). It is interesting to note that in this case “a little white powder” prescribed by a qualified practitioner counteracted that Evil Eye.

Another case in which a child was ill was told as follows:—A woman went to inquire after a man who had just lost his wife in the Low Country, and brought their child home to his relations. She was told that the child was “not but poorly.” “What is the matter with him?” I asked. My informant answered me, that his mother had been sitting at the fire and the child in her bosom, when two women came to ask for the child’s father. The child was quite well and brisk when they came in, but before they went away he began to cry and groan. “He was quite sure,” he said, “that one or other of them had injured the child, but why they should do that he did not know, for they both had families of their own.” This case was cured by an unlicensed practitioner.

The following is from a woman of her own experience in the case of her own son. She told that his sister went out with him one day to a neighbour’s house. He was sitting in her lap, when the neighbour’s daughter called her mother’s attention to the white beauty of the child’s legs. The mother agreed, and something more was said praising the child, and he then got a drink of milk. Well, as soon as he took the milk, he began as if he were singing, “Do re do, do re do.” This he continued to do for a good while, and was very fretful. This child was cured by a magic thread which stopped the “humming.”

Cattle, in popular belief, are much more liable to damage from the Evil Eye than other animals, judging from the greater number of instances related of it in their case. “Two of M. McN.’s cattle died within a short time of each other, and all the old people of the place persisted in saying they were injured by some Evil Eye.” A reciter told of her mother, who had married the elder of two brothers occupying a farm in common, getting the credit of the Evil Eye because, shortly after her marriage, the cattle on the farm “began to die right away.”

In the following case motive is given, and if any overt act of a magical nature had been said to occur, it would certainly have to be classified as witchcraft, but seeing there is no such history, it is one of those cases in which the action of an Evil Eye was evidently not supposed to be involuntary. The heir to a tenant who had fallen into arrears, having paid what was owing, got possession from the superior. Meanwhile a woman had been living in the house. She was warned to leave, but paid no heed to the warning, and it became necessary to turn her out by force. She got shelter from a relative near by, while the new tenant went to live in the house from which she had been ejected. “But if he did, he soon suffered for it, for he was not long there until he had lost nine of his cattle by death, and he and every one else believed that they had been “air an cronachadh” by the woman from spite.

There are no symptoms recounted in these general losses.

More rarely than of cows, we hear of stirks being affected. This is rather an old story, and the authority for this is the reciter’s father, who told it of his own father. He was at market in Stratherrick, and refused to part, after considerable bargaining, with a stirk he had to a would-be buyer. “Before the market-day closed, down fell the stirk on the ground and nothing could make it get up.”

In a quite recent case, however, a stirk, said to be affected by the Evil Eye, “was very ill; its horns were quite cold, and it could not eat anything. The beast recovered.”

By far most commonly, evil from a “bad eye” comes to cows. A reciter tells of an instance that occurred to himself, where in a farm previously occupied, his mother had a particularly good cow. “One day my sister was in a neighbour’s house, and she was telling the woman about the lot of milk this cow had. The next day when my mother went out at the usual hour to milk the cow, she had scarcely begun when this woman passed close to where she was milking. Well, not a drop of milk could my mother get from that cow. The cow became suddenly unwell and fell to the ground. The skin came off her udder and not a bit of skin was on it after that. There was not the least doubt but that it was the other woman that had injured her.”

A native of Skye, in whose younger days the belief in the Evil Eye was very common there, and who remembers seeing “a general turn up” in the township in which she was brought up, caused by the alleged effect of one person’s Evil Eye upon the cattle of the neighbours, tells how her father had a fine Ayrshire cow. She was such a good milker that it was necessary to milk her three times every day. “All of a sudden her milk left her, and they never could account for it, except on the supposition of the action of an Evil Eye, and in fact were quite sure that this was the case.”

The reciter of the following says she remembers a Sutherlandshire minister telling it to her mother. He said that one time his cows were not giving the right milk. The milk was more like water than milk, and as for butter, not a bit could he get, no matter how well it might be churned. The minister here, on the advice of his housekeeper, resorted to witchcraft for a cure.

Another reciter says: “When my sister and myself were lumps of lasses we were down the road one day with a cow of my father’s. When we brought her home the milk was running from her, and she lay down on the floor and she wouldn’t rise. When they tried to put her up she would make as if she would climb up the wall.”

In fact, as another reciter in Rothiemurchus said: “It used to be a very common experience to have cows going off their milk, and sometimes dying from the effects of a person possessed of an Evil Eye looking upon them, and it is still believed that cases of this kind happen.”

A cow that was “kicking and would let nobody milk her,” being cured by one of the processes against the Evil Eye, the cure was understood to certify the diagnosis.

Mrs. McN. was milking her cow. A woman passing at the time remarked, looking at the cow the while, “That is a grand cow, and she gives a great deal of milk.” “Yes, she is a good cow,” replied the owner, and the woman having passed on there was no more about it, until a little while after the milking was done the cow lay down on the ground and began to roll in great pain. There never was any doubt but that it was a case of injury by the Evil Eye. The cow was cured by magic.

Another cow “grew to be unwell, and she was rolling herself upon the ground.” She was so unwell that the schoolmaster, who was a great friend of her owner’s, advised him to send for a man to flay her. She recovered.

Of course a recognised wizard may have the Evil Eye as much as a more innocent person. The reciter of this, a credulous man, no doubt, and uneducated, with the gift of the gab and a good deal of natural shrewdness, a distillery workman, is detailing his own experience. “The cows were all tied in the byre, and we were looking in the window and saw the Buidseach ruadh (the red wizard) standing at the byre door. The door was in two halves, the upper half was open at the time, the lower closed, and he was leaning on it and gazing with all his might at one of the cows. The kitchen was at the end of the byre, and they always came straight down from the kitchen when they were going to milk. The women just came down then, and when they came to the cow that he had been looking at, not a drop of milk could they get. When they untied her to let her out she gave a loud bellow, and running up by the kitchen door made for the fire and tried to go up by the chain through the roof of the house. They had nothing for it but tie her up again, and for some days they did not get a drop of milk from her, and her skin became so loose on her it looked as if hardly sticking to her flesh at all. When the day for churning came they found the butter was gone also.”

