HISTORICAL
TALES AND LEGENDS

OF THE

HIGHLANDS.

COMPILED BY

ALEXANDER MACKENZIE,

EDITOR OF THE “CELTIC MAGAZINE,”
AUTHOR OF THE “HISTORY OF THE CLAN MACKENZIE,”
THE “PROPHECIES OF THE BRAHAN SEER,” &c., &c.

“ ’S iomadh rud a chi Am fear a bhitheas fada beo.”

INVERNESS:
A. & W. MACKENZIE, CELTIC MAGAZINE OFFICE
EDINBURGH: MACLACHLAN & STEWART.

1878.

PREFACE

These Tales and Legends were very favourably received by a wide circle of readers, and by the Press generally, as they appeared from month to month in the Celtic Magazine. They are now published in a collected form at the request of many who have previously perused them. I would like to present the public with the names of their authors; but as one of them—the “Norman” and “Torquil” of the Celtic Magazine—objects to have his name made public, although he has written the greater number of them, I must content myself now by taking advantage of this opportunity to thank him, “Mac Iain,” and the others who supplied the Tales and Legends, the merits of which—especially those for which I may be held personally responsible—I propose to leave to the tender mercies of an indulgent public.

ALEX. MACKENZIE.

Celtic Magazine Office, Inverness,
September 1878.

CONTENTS.

HISTORICAL TALES & LEGENDS
OF THE HIGHLANDS.

LOCALITY.

We are in a West Coast village or township, cut off from all communication with the outer world, without Steamers, Railways, even Roads. We grow our own corn, produce our own beef, our mutton, our butter, our cheese, and our wool. We do our own carding, our spinning, and our weaving. We marry and are taken in marriage by, and among, our own kith and kin. In short, we are almost entirely independent of the more civilized and more favoured South. The few articles we do not produce—tobacco and tea—our local merchant, the only one in a district about forty square miles in extent, carries on his back, once a month or so, from the Capital of the Highlands. We occasionally indulge in a little whisky at Christmas and the New Year, at our weddings and our balls. We make it, too, and we make it well. The Salmon Fishery Acts are, as yet, not strictly enforced, and we can occasionally shoot—sometimes even in our gardens—and carry home, without fear of serious molestation, the monarch of the forest. We are not overworked. We live plainly but well, on fresh fish, potatoes and herring, porridge and milk, beef and mutton, eggs, butter, and cheese. Modern pickles and spices are as unknown as they are unnecessary. True, our houses are built not according to the most modern principles of architecture. They are, in most cases, built of undressed stone and moss (coinneach), thatched with turf or divots, generally covered over with straw or ferns held on by a covering of old herring nets, straw, and rope, or siaman.

The houses are usually divided into three apartments—one door in the byre end leading to the whole. Immediately we enter, we find ourselves among the cattle. A stone wall, or sometimes a partition of clay and straw separates the byre from the kitchen. Another partition, usually of a more elegant description, separates the latter from the “culaist,” or sleeping apartment. In the centre of the kitchen a pavement of three or four feet in diameter is laid, slightly raised towards the middle, on which is placed the peat fire. The smoke, by a kind of instinct peculiar to peat smoke, finds its way to a hole in the roof called the “falas,” and makes its escape. The fire in the centre of the room was almost a necessity of the good old Ceilidh days. When the people congregated in the evening, the circle could be extended to the full capacity of the room, and occasionally it became necessary to have a circle within a circle. A few extra peats on the fire would, at any time, by the additional heat produced, cause an extension of the circle, and at the same time send its warming influences to the utmost recesses of the apartment. The circle became extended by merely pushing back the seats, and this arrangement became absolutely necessary in the houses which were most celebrated as the great Ceilidh centres of the district.

The Ceilidh rendezvous is the house in which all the folk-lore of the country, all the old “sgeulachdan,” or stories, the ancient poetry known to the bards, or Seanachaidhean, the old riddles and proverbs are recited from night to night by old and young. All who took an interest in such questions congregated in the evening in these centres of song and story. They were also great centres of local industry. Net-making was the staple occupation, at which the younger members of the circle had to take a spell in turn. Five or six nets were attached in different corners of the apartment to a chair, a bedstead, or to a post set up for the purpose, and an equal number of young gossippers nimbly plied their fingers at the rate of a pound of yarn a-day. Thus, a large number of nets were turned out during the winter months, the proceeds of which, when the nets were not made for the members of the household, went to pay for tobacco and other luxuries for the older and most necessitous members of the circle.

We shall now introduce the reader to the most famous Ceilidh house in the district. It is such as we have above described. The good-man is bordering on five-score. He is a bard of no mean order, often delighting his circle of admiring friends with his own compositions, as well as with those of Ossian and other ancient bards. He holds a responsible office in the church, is ground-officer for the laird as well as family bard. He possesses the only Gaelic New Testament in the district. He lives in the old house with three sons whose ages range from 75 to 68, all full of Highland song and story, especially the youngest two—John and Donald. When in the district, drovers from Lochaber, Badenoch, and all parts of the Highlands find their way to this noted Ceilidh house. Bards, itinerants of all sorts, traveling tinkers, pipers, fiddlers, and mendicants, who loved to hear or tell a good story, recite an old poem or compose a modern one, all come and are well received among the regular visitors in the famous establishment. In the following pages strangers and local celebrities will recite their tales, those of their own districts, as also those picked up in their wanderings throughout the various parts of the country.

It was a condition never deviated from, that every one in the house took some part in the evening’s performance, with a story, a poem, a riddle, or a proverb. This rule was not only wholesome, but one which almost became a necessity to keep the company select, and the house from becoming overcrowded. A large oak chair was placed in a particular spot—“where the sun rose”—the occupant of which had to commence the evening’s entertainment when the company assembled, the consequence being that this seat, although one of the best in the house, was usually the last occupied; and in some cases, when the house was not overcrowded, it was never occupied at all. In the latter case, the one who sat next to it on the left had to commence the evening’s proceedings.

It was no uncommon thing to see one of the company obliged to coin something for the occasion when otherwise unprepared. On one occasion the bard’s grandson happened to find himself in the oak chair, and was called upon to start the night’s entertainment. Being in his own house he was not quite prepared for the unanimous and imperative demand made upon him to carry out the usual rule, or leave the room. After some hesitation, and a little private humming in an undertone, he commenced, however, a rhythmical description of his grandfather’s house, which is so faithful that, we think, we cannot do better than give it. The picture was complete, and brought down the plaudits of the house upon the “young bard” as he was henceforth designated.

Tigh mo Sheanair.

An cuala sibh riamh mu’n tigh aig I——r ’S ann air tha’n deanamh tha ciallach ceart, ’S iomadh bliadhna o’n chaidh a dheanamh, Ach ’s mor as fhiach e ged tha e sean; Se duine ciallach chuir ceanna-crioch air, ’S gur mor am pianadh a fhuair a phears, Le clachan mora ga’n cuir an ordugh, ’S Sament do choinntich ga’n cumail ceart.

Tha dorus mor air ma choinneamh ’n-otraich, ’Us cloidhean oir air ga chumail glaist, Tha uinneag chinn air ma choinneamh ’n teintean, ’Us screen side oirre ’dh-fhodar glas; Tha’n ceann a bhan deth o bheul an fhalais A deanamh baithach air son a chruidh ’S gur cubhraidh am faladh a thig gu laidir O leid na batha ’sa ghamhuinn duibh.

Tha catha’s culaist ga dheanamh dubailt, ’S gur mor an urnais tha anns an tigh, Tha seidhir-ghairdean do dharach laidir, ’Us siaman ban air ga chumail ceart, Tha lota lair ann, do ghrebhail cathair, ’S cha chaith’s cha chnamh e gu brath n’ am feasd, Tha carpad mor air do luath na moine, ’S upstairs ceo ann le cion na vent.

Tha sparan suithe o thaobh gu taobh ann, ’Us ceangail luibte gan cumail ceart, Tha tuthain chaltuinn o cheann gu ceann deth, ’Us maide slabhraidh’s gur mor a neart, Tha lathais laidir o bheul an fhail air, Gu ruig am falas sgur mor am fad, Tha ropan siamain ’us pailteas lion air ’S mar eil e dionach cha ’n eil mi ceart.