A Kintyre man recites the following of an authority consulted for the cure of the Evil Eye. “Her cow, put out for the first time after calving, became wild and jumped against everything like to kill herself. There was nothing for it but just to put her back into the house. Everybody was sure the beast had been air a cronachadh by some person’s Evil Eye, or bewitched by witchcraft. When the woman to whom the cow belonged came to know of it she came up, and going up to the cow, gave her a clap or two on the back, said something, and in a minute or two the cow was as quiet as she had ever been.”

A farmer of the name of M. had the farm of B., near Campbeltown. He had a favourite cow which he would not part with for anything. Some drovers wished to buy this cow, but M. refused, and though the drovers persisted, he would not part with her. They went to the cow and began to soothe and fondle her. When they left the cow began to go about in a circle, and could not be got out of that circle. At length the farmer was forced to kill her. This was told by an educated and reliable gentleman, without prejudice, so to say, to his belief or disbelief in the origin of the illness.

One is apt to smile at any one talking of an animal going up the chimney by the pot chain; frightened animals do curious things. The writer of this, having opened the window in the parlour widely, the door being shut to prevent it going into the house, was trying to drive out a strange cat. There was a lighted fire in the chimney, but the cat, without trying the window, went up the chimney. The fire being damped down and a dustpan put on the top of it, the cat returned to civilisation, and then disappeared through the window.

One other symptom comes from the Black Isle, Ross-shire. H. says that belief in the Evil Eye was very common in his native place, and has a good hold still on people’s minds. It was said to do injury to beasts, in many ways, among others that they could be blinded by it. His father had a striking case while living in the Parish of Redcastle. One of his cows died of what was considered a natural trouble, no Evil Eye influence being thought of. He had a quey grazing on the farm of a friend on the opposite side of the Beauly Firth, so he went for her and brought her home by Kessock Ferry, where some people examined her and admired her. She was a dun, and a fine-looking animal. Having reached home the quey was tied in the byre, apparently in good health. They however soon noticed that she had a habit of standing back in her stall to the full extent of the tether rope, and do what they would they could not get her to stand forward. A woman with knowledge of Evil Eye cases was consulted. After examining the beast in the byre by herself she told them the quey was blind, because some one’s eye had fallen on her. She recommended the following procedure to cure the animal and find out who had done the injury. She was to be let out and, no one going before her or trying to turn her, allowed to go where she liked. If this were done she said the quey would, of her own accord, go to the house of the person who had made her blind, and that she would go three times round the house bellowing, and then come back to her own byre quite well with recovered sight. This procedure was carried out. She went straight for a neighbour’s house, went round it three times, bellowed, and came back quite well and seeing. The reciter added, “Now the woman that could do that and find out things of that kind must have had some power herself, quite as much as the one whose eye had fallen upon the heifer.” The reciter of the above is an uneducated man, and superstitious in other ways.

A believer, a native of Knapdale, tells the following. For a considerable time none of her cows had quey calves, but at length she got one, a nice beast, of which she was particularly careful. When it was first let out she went herself to watch it. At that time she had a neighbour who had an ill-will to her, although they were on speaking terms, though without having much to do with each other. While she was watching the calf this neighbour came out of her own house, and putting her hands on each of her sides, stood and gazed for a few seconds at the calf. While she was staring at it the calf gave a ‘loup,’ rushed as if it were mad through the place, and when, with a deal of difficulty it had been caught and put into the byre, it kept leaping straight up, and seemed as if it could not rest. The person consulted said he could do nothing in the case, and that it was ill from the other woman looking at it. Subsequently she had two more quey calves of which she was very proud and pleased to have them, and as they were grazing in a park near the road, many people admired them. One day the same objectionable neighbour went, and placing her two arms on the dyke, stared at the calves for some time. “I saw her with my own eyes and did not like it, but said nothing.” Not long after her daughter came in and said that the white calf was lying dead among the nettles. “On hearing this I trembled, but spoke quite calmly and said, ‘Is it?’” On examination, sure enough the calf was dead, and the other was ill also. She consulted a skilled woman, and the remaining calf got better. This reciter added that since then she had lost beasts through the same person’s Evil Eye, and is in terror when she sees her coming about the house.

A woman who lived on Loch Awe-side, who was believed to have the Evil Eye, and whose father was also credited with it, was exchanging brood hens with a neighbour. She brought her own hen, and was going to take away the one to be exchanged. In the absence of the mistress, the girl who was keeping the house was going to give the cow a drink, and the woman accompanied her. There was nothing wrong with the cow then, but later in the day the cow’s calf died, and the cow herself began to take some kind of fits, and though she lived for a while never got well. When night came the hens were crowing, and next morning two of them were found dead. The hen that had been brought was put on the eggs, but if she was, it was not long that she remained on them. She took to the hills and was never caught, and all this was the consequence of the Evil Eye.

Even more common than injury to cows and calves is the deterioration of milk. Mrs. McL., appealing to her husband for confirmation, told how that in the winter-time she began to churn sometime after dark. Her husband helped her with it, and they had just finished, and she was going to stop and take off the butter, when a young man came in. When he went away she went back to her churn, but not a bit of butter could she get. To gather it she took another turn of churning, but the milk only swelled and went over the churn mouth. The butter was all gone. It was this young man’s Evil Eye.