On one occasion, on a dark and stormy winter’s night, the lightning flashing through the heavens, the thunder clap loud and long, the wind blowing furiously, and heavy dark ominous clouds gathering in the north-west, the circle had already gathered, and almost every seat was occupied. It was the evening of the day of one of the local cattle markets. Three men came in, two of them well-known drovers or cattle buyers who had visited the house on previous occasions, the other a gentleman who had, some time previously, arrived and taken up his quarters in the district. No one knew who he was, where he came from, or what his name was. There were all sorts of rumours floating amongst the inhabitants regarding him; that he had committed some crime, and escaped from justice; that he was a gentleman of high estate, who had fallen in love with a lowly maiden and run away to spite his family for objecting to the alliance; and various other surmises. He was discovered to be a gentleman and a scholar, and particularly frank and free in his conversation with the people about everything except his own history and antecedents, and was a walking encyclopædia of all kinds of legendary lore connected with the southern parts of the country. His appearance caused quite a flutter among the assembled rustics. He was, however, heartily welcomed by the old bard and members of the circle, and was offered a seat a little to the left of the oak arm chair. It was soon found that he was a perfect master of Gaelic as well as English. It was also found on further acquaintance, during many subsequent visits, that he never told a story or legend without a preliminary introduction of his own, told in such a manner as to add immensely to the interest of the tale. Being called upon, he told the “Spell of Cadboll.”

These remarks are taken from the introduction to the Highland Ceilidh in the “Celtic Magazine,” at which the following Tales, the reader must assume, have been told by the various characters who frequented the Ceilidh house.

THE SPELL OF CADBOLL.

In olden days the east coast of Scotland was studded with fortresses, which, like a crescent chain of sentinels, watched carefully for the protection of their owners and their dependents. The ruins remain and raise their hoary heads over valley and stream, by river bank and sea shore, along which nobles, and knights, and followers “boden in effeyre-weir” went gallantly to their fates; and where in the Highlands many a weary drove followed from the foray, in which they had been driven far from Lowland pastures or distant glens, with whose inhabitants a feud existed. Could the bearded warriors, who once thronged these halls, awake, they would witness many a wonderful change since the half-forgotten days when they lived and loved, revelled and fought, conquered or sustained defeat. Where the bearer of the Crann-taraidh or fiery cross once rushed along on his hasty errand, the lightning of heaven now flashes, by telegraphic wires, to the farthest corners of the land. Through the craggy passes, and along the level plains, marked centuries ago with scarce a bridle path, the mighty steam horse now thunders over its iron road; and where seaward once swam the skin curach, or the crazy fleets of diminutive war galleys, and tiny merchant vessels with their fantastic prows and sterns, and carved mast-heads, the huge hull of the steam propelled ship now breasts the waves that dash against the rugged headlands, or floats like a miniature volcano, with its attendant clouds of smoke obscuring the horizon.

The parish of Fearn, in Easter Ross, contains several antiquities of very distant date. One of these shattered relics, Castle Cadboll, deserves notice on account of a singular tradition regarding it, once implicitly credited by the people—namely, that although inhabited for ages no person ever died within its walls. Its magical quality did not, however, prevent its dwellers from the suffering of disease, or the still more grievous evils attending on debility and old age. Hence many of the denizens of the castle became weary of life, particularly the Lady May, who lived there centuries ago, and who being long ailing, and longing for death, requested to be carried out of the building to die. Her importunity at length prevailed; and, according to the tradition, no sooner did she leave it than she expired.

Castle Cadboll is situated on the sea-shore, looking over the broad ocean towards Norway. From that country, in the early ages of Scottish history, came many a powerful Jarl, or daring Viking, to the coasts, which, in comparison with their own land, seemed fertile and wealthy. There is a tradition of a Highland clan having sprung from one of those adventurers, who with his brother agreed that whoever should first touch the land would possess it by right.

The foremost was the ultimate ancestor of the tribe; his boat was almost on shore, when the other, by a vigorous stroke, shot a-head of him; but ere he could disembark, the disappointed competitor, with an exclamation of rage, cut off his left hand with his hatchet, and flinging the bloody trophy on the rocks, became, by thus “first touching Scottish ground,” the owner of the country, and founder of the clan. The perfect accuracy of this story cannot now be vouched for; but it is an undeniable fact that the Clan Macleod have successfully traced their origin to a Norwegian source; and there is a probability that the claim is correct from the manifestly Norwegian names borne by the founders of the Clan Tormod and Torquil, hence the Siol Tormod—the race of Tormod—the Macleods of Harris; and the Siol Torquil, the race of Torquil—Macleods of Lewis—of whom came the Macleods of Assynt, one of whom betrayed Montrose in 1650, and from whom the estates passed away in the end of the seventeenth century to the Mackenzies.

The Macleods of Cadboll are cadets of the house of Assynt, but to what branch the Lady May of the legend belonged, it is difficult to decide, so many changes having occurred among Highland proprietors.

The cliffs of this part of Ross-shire are wild and precipitous, sinking with a sheer descent of two hundred feet to the ocean. The scenery is more rugged than beautiful—little verdure and less foliage. Trees are stunted by the bitter eastern blast, and the soil is poor. Alders are, however, plentiful, and from them the parish has derived its name of Fearn. There is a number of caves in the cliffs along the shore towards Tarbat, where the promontory is bold, and crowned with a lighthouse, whose flickering rays are now the only substitute for the wonderful gem which was said of yore to sparkle on the brow of one of these eastern cliffs—a bountiful provision of nature for the succour of the wave-tossed mariner.

During the reign of one of the early Stuart kings—which, is of little moment—Roderick Macleod ruled with a high and lordly hand within the feudal stronghold of Cadboll. He was a stout and stern knight, whose life had been spent amidst the turmoil of national warfare and clan strife.

Many a battle had he fought, and many a wound received since first he buckled on his father’s sword for deadly combat. Amid the conflicting interests which actuated each neighbouring clan—disagreement on any one of which rendered an immediate appeal to arms the readiest mode of solving the difficulty—it is not to be wondered at that Cadboll, as a matter of prudence, endeavoured to attach to himself, by every means in his power, those who were most likely to be serviceable and true. Macleod had married late in life, and his wife dying soon after, while on a visit to her mother, left behind her an only daughter, who was dear as the apple of his eye to the old warrior, but, at the same time, he had no idea of any one connected with him having any freedom of will or exercise of opinion, save what he allowed; nor did he believe women’s hearts were less elastic than his own, which he could bend to any needful expedient. About the period our story commences, the Lady May was nearly eighteen years of age, a beautiful and gentle girl, whose hand was sought by many a young chief of the neighbouring clans; but all unsuccessfully, for the truth was she already loved, and was beloved, in secret, by young Hugh Munro from the side of Ben-Wyvis.

The favoured of the daughter was not the choice of her father, simply because he was desirous to secure the aid of the Macraes, a tribe occupying Glenshiel, remarkable for great size and courage, and known in history as “the wild Macraes.” The chief—Macrae of Inverinate—readily fell in with the views of Macleod, and as the time fixed for his marriage with the lovely Lady May drew nigh, gratified triumph over his rival Munro, and hate intense as a being of such fierce passions could feel, glowed like a gleaming light in his fierce grey eyes.

“Once more,” he said, “I will to the mountains to find him before the bridal. There shall be no chance of a leman crossing my married life, and none to divide the love Inverinate shall possess entire. By my father’s soul, but the boy shall rue the hour he dared to cross my designs. Yes, rue it, for I swear to bring him bound to witness my marriage, and then hang him like a skulking wild-cat on Inverinate green.”

It was nightfall as he spoke thus. Little he knew that at the same moment Hugh Munro was sitting beneath the dark shadows of the alder trees, which grew under the window of the little chamber where May Macleod was weeping bitterly over the sad fate from which she could see no way of escape. As she sat thus the soft cry of the cushat fell upon her ears. Intently she listened for a few moments, and when it was repeated she stepped to the window and opened it cautiously, leaning forth upon the sill. Again the sound stole from among the foliage, and May peered down into the gloom, but nothing met her gaze save the shadows of the waving branches upon the tower wall.

“It is his signal,” she whispered to herself as the sound was repeated once more. “Ah me! I fear he will get himself into danger on account of these visits, and yet I cannot, I cannot bid him stay away.”

She muffled herself in a dark plaid, moved towards the door, opened it cautiously, and listening with dread, timidly ventured down to meet her lover.

“I must and will beg him to-night to stay away in future,” continued she, as she tripped cautiously down the narrow winding stair; “and yet to stay away? Ah me! it is to leave me to my misery; but it must be done, unkind as it may be, otherwise he will assuredly be captured and slain, for I fear Macrae suspects our meetings are not confined to the day and my father’s presence.”

After stealing through many dark passages, corridors, and staircases, in out-of-the-way nooks, she emerged into the open air, through a neglected postern shadowed by a large alder, opposite the spot from which the sound proceeded.

Again she gazed into the shadow, and there leaning against a tree, growing on the edge of the crag, she saw a tall slender figure. Well she knew the outlines of that form, and fondly her heart throbbed at the sound of the voice which now addressed her.

“Dearest,” said the young Munro in a low tone, “I thought thou wouldst never come. I have been standing here like a statue against the trunk of this tree for the last half-hour watching for one blink of light from thy casement. But it seems that thou preferest darkness. Ah May, dear May, cease to indulge in gloomy forebodings.”

“Would that I could, Hugh,” she answered sadly. “What thoughts but gloomy ones can fill my mind when I am ever thinking of the danger you incur by coming here so often, and thinking, too, of the woeful fate to which we are both destined.”