Another nearly similar case to the above, and they could be considerably added to, happened to the mother of the reciter, who was churning, and a woman, supposed to possess an Evil Eye, and also suspected of a measure of witchcraft, coming in, “the butter got scattered into a kind of grainy substance, and do what she would the churner could not get it to gather again.”

Horses, of course, are liable to the malign influence of the Evil Eye. —— had a nice white horse which he used to lend on hire to the minister. It was much admired, and one day when it came home a neighbour, who bore the owner no goodwill, came forward and, standing beside the horse, said in Gaelic, “You have got fine limbs;” he then walked away. Shortly afterwards the horse threw itself down on the ground and kicked as if in great pain. It was at first supposed to be an attack of colic, and the son walked it out a little, but so soon as it entered the stable it fell down and was like to die. A woman with skill being consulted, cured the horse and confirmed their suspicion of it being a case of Evil Eye.

Ministers’ horses do not escape any more than those of laymen. A Mull woman related the following:—The minister, whose grave you may see there, had a fine horse. His man had it out ploughing, and without previous illness or warning of any kind, it fell down and could not plough another furrow. The minister came to see it.

“A mhinistear, tha an t-each air a chronachadh. Feumaidh mi dhol airson eolas a chronachaidh.”

“Eisd, eisd, cha dean thu sin. Tha fios agad nach eil mise a’ creidsinn ann a leithid sin.”

“Direach falbhaidh sibhse a steach, agus managie mi fein an t-each.”

(“Minister, the horse is air a cronachadh, and I must go for eolas a chronachaidh.” “Hush, hush, you will not do that; you know that I do not believe the like of that.” “Just you go in, and I’ll manage the horse myself.”)

We may finish the incident which tells how the minister did as was suggested, and how, as soon as he was out of sight, off the lad set for what he considered skilled assistance. Having got it, in less than three hours the horse was quite well and ploughing. When the minister was again looking on, the lad remarked on the rapid recovery from the process used, but the minister was unconvinced.

“Cha’n eil mi dol a thoirt creideas da leithid sin idir.”

Thuirt an gille: “Well, tha mi fein ‘s an t-each a’ creidsinn ann.”

(“I am not going to give credence to the like of that at all.” The lad replied: “Well, both I and the horse believe in it.”)

A like case. “You remember A. B. He had a braw mare; everybody was praising her, and there wasn’t the likes of her to be seen about the place. A man who was passing waited to look at her, and praised her for being a splendid beast. But if he did, when she reached home she fell down and would neither rise nor eat.”

Mrs. G. said: “One of our horses, a fine beast, was going past the barn when all at once it fell on the ground. They got it into the stable. In a little time it could not move its body, but was tossing its head from side to side and seemed to be in great pain. It was striking its head on the ground so much that we thought it would kill itself.”

A case in which the illness had lasted for some time before skilled advice was got, is the following: “D. D.’s father-in-law had a horse unwell and not expected to recover. It was lying in the stable quite stiff, and had neither eaten nor drunk anything for some days.”

A farmer who had two fine horses told the reciter to put the saddle on one of them and meet him on his way home from a visit he had to pay. D. McT., as instructed, saddled the better of the two horses and started to meet his father. He was very careful, leading the horse instead of riding it. He met his father within three miles of home driving in a cart with a neighbour. When they met, his father said, “You have killed that beast. Why did you ride it so hard?” D. told his father, what was the fact, that he had not ridden at all, but walked all the way from home. “Look at the horse,” said his father, and the horse was pouring of sweat and trembling. He turned home, but could not keep up with the cart, and only managed to make it crawl back with difficulty. As soon as it was got into the stall, it lay down and commenced kicking as if in great pain. The horse was cured.

A man of whom we have already spoken as injuring animals with his Evil Eye unintentionally, as a reciter tells us, “was at this time threshing with my father. They had no threshing-mill, and did it all with flails. One day my father had been out ploughing, and had the best mare ever they had in the plough. Coming home, he had to pass the barn to go to the stable, and McA., of the Evil Eye, came to the door and looked after the mare. That was enough; before the mare reached the stable door she began to shake and tremble, and it was with great difficulty they managed to get her into the stall. They knew quite well what was the matter.”

One other horse case. The reciter says: “One Sunday I was standing there on the little hill at C., and I saw a man coming towards me from Gartachara. I knew the man and waited till he passed. He went down to C. I never thought of anything being wrong, but when I turned down the way the man had come up, what did I find but a beautiful brown horse I had at the time, lying on his belly in the water where the horses used to take their drink. He could not stand on his feet, but I got help, and we managed to get him into the kailyard, where he lay groaning.” The horse recovered.

Fowls are said to be affected. A certain woman had been suspected of hindering the butter from coming at a churning. The case was being reported to a collector, when a bystander expressed doubts as to the existence of an Evil Eye. The reciter then said that her own experience had proved the truth of the accusation in the case of this individual. “She was living for a year beside me, and all that year, although I had most beautiful hens, they laid nothing but soft eggs. They would be found in the mornings all scattered here and there on the floor. Indeed I thought they dropped more eggs than was natural. It was only when talking about the hens to another neighbour that it was suggested to me that her Evil Eye was the cause. Then I knew that there would be no use keeping hens while that woman was beside me, so I sold them all. I got clear of her at the end of the year. I never said anything to her about it, for I was afraid.”

The reciter of the following said that he was positively certain that the facts were as stated, though it had not occurred to himself. “A certain man once called at a house, and a beautiful brood of chickens were going about on the kitchen floor. He was not right out when a stool fell on them and smothered every one of them. From the kitchen he went to the byre, and saw there a beautiful quey, which he professed to admire very much. He was not long gone when the quey became unwell.” The belief was firmly established that the chickens and the quey had been air an cronachadh.

A firm believer gives the following:—“One time her mother had a brood of ducks, and every time Mrs. Mac. came in she praised the ducks, but meanwhile one after another was dying, until at last only one remained. One day this one was in the kitchen when Mrs. Mac. came in, and she praised it as usual, but when she was going away she tramped on it and killed it. They were quite sure it was her Evil Eye that had been doing the mischief.”

Not only live fowls but even eggs may be injured. B. S., a respectable girl, a domestic servant, able to read and write, and quite reliable, gives this as a sample. She had bought some eggs, and on bringing them home a neighbour woman was in the house and looked at the eggs. She went away, and afterwards some of the eggs were put on to boil. Although left on the fire for the usual time, it was found they were not boiled enough, and were returned to be further boiled. One of them then cracked and sent the hot water in sparks in her face, and the others were so broken that they were of no use. The people in the house attributed the mishap to the woman who had been there when the eggs were brought in.

On considering the whole of these symptoms, the principal thing that strikes one to be urged in excuse of the faith that is in the reciters is that what was wrong came on apparently suddenly, in some cases after a visit from a person already suspected, but as often as not it was the suddenness of the mishap which gave ground to the accusation of some probably entirely innocent passer-by. Unless faith in the Evil Eye were already present, there seems hardly ground for any person with experience of cattle and their ailments to evolve a theory of the existence of any such latent power in the individuals accused. So little critical people became, that everything unexpected was referred to the Evil Eye. As a Kintyre man said, “If anything went wrong with the beef when the winter supply was cured, it was attributed to the Evil Eye of some one or other.”

BENEFIT TO THE OWNER OF AN EVIL EYE

Though in many cases involuntary, it has been pointed out that some believe that individuals knowing or professing to know that they have an Evil Eye, from sheer devilry, exercise it to the injury of others, though for no visible benefit to themselves.

A reliable and fairly educated woman, whose father began life as a crofter and died what in that class of life is to be considered as a rich man, a native of South Uist, relates:—There was a woman near her father’s house believed to have a very bad eye, and to be able to do mischief with it. Her aunt was very careful as much as possible to keep out of this woman’s sight, and if she happened to come about at churning time her aunt would put the churn so that the woman would not see it. She would not sell a pound of butter to her for any consideration. The curious thing was that although that woman could take away the produce from other people’s cows, she seemed unable to make any profit of it for herself. It was just her envious and malicious nature that made her take it (the produce) from other people, although it was not going to benefit herself. She was well known by all the people in the district, and they all suspected her of the practice of witchcraft. It was on account of this suspicion, selling butter to her was objected to.

It is not necessary that the desire to possess something should be, as it were, illegitimate or unreasonable to cause damage. Thus M. MacL. was relating how a neighbour’s horse had died. “People say that it was blighted by the Evil Eye. One of his sons had his eye in it, for he expected to get it for himself, but it took ill. At first they thought it was going to get better, for it was eating its food in the evening, but on the following morning this son went out to the stable when he rose, and found it lying down. When it saw him it got up, gave itself a shake, and fell down dead.”

There may be, however, indirect advantages from being credited by your neighbours with having an Evil Eye. Mrs. MacE., a cottar, lived on the farm of L. in one of the inner isles. She was believed to have had the Evil Eye very strongly, and people would do almost anything rather than offend her, so general was the impression that she could injure any person if she wished to do so. The reciter served for some time on a farm that marched with hers, and he says that when Mrs. MacE. came their way she could have almost whatever favour she chose to ask, so much were they afraid of her Evil Eye. He often heard his master remark that he would not incur her displeasure for almost any consideration, in case she might do him injury.

DISADVANTAGE TO THE OWNER OF AN EVIL EYE

If in an indirect way, as above pointed out, some benefits may accrue to one credited with the Evil Eye, it is also said that they may personally suffer serious loss. An old Islay woman who can read Gaelic well, intelligent and full of information, says she knows for certain there are people who possess the Evil Eye. She believes that it is not a matter of choice with them, they cannot help it. Some even do harm to their own cattle. R., who was at one time in Islay, could not go into his own byre but one or other of the cattle would be ill after it. This was so well known that a big dairymaid that he had engaged, a north-country woman, protested against his coming over the byre doorstep. It was because he had such an envious eye that he did so much mischief.

Another reciter tells us of the same farmer that they kept him in the house when his own cattle were being taken in from pasture, in case by admiring them he might be the means of doing them an injury.

Another man in the same island, having got a first-prize animal, said to the herd that he would go out to see it. The herd, fearing evil, tried to dissuade him, but he persisted in going. Shortly afterwards the animal died. His neighbours used to hurry their cattle out of his sight when they saw him coming that way. It was said he could not help it.

D. C. had the Evil Eye very powerfully. On one occasion he went to examine some cattle he had newly bought, and when he looked at them some of them fell down as if they would die. The herd ran across the hill to a hamlet marching with D. C.’s farm and got a bottle of water from a skilled person. When sprinkled on the cattle they at once recovered.

A man in Bowmore went into his own byre one night when his cousin, who lived with him, was milking his cow. He had a nice calf in the byre, and he put his arms round its neck and began to praise it very much. His cousin said to him it was not good to do that. The next morning the calf was found dead, an occurrence credited to his Evil Eye.

A native of Mull avowed her firm belief in the Evil Eye, especially quoting what her mother had told her of a large farmer where she had been brought up who owned a number of cattle, and who had the Evil Eye. “Every time that man went into his own byre the best of his cattle were sure to be unwell afterwards, and they were often dying with him. He could not help it. At last he got a dairymaid who, when she had become acquainted with his peculiarities, would not allow him to go into the byre at all, or near the cows. She turned him back when she would see him coming.”