“Think no more of it,” said her lover in a cheerful tone. “We have hope yet.”

“Alas, there is no hope. Even this day my father hath fixed the time for, to me, this dreaded wedding! And now, Hugh, let this be our last meeting—Mar tha mi! our last in the world. Wert thou caught by Inverinate, he so hates thee, he would have thy life by the foulest means.”

“Fear not for that, dearest. And this bridal! Listen, May; before that happen the eagle will swoop down and bear thee away to his free mountains, amid their sunny glens and bosky wood, to love thee, darling, as no other mortal, and certainly none of the Clan-’ic-Rath mhearlaich has heart to do.”

“Ah me!” sighed May, “would that it could be so. I cannot leave my father until all other hope is gone, and yet I fear if I do not we are fated to be parted. Even this may be the last time we may meet. I warn thee, Hugh, I am well watched, and I beg you will be careful. Hush! was that a footfall in the grove below the crag?” and she pointed to a clump of trees at some distance under where they were standing, and on the path by which he would return.

“By my troth it may be so,” said he. “Better, dear May, retire to your chamber, and I shall remain here till you bid me good night from your window.”

Again they listened, and again the rustling met their ears distinctly. It ceased, and the maiden, bidding her mountain lover a fond good night, ascended to her chamber, while he, disdaining to be frightened away by sound, moved to his former position below the alder tree. Seating himself at its root, with his eyes fixed on the window, in a voice low but distinct, he sang to one of the sweet sad lays of long ago a ditty to his mistress, of which the following paraphrase will convey an idea:—

“O darling May, my promised bride, List to my love—come fly with me, Where down the dark Ben Wyvis side The torrent dashes wild and free. O’er sunny glen and forest brake; O’er meadow green and mountain grand; O’er rocky gorge and gleaming lake— Come,—reign, the lady of the land.

“Come cheer my lonely mountain home, Where gleams the lake, where rills dance bright; Where flowers bloom fair—come, dearest, come, And light my dark and starless night. One witching gleam from thy bright eye Can change to halls of joy my home! One song, one softly-uttered sigh, Can cheer my lone heart—dearest, come.”

The moment the song ceased the fair form of May Macleod appeared at the casement overhead, she waved a fond farewell to her mountain minstrel, and closed the window; but the light, deprived of her fair face, had no charm for him—he gazed once more at the pane through which it beamed like a solitary star, amid the masses of foliage, and was turning away when he found a heavy hand laid on his shoulder.

“Stay,” exclaimed the intruder in a deep stern voice, whose tone the young chief knew but too well, “Thou hast a small reckoning to discharge ere thou go, my good boy. I am Macrae.”

“And I,” answered the other, “am Hugh Munro, what seek’st thou from me?”

“That thou shalt soon know, thou skulking hill cat,” answered Macrae, throwing his unbuckled sword, belt, and scabbard on the ground, and advancing with extended weapon.

“Indeed! then beware of the wild-cat’s spring,” Munro promptly replied, giving a sudden bound which placed him inside the guard of his antagonist, whose waist he instantly encircled with his sinewy arms with the design of hurling him over the crag on which they stood. The struggle was momentary. Munro, struck to the heart with Macrae’s dagger, fell with May’s loved name on his lips, while Macrae, staggering over the height, in the act of falling so wounded himself by his own weapon as to render his future life one of helpless manhood and bitter mental regret.

Macleod was soon after slain in one of the many quarrels of the time, while his daughter May, the sorrowing heiress of the broad lands of Cadboll, lived on for fifty years one long unrelieved day of suffering.

Fifty years! alas for the mourner—spring succeeded winter, and summer spring, but no change of season lightened May Macleod’s burden! Fifty years! year by year passing away only brought changes to those who lived under her gentle sway, and among the dependents of her home; youth passed into age, young men and maidens filled the places of the valued attendants of her girlhood; and the lady, solitary, still a mourner, in her feudal tower grew old and bent, thin and wan, but still in her heart the love of her youth bloomed fresh for her betrothed.

And then disease laid hold of her limbs—paralyzed, unable to move, she would fain have died, but the spell of Cadboll was on her, death could not enter within its walls.

Sickness and pain, care and grief, disappointment, trust betrayed, treachery, and all the ills which life is heir to, all might and did enter there. Death alone was barred without.

Sadly her maidens listened to her heart-breaking appeals to the spirit of Munro, her unwed husband, the murdered bridegroom of her young life, to come to her aid from the land of shadows and of silence. They knew her story of the fifty years of long ago, and they pitied and grieved with her, wondering at the constancy of her woman’s heart.

Still more sadly did they listen to her appeals to be carried out from the castle to the edge of the precipice, where the power of the spell ceased, there to look for, meet and welcome death; but they knew not the story of the spell, and they deemed her mad with grief.

Terrified at last by her appeals to the dead, with whom she seemed to hold continual conversation, and who seemed to be present in the chamber with them, though unseen, and partly, at length, worn out with her unceasing importunities, and partly to gratify the whim, as they considered it, of the sufferer, tremblingly they agreed to obey her requests and to carry her forth to the edge of the cliff. A frightened band, they bore the Lady May, lying on her couch, smiling with hope and blessing them for thus consenting. Over the threshold, over the drawbridge, her eyes, fixed on the heavens, brightened as they proceeded. Hope flushed with hectic glow upon her pale suffering face, grateful thanks broke from her lips. Hastening their steps, they passed through the gate, wound along the hill side, and as the broad expanse of ocean, with the fresh wind curling it into wavelets, burst upon the sight, a flash of rapture beamed on her countenance, a cry of joy rushed from her pallid lips—their feeble burden grew heavier; a murmur of welcoming delight was uttered to some glorious presence, unseen by the maidens, and all became hushed eternally. The Lady May lay on her couch a stiffening corpse. The spell of Cadboll had been broken at last. A Macleod inhabited it no more, and decay and ruin seized on the hoary pile of which now scarcely a vestige remains to tell of the former extent and feudal strength of Castle Cadboll.

PRINCE CHARLIE AND MARY MACLEOD.

The fate of the Chevalier and his devoted Highlanders forms one of the most romantic and darkest themes in the history of Scotland, so rich in historical narrative, song, and tradition—

Still freshly streaming When pride and pomp have passed away, To mossy tomb and turret grey, Like friendship clinging.

In the contemplation of their misfortunes, their faults and failings are forgotten, and now that the unfortunate Chevalier’s name and memory have become “such stuff as dreams are made of,” every heart throbs in sympathy with the pathetic lyric “Oh! wae’s me for Prince Charlie.”

In the present day, when it is not accounted disloyal to speak kindly of the Prince, or of those who espoused his cause—one cannot help indulging in admiration of the courage and cheerfulness with which he bore trials, dangers, and “hairbreadth ’scapes by flood and field,” nor wonder at the devotedness of the poorer Highlanders; their affection to his person; the care with which they watched over him in his wanderings; and, above all, the incorruptible fidelity which scorned to betray him, though tempted by what, in their poverty, must have seemed inconceivable wealth.

The history of the rising, and particularly of what followed after Culloden, relating to Prince Charlie, although generally minute, gives but little idea of the wonderful dangers he incurred, and the escapes he made. One should, in order to form a moderately correct idea of his hardships, have listened to those who had been out with him, as they, in the late evening of their days, talked of the past, and of the “lad they looed sae dearly,” or heard their descendants, who were proud of their forbears, having been out in the ’45, when—

The story was told, as a legend old, And by withered dame and sire, When they sat secure from the winter’s cold, All around the evening fire.

His capabilities of enduring cold, hunger, and fatigue prove that his constitution was of a very high order, and not what might have been expected from the descendant of a hundred kings brought up in the enervating atmosphere of courts. The magnanimity was surprising with which he bore up under his adverse lot, and the very trying privations to which he was subjected. The buoyancy of spirit with which he encountered the toils that hemmed him round, seemed to gather fresh energy from each recurring escape while wandering about, a hunted fugitive.

His appearance when concealed in the cave of Achnacarry as described by Dr Cameron, who was for a time a companion of his wanderings, is not suggestive of much comfort, but rather of contentedly making the most of circumstances. “He was then,” says Dr Cameron, “bare footed; he had an old black kilt and coat on, a plaid, philabeg, and waistcoat, a dirty shirt, and a long red beard, a gun in his hand, a pistol and dirk by his side. He was very cheerful and in good health, and, in my opinion, fatter than when he was at Inverness.” His courage and patience during his wandering drew forth even the admiration of his enemies, while his friends regretted that one capable of so much was so wanting in decision of character when it was urgently required by his own affairs, and the fortunes and lives of those who had perilled all for his sake. His friends, rich and poor, “for a’ that had come and gane,” were staunch in his favour to the very death; while his enemies, hounded on by a scared and vindictive Government, and earnestly anxious to enrich themselves by obtaining the reward offered for his capture, left no means untried to secure his person.