Exactly the same account of another farmer is given by a reciter in Ross-shire in the parish of U——. She knew him very well by sight, having often seen him at markets, and many times she had heard that he had the Evil Eye, could not help it, and often hurt his own cattle “by thinking too highly of them.” This information was corroborated by another, D. McL., who also knew the man by name and sight, having served on a farm in the same district, and he often heard of him hurting his own cattle.

Of course the Evil Eye is as lively in Ireland as on this side of St. George’s Channel; but the following experience of a native of county Cork, an educated, reliable woman, the wife of a member of the lower ranks of the Civil Service, while staying in Jura, is interesting. Desiring a drink of water one day she called at a house, the mistress of which met her at the door and invited her to come in to have a drink of milk. When she went in she found a girl churning. After sitting for a minute or two Mrs. M. would have left, but was urged to wait for a little to taste the new butter off the churn on a scone. She sat a while, and the girl continued at the churn, evidently working as hard as she could, perspiring, and yet there were no signs of butter. Mrs. M. innocently remarked, “Dear me, I never thought churning was so difficult.” The woman and girl looked at each other, but without speaking. The girl continued churning, until at last her mistress said, “You may put the churn past, you will get no butter off it to-day.” Shortly after Mrs. M. left without having tasted the butter, but beyond that thinking nothing of the circumstances. About two months afterwards, while walking in the same direction, she called at the same house. When going in she noticed the girl again at the churn, but making a rush with it to the other end of the house. Mrs. M. observed, “Oh! Mrs. Mac., I hope I am not interfering with your work. I see J. going out of the way.”

“She is churning, and is going away with the churn, for the last time you were here she did not get one bit of butter off the churn.”

“I am sorry to hear that; I am sure I did nothing to keep the butter from coming.”

“I do not know; she got none at any rate, that’s all I can say.”

Of two women living beside each other in Islay, one was credited with the Evil Eye, and supposed to take away the dairy produce from her neighbours. One year her neighbour for a whole summer was unable to get a bit of butter from her churning. Her suspicion rested strongly on the other. Her account of it was as follows: “I tried everything. They told me to put a horseshoe in the churn, and I did that. Others told me to put salt in it, and I did that, but neither did any good. I scrubbed and scrubbed the churn and the milk dishes, but it was of no use. The milk would only come up with a hissing sound. I was even afraid to use the sour milk in baking scones, for I was sure there was something not right about it. The pig got fat that year, for it was getting the most of the milk. At last I consulted a neighbour, and she told me just what I knew already, that it was a bad woman beside me that was taking away the butter. She advised me not to bother any more, and to keep churning, for the woman would stop her mischief by-and-by, and then the butter would come back as it had gone. I did as she told me, and through time the butter came. I was not speaking about it to any one, for I did not want people to know I believed that she could do so much harm.”

A well-educated small farmer’s wife, a woman of five-and-thirty, knew a husband and wife who both possessed the Evil Eye. They were quite aware themselves that they did, and could not help it. Passing through a park where several colts were grazing, one of which took their fancy, they expressed their admiration of it. That evening the colt took ill and never recovered.

One would think that a little consideration would have made it clear that with two in the same house equally unfortunate nothing they had could have succeeded with them, and yet there was no account of this couple being in worse circumstances than their neighbours.

It certainly is a curious development, the belief already alluded to of the injurious action of the Evil Eye of the farmer on his own stock. “W. C. was on intimate terms with a neighbouring farmer, whom he visited frequently. It was observed that if at any time he (the farmer) praised an animal, something for certain happened to it afterwards. On one occasion he talked admiringly of the poultry, and shortly after all of them died.”

Another reciter said: “In our own time a farmer required to be kept from going among his own cattle, lest by looking on them they should be injured.” These cases respectively were in Islay and Harris.

Judging from personal experience of an old friend addicted to prophesying on his first appearance in the morning the sort of weather for the day, the result being, as we of a younger generation all believed, almost invariably wrong, it seems probable that these stories have arisen in connection with men who talked freely, giving opinions based upon hurried observation. Where silence would have left no ground for animadversion the wordy man had his sayings remembered against him, especially when he was wrong, and the good beasts subsequently turned out failures, as the fine days foretold were generally wet.

CONSEQUENCE OF DIRECT PRAISE

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.

A horse going up the main street of Bowmore in Islay was looked at by a man passing. A few minutes after it fell and could not rise, till a woman, C. McI., came and did “something to it.” The horse got all right, and the woman consulted maintained that it was a case of Evil Eye.

A man now resident in Glasgow was visiting some friends on a farm in one of the inner islands, and a man riding past was observed looking rather attentively at the cows in a field beside the road. He was supposed to have paid particular attention to a cow which, shortly after he had passed, was noticed to be unwell. It was treated as a case of the Evil Eye, and recovered.

These cases occurred with persons not notorious. The following is one in which the woman who affected the cattle was generally believed to have the Evil Eye. The reciter’s father was driving four cows from the park one evening, and when passing this woman’s house she stood at the door looking at the cows. In a moment off they went as hard as they could run. One of them, a handsome beast that had been bought from a farmer in Gartbreac, when they got them into the byre, was tied to a heavy kitchen grate which was there, but she ran out of the byre with the grate hanging to her neck, and climbed up a peat stack nearly reaching the top of it. From that day they never got any further good of that cow, and were decidedly of opinion that she had been bewitched by the woman.