Among the many who signalized themselves in these attempts was one Ferguson, who, in command of a small squadron, cruised round the coast in search of the Prince and his fugitive friends, but in reality sparing none on whom it was possible or not dangerous to vent those feelings of oppression and worse, which the cruel Cumberland had made a fashion as regards Highlanders and the Highlands, and a sure recommendation to the notice of Government.

Soon after Culloden, Ferguson appeared off the coast and dropped anchor in Loch-Cunnard. A party landed there and proceeded up the strath as far as the residence of Mackenzie of Langwell, who was married to a near relation of Earl George of Cromartie. Mackenzie got out of the way, but the lady was obliged to attend some of her children who were confined by small-pox. The house was ransacked, a trunk containing valuable papers, and among these a wadset of Langwell and Inchvennie from the Earl of Cromartie, was burnt before her eyes, and about fifty head of black cattle were mangled by their swords and driven away to their ships.

Similar depredations were committed in the neighbourhood, without discrimination of friends or enemies. So familiarized were the west Highlanders and Islanders with Captain Ferguson, his cutter and crew, that they were in the habit of jeering him and them by calling after them—“Tha sinn eolach air a h-uile car a tha na t’eaman”—(We are acquainted with every turn in your tail)—a source of great irritation to the annoyed commander, who knew well the fugitives were hiding on the West Coast of Inverness-shire, and consequently resolved to adopt every species of decoy to entrap the Prince and his companions. To deceive the inhabitants of this wild and extensive coast, Ferguson pretended to give over the search and leave for Ireland. The Highlanders, wondering what would be the next move, were not deceived, nor did they relax their watchful precautions. The dwellers at Samalaman, the most western point of Moidart, had been especially harassed, as it was suspected they were in the confidence of Prince Charles. The suspicion was correct, and therefore, although they went about their usual employments they kept many an anxious look towards the ocean—many a lonely watch and walk was taken for the protection of the hunted wanderers.

To those who are not oppressed by anxiety the look-out from this headland is of surpassing beauty. Few scenes are equal to that presented in a midnight walk by moonlight along the sea beach, the glossy sea sending from its surface a long stream of dancing and dazzling light, no sound to be heard save the small ripple of the idle wavelets or the scream of a sea bird watching the fry that swarms along the shores! In the short nights of summer the melancholy song of the throstle has scarcely ceased on the hillside when the merry carol of the lark commences, and the snipe and the plover sound their shrill pipe. Again, how glorious is the scene which presents itself from the summits of the hills when the great ocean is seen glowing with the last splendour of the setting sun, and the lofty hills of the farther isles rear their giant heads amid the purple blaze on the extreme verge of the horizon.

Nothing of all this, for they were sights and scenes of continual recurrence, did Mary Macleod feel. Mary was a bold, spirited, handsome girl, who, in company with her father and two brothers forming the boat’s crew, knew well all ocean’s moods, and often braved the storms so common on that coast, and so fatal to many toilers of the deep.

On the morning of the fifth day after the departure of Captain Ferguson, Mary arose as usual to prepare the food for the family, and in going outside for a basket of peat fuel was surprised to observe a strange looking little vessel at anchor in a dark creek in the opposite island of Shona which partly occupies the mouth of Loch-Moidart. Time was when a circumstance, so apparently trivial, would have created no wonder nor left in the mind any cause for suspicion; but now Mary carefully scanned the low long dark hull of the craft, and her tanned and patched sails, which ill agreed with the trimness about her, and which at once spoke against her being a fishing craft or smuggler. “Cuilean an t-seann mhadaidh” (cub of the old fox) sighed the girl as she returned to the house to communicate the circumstance to the rest of the family, each of whom on reconnoitring the vessel confirmed her opinion. “Well then,” said Mary, “let us advise the neighbours to betake themselves to their daily employment without seeming to suspect the new comer, and above all let us warn the deer of the mountain that the bloodhounds have appeared.”

As the Moidart men were about to go to sea they were visited by a couple of miserable looking men from the suspected craft. One of them who spoke in Irish made them understand that they had lately left the coast of France laden with tobacco and spirits, some of which they would gladly exchange for dried fish and other provisions of which they were much in want, having been pursued for the last three days by an armed cutter, from which they had escaped with difficulty, and from which they intended to conceal themselves for some days longer in their present secluded anchorage. The fishermen, pretending to commiserate their condition, replied that they had no provisions to spare, and left only more convinced that Mary’s suspicions were well founded. Matters remained in this state for a few days, the craft lying quietly at anchor, and her six hands, being, it was said, the full complement of her crew, sneaking about in all directions, in pairs, on pretence of searching for provisions. At last, after an unusually fine day the sun sank suddenly behind a mountain mass of clouds which for some time before had been collecting into dense columns, whose tall and fantastic shapes threw an obscurity far over the western horizon.