Not the cattle alone but milk also is influenced by a mere look. We give an instance in the words of the narrator:—

“Bha ’n toradh air a thoirt uam fein an uiridh. Mhaistir sinn gus an robh Raonull agus Donull agus mi fein a ruith leis an fhallus ach ged a leanamaid air fathast cha ’n fhaigheamaid mir ime. ’S an anns an t-sabhal bhios sinn a cruinneachadh a bhainne agus thainig duine ’n rathad latha aig nach eil bo da chuid fein agus dh’amhairc e air a bhainne ’san t-sabhal: bha sinn a’ deanadh dhe gum b’esan a rinn an cron. Bha na cairdean gam’ chomhairleachadh gun a bhi leigeil le daoine bhi faicinn a’bhainne ach mi bhi cuimhnicheadh nach eil na h-uile duine cosmhuil rium fein. Well, o’n am sin, tha sinn a toirt fanear nach fhaigh neach sam bith cothrom air dol far am bheil am bainne agus tha sinn a faotainn a nis urrad ime’s bu chor air na h-uile maistreadh.” (“The butter was taken from myself last year. We churned until Ronald and Donald and myself were running with sweat, but although we had continued at it till now we could not get a bit of butter. It is in the barn that we gather the milk, and a man who has not got a cow of his own came the way one day and he looked on the milk in the barn, and we were making out that it was he who had done the harm. The friends were advising me not to be allowing people to see the milk, but that I should remember that every person is not like myself. Well, from that time we are taking care that nobody will get an opportunity to go where the milk is, and now we are getting as much butter as we ought to get on every churning.”)

The Isle of Man, from a Gaelic point of view, may be considered as likely to be much the same as the islands of Argyll, and a lighthouse-keeper, stationed there for some time, tells us he heard a good deal about the Evil Eye, and that belief in it is pretty common. “If a person is seen to look closely at a cow when passing her he is at once suspected, and is likely to be requested by the owner of the beast to take certain steps to prevent injurious consequences.”

As we have seen above, the very natural consequence of this belief in a look doing injury leads to the hiding of things liable to harm.

A somewhat amusing story of the effects of a look is from Arran.

“One time M. K. and myself were at a meeting, and there was an old bachelor there who kept looking at us all the time. We noticed it, but did not think much about it until after we went home, but when we got home both of us began to yawn and rift, and could not stop it. We were quite sure that we had been hurt by the ‘eye’ of the old fellow. M. K. made a drink of salt and water for us, and we took it and that cured us.”

Eructation in Arran seems to have a special connection with the Evil Eye and witchcraft. Another reciter remembers quite well a reputed witch going into her mother’s house, and not very long after she left her younger sister, a child at the time, became unwell. Her mother at once suspected that the fault lay with the woman who had left, so she sent after her and brought her back. The reputed witch “mixed salt and water, drank it herself, rifted fearfully, and in a little while the child got quite well.”

The use of salt as a “preservative” is illustrated in the case of an Arran woman who was a strong believer in and much afraid of the effects of the Evil Eye. She had one cow, and it gave her much discomfort when she saw the cow grazing near the roadside, fearing that some passer-by might “put his eye in her.” To keep the milk right, if she gave any to be carried away, or even “to be drunk on the premises,” she invariably put salt in it, and that sometimes to excess. The reciter said, “For a while we were getting milk from her for a man staying with us who was seriously annoyed when the milk was more than ordinarily salt, giving vent to his discontent saying, ‘Why the deuce does she not let us put saut in oor ain milk?’”

AVOIDING THE LOOK

The following recited by a Mull woman is interesting as showing that smiths and Druids, or their modern representatives, have still some affinity. The reciter told how her mother’s cow had taken suddenly ill as her brother Sandy was starting for the smithy. When he arrived there he mentioned the circumstance to the smith. “‘And did your mother no send any message to me?’ said the smith. Sandy said, ‘No, she had sent no message.’ ‘Well, I think your mother might ken that anything that I could do, I would do for her, and she might have sent for me.’ My brother suggested that he had better come away down to see her, so the smith came down and found my mother very vexed about the cow. He said, ‘The cow is bad enough, but it might have been one of the family, for the one that could do this could do the other thing just as well, but we’ll see what can be done.’ Having taken certain steps, he advised her also not to allow any one to see the cow on any account, for three would soon pass, he said, and if she would allow them in to see the cow, the cow would be gone. The three were strong, and she would need to use all her strength to keep them out. He told her that was all he could do just then, but that she must send Sandy over twice to him for a bottle. When he went away she told the children not to tell any one where she was, and she went to the byre to watch the cow. Having got tubs she filled them with stones and placed them against the byre door with spades and everything she could think of to keep the door from being opened. She was not long there when a man passed with a horse and a dog. He came to the kitchen door and asked the children where their mother was, but they did not tell him. He then came to the byre door, lifted the sneck, and when it did not yield tried to force it open with all his might, saying, ‘A Cheit nic Iain, am bheil thu ann sud?’ (‘Kate, John’s daughter, are you there?’) My mother knew his voice as that of a near neighbour, and answered: ‘Tha Iain, tha a’ mhart gu bochd agus tha i na laidh cul an doruis ’s cha ’n urrainn dhuit tighinn a steach.’ (‘Yes, John, the cow is unwell, and she is lying behind the door and you cannot get in.’) My mother had to tell the lie, or he would force the door open. The man went away, and these were the three that the smith had said would come the way—the man and the horse and the dog. And it was that man that had done the harm to the cow, but it was found out in time and the cow got better, but it was that very year my two brothers died, and nobody knows whether he had anything to do with their death or no.”

We include this under Evil Eye, because there is no statement of any accusation of witchcraft against the “man,” or for the matter of that “of the horse or the dog.”

In another case, in which a certain George T., by his devices, cured a cow of which he had said it was “bitten, wounded” (teum), he asked if there had been a man with a black head praising the cow. When he was told that they had no knowledge of such a thing, “Well,” said he, “it is a man with a black head that has injured your cow with the Evil Eye, but be under no anxiety, the cow is all right now.” He asked my mother if she had shown to any person the whole of the butter that came off the churn. My mother said that she was not showing (was not in the custom of showing) the butter to any one. “That is right, Flora. For all you have ever seen, although you would not keep but as much as the size of an egg, be sure that you do not let the whole of the butter be seen by anybody.”

An Islay farmer’s daughter remembers a certain woman who was supposed to possess an Evil Eye, and who paid them occasional visits. So terrified were they lest she should interfere with their butter, that whenever they saw her coming while they were churning, they would throw a cloth over the churn and put it out of sight until the woman left.

From Stratherrick, Ross-shire, a reciter said, “When she heard so much talk about cattle being injured by the Evil Eye, and the substance taken away, she became afraid of this, and especially when churning disliked anybody to come where the churn was, so much so that she used to do the churning in an out-of-the-way corner of the house.”

It is evidently not so easy to protect a horse or a cow from a glance of an Evil Eye, but a lady tells how that, visiting at a farmhouse, she saw the old cook, who had been long in the farmer’s service, running in great excitement to gather in a brood of young ducklings that were running about the yard. Being a frequent visitor and intimately acquainted with the cook, she asked her what was wrong, and why she was hurrying the ducklings at that hour of the day. “Oh,” said the cook, “Mr. A. is coming up the road, and last time he was here I had a beautiful brood of ducklings, and his eye took them and every one of them died, so I am putting these out of sight in case he should look at them.”

According to one authority the influence of an Evil Eye does not cease at once with the absence of the possessor. “W. G. lived for some time on a certain farm; she was supposed to be possessed of the Evil Eye, and on one occasion it was particularly noticed that certain animals she had praised died. When removed from the farm, the farmer met with a succession of misfortunes which were credited to W. G.”

CONVERSION TO BELIEF IN EVIL EYE

We have already seen a case, in which a woman on her own showing demonstrates that it was the influence of others which caused her to believe in the power of the Evil Eye; but conviction has in some cases been carried to the minds of men as a result of experience. A man taking a valuable horse from the west coast of Kintyre to Tarbert was, after leaving Musadale, offered a considerable sum for it. He said he would not, could not sell the beast, and though the offer was raised to sixty pounds, he still refused and went on his way. Before he reached Tayinloan the horse fell dead on the road. The owner of the horse, considered to be a religious man, after this incident could not be shaken in his belief in the Evil Eye.

In another case, a woman having got from her mother a hen, a first-rate layer, an acquaintance came in and the conversation turned upon the excellence of the bird, frankly acknowledged by the owner, who added her own quota of praise. The visitor was no time gone when the hen “clapped her wings, fell down, and died.” Mrs. G. declared that it has been her firm belief ever since that it was a case of cronachadh.

GIVING AWAY MILK DANGEROUS

All have heard of the belief in the power of witches to acquire for themselves, among other things, the milk and butter of their neighbours. This apparently requires some deliberate act of magic, “drawing the tether,” as they say in the north of Ireland, or even milking the pot chain, as reported in the Highlands. In only one case, as reported, was this danger ascribed to the owner of an Evil Eye, and the writer is still of opinion that his lady friend, who said, “If an evil-disposed person who possesses an Evil Eye gets a little milk from another, he or she will be able to operate through that to injure all the milk that remains, and even the cows,” had not differentiated in her own mind the “Evil Eye” from “witchcraft.” We will repeat the incident.

A suspected woman, living near, one time asked her servant if she could get a little milk daily, her own cow giving none at the time. The servant girl told the lady that the woman was asking milk, and then added, “I will not give it her.” Her mistress said, “Oh, you may give it; she needs it, and you can spare it quite well.” The girl said it was not that, but showed that she was afraid of the woman getting what she asked, and thus taking their milk from them and perhaps injuring the cow. Her mistress said there was no fear of that, and the girl yielded, adding, “I know what I’ll do.” What she did was to put pinches of salt and of sugar in the milk the woman was to get that evening, and to take the first mouthful (bolgam) of it herself. This, according to prevalent ideas in the district, would hinder the receiver of the milk having any power to do harm for the remainder of that season. This performance seems a common precaution in cases where milk is given to suspected persons.

SCIENCE VERSUS EOLAS

It will be easily understood that to a believer in the Evil Eye mere modern science, as met with in daily life, in doctors, and veterinary surgeons, is of small account. A well-educated lady, a friend of the writer, advised a neighbour whose cow was ill to send for the vet. The answer was: “Cha’n eil vet a chum feum sam bith, oir ’san a tha bho air a cronachadh. ’S e rud is fearr eolas fhaotainn air a son.” (“A vet is no use whatever, because the cow is air a cronachadh; the best thing is to get eolas for it.)”

In that case they didn’t even send for the “vet.” In the following instance a certain preliminary confidence seems to have been shown in medical men. The reciter gives this as a very clear case of Evil Eye. A child had fallen sick; two doctors were attending it, but it was getting worse. The parents, having done all that they could think of, requested the aid of a woman who was known to deal with eolas a chronachaidh. The woman went to see the child, and what she did the reciter did not know, but, “sure enough, she soon cured the child and told its parents that it had been air a cronachadh.” This may have been “sure enough” for those immediately interested, others may be permitted to doubt.

In these cases common sense has generally the minister on its side. In a case already quoted, in which the mother’s milk was supposed to have been turned into water in her system by the Tiree woman, her mother was sent for. This old lady’s granddaughter tells us, “When my grandmother came she suggested that a decent man who was living near them, who was used to work with eolas where people or beasts had been air an cronachadh, should be called in, but she said they would need to go to him secretly, for he had promised the minister that he would not make any more eolas. My father and mother agreed, but my mother requested my grandmother to go to the man, because she did not know how to go about it. My grandmother went and spoke to the man’s wife first. The wife said, ‘I am sure he will do what he can for John (the child’s father), but he has promised the minister that he would not make any more of that; but come and speak to him yourself.’ My grandmother spoke to the man, who said that he had promised to the minister that he would not do any more of these things. He could not go to her, but she might come back to him again the following day. This was a Wednesday, and there were only two days of the week on which he could make eolas—these were Thursdays and Sundays. When she went back the following day, he had not got his cure ready yet, he said, but would have it on Sunday. He told her that her daughter would not have so much milk as she had at first, but would have enough to bring up the child. On Sunday he had the thing ready as he had promised, and he made it twice for her afterwards. That is, he made it three times. He correctly described the whole appearance of the woman who had taken the milk away, although nobody had ever mentioned about the Tiree cailleach to him. My mother had plenty of milk after that.”

We can scarcely wonder at the minister objecting to this magical practitioner when we consider the nature and the time of his performance. An old Islay man says that when he was a young man he was very intimate with a woman who had knowledge of the curing of toothache (eolas deide). She was a relative of his own, and many a time she offered to teach him the words she used. She could teach them to a male, not to a female. He was young at the time, and did not like to learn them, for some people were saying that it was a sort of witchcraft (buideachas), but it was not that, for the words were all good words. They were taught by the Saviour, who taught them first to His mother. Our reciter went on to say that this toothache cure is of no use, and need not be tried, in any case beyond a first or second attack. It is hard to make it succeed even in the case of a second attack, and beyond that it can have no effect whatever. Neither will it do in a case where the sufferer has his tooth taken out.

These latter confessions were doubtless memories of the instructions of the teacher. Our old friend did not repeat the formula, but it has appeared elsewhere.[6]

The “some” who said that eolas was a sort of witchcraft seem undoubtedly to be right, unless, of course, we admit that their action is based on a scientific understanding. The Evil Eye itself is unconscious, and therefore a natural phenomenon like measles or hay fever, but its cure is a good deal like that employed for hay fever in many cases, more empirical than scientific.

[6] “Gaelic Incantations, with Translations,” W. Mackenzie, p. 55 et seq.

We are lucky in being able to give in his own words medical science as expounded by a Gaelic-speaking tailor, a simple-minded man of about seven-and-thirty, a man who can read and can work, but with no special affection for either. He belongs to one of the inner islands:—

“Tha Eolas nathrach ann, agus tha Eolas deide ann. Tha Eolas sul, agus Eolas greim, agus Eolas chronachaidh ann. Eolas gach ni, ’na aite fein. Ma lotar neach le nathair, faigheadh e Eolas nathrach: agus ’nuair bhios an deide air duine faigheadh e Eolas deide; agus mar sin leis gach ni eile. Is aithne dhomh fhein da neo tri, a fhuair leigheas airson lot nathrach. Tha na facail th’ aca airson Eolais greim air an toirt as an Tiomnadh nuadh, pios an so, agus pios an sin; agus iad sin air an sgriobhadh air paipear, agus am paipear sin air fhuaigheal air an taobh a steach de chot’ an duine air an robh an greim. Cuiridh so an greim air falbh. B’aithne dhomh fhein duine a dh’ fheuch so, agus rinn e feum dha. Ach feumaidh duine bhi cinnteach gum bu na facail ceart aige. Agus tha na facail airson eolas deide air an cuir air paiper, agus am paiper air fhuaigheal an taobh a stigh de aodach duin’ air a cheart doigh. Ach ma tha na fiaclan air falbh, cha dean e math sam bith, ach ma tha iad slan fathast, ni e feum, agus cha tig an deide air ais tuille.

”Chuala mi iomadh uair na facail th’ aca airson Eolas sul; ach bheir mi dhuibh na chrunas an t-iomlan—ni a thug Mathair da Mac gus olc a chumail air falbh, bho’n bhainne agus bho’n chuinneag. So na briatharan:—

‘’Nuair a ni thu toiseachadh.

Cuir dorlach math salainn ann.

Cuir bun ’us barr an neonain ann.

Cuir mionach roin, ’us gearr fheidh ann.

Buain slat de’n chaoran a nall o aodann Eallasaid.

Snathain dearg le snuim teann

Air a chuir mu cheann a’ chratachan.

’S ged a thigeadh buidseach Hendry.

Cheannsaicheadh am balach i.’

Tha sibh a faicinn, bha ’m buidseach Hendry anns a Bhioball. B’ ise’ m buidseach bu laidire bha beo riomh; ach nam faigheadh neach sambith na nithe sin uile, agus an cuir gu feum, cha b’ urrainn dhise neo do bhuidseach sam bith eile a chron a dheanadh. Chunnaic mi fein an snathain dearg air clann, gus olc a chumail bhuapa.”

(“There is serpent knowledge (serpent bite) and toothache knowledge. There is eye knowledge and stitch (gripes) knowledge and hurt knowledge (by Evil Eye or Witchcraft). Knowledge of each thing in its own place. If any person is wounded by a serpent let him get serpent knowledge, and when a man has toothache let him get toothache knowledge, and so with every other thing. I myself know two or three who got a cure for serpent bites. The words they have for curing stitch (gripes) are taken from the New Testament, a bit here and a bit there, and these written upon paper, and that paper sewn in the inside of the coat of the person who had the stitch. This will put the stitch away. I knew a man that tried this, and it was of use to him. But one must be sure that he has got the right words. And the words for toothache knowledge are put on paper, and the paper sewn inside a person’s clothes in the same manner. But if the teeth are gone it will do no good, but if they are still whole it will do good, and the toothache will not return any more.

“I have often heard the words they have for eye knowledge, but I will give you what crowns the whole, the thing a Mother gave to her Son to keep evil away from the milk and from the churn. Here are the words:—

‘When you make a beginning

Put a good handful of salt in it.