The coming storm was so apparent that the fishermen of Samalaman secured their boats upon the beach just as some heavy drops, bursting from the region of the storm clouds, showed that the elemental war had begun.

The Atlantic rolled its enormous billows upon the coast, dashing them with inconceivable fury upon the headlands, and scouring the sands and creeks, which, from the number of shoals and sunken rocks in them, exhibited the magnificent spectacle of breakers white with foam extending for miles. The blast howled among the grim and desolate rocks. Still greater masses of black clouds advanced from the west, pouring forth torrents of rain and hail. A sudden flash illuminated the gloom, and was followed by the crash and roar of thunder which gradually became fainter until the dash of the waves upon the shore prevailed over it.

Far as the eye could reach the ocean boiled and heaved in one wide extended field of foam, the spray from the summits of the waves sweeping along its surface like drifting snow.

Seaward no sign of life was to be seen, save when a gull, labouring hard to bear itself against the breeze, hovered overhead, or shot across the gloom like a meteor. Long ranges of giant waves rushed in succession to the shore, chasing each other like monsters at play. The thunder of their shock echoed among the crevices and caves, the spray mounted along the face of the cliffs in columns, the rocks shook as if in terror, and the baffled wave returned to meet its advancing successor.

By-and-bye there came a pause like the sudden closing of a blast furnace, or as if the storm had retired within itself; but now and then, in fitful bursts, proclaiming that its power was but partially smothered. During the conflict of the elements Mary Macleod seemed to suffer the most acute agonies of mind; and no sooner did it abate than, wrapping herself in her plaid, she sallied out and proceeded towards the sea shore. There, straining her eyes over the dark and fearful deep, she thought she saw, by a broad flash of lightning, a small speck on the wild waters, pitching as if in dark uncertainty, about the mouth of Loch-Moidart. With the speed of frenzy away flew the maiden to the nearest cottage, and grasping a burning peat and a lapful of dried brushwood, she, with equal speed, retraced her steps to the shore. In an instant the beacon threw its crackling flame far over the loch, and in an instant more the small black craft at Shona had cut from her moorings and stood out to the entrance of the bay. Now rose the struggle in Mary’s mind. There stood the maid of Moidart in the shade of the lurid beacon, listening to the fitful blast, like the angel of pity. Something was passing on in the troubled bosom of that dark loch over which she often looked, that drew forth all the energies of her soul; but what that something was, was as hidden to her as futurity. She was startled from this state of intense feeling by a momentary flash on the water, instantaneously followed by a crash among the rocks at her side, and then came booming on her ear a sound as if the island of Shona had burst from its centre. “A Dhia nan dùl bi maile ris” (God of the elements be with him) ejaculated Mary as she bent her trembling knees on the wet sand, and then, like a spring from life to death, a boat rushed ashore, grounding on the shingle at her feet. A band of armed men immediately sprung on land, one of whom, gently clasping the girl, pressed her to his heart. “Failte ’Phrions” faltered Mary, giving a momentary scope to the woman in her bosom, but instantly recollecting herself, she whispered, “Guide him some of you to the hut of Marsaly Buie in the copse of Cul-a-chnaud, and I shall meet you there when the sun of the morning shall show me the fate of the pursuer.” By this time the intrepid girl was joined by the villagers, who extinguished all traces of the late fire, and carried the stranger’s boat where none but a friend could find it. The storm had again broken from its restless slumber, and the rain and sickly sun of the following day showed the pretended smuggler scattered on the beach. She appeared to have been well armed, and the easily recognised body of Captain Ferguson’s first mate was one of the twelve who were washed ashore.

JAMES MACPHERSON, THE FAMOUS
MUSICIAN & FREEBOOTER.

The story of James Macpherson is one which has induced much curiosity and inquiry, and, short as the time is since he was done to death, shows how soon facts may become garbled and altered in complexion. Sir Walter Scott, for instance, makes Inverness the closing scene of the proceedings. That he was wrong is clearly shown by the records of the Sheriff Court of Banff.

James Macpherson was the illegitimate son of Macpherson of Invereshie, by a beautiful gipsy girl who attracted his notice at a wedding.

He acknowledged the child, and reared him in his own house until he lost his life in pursuing a hostile clan to recover a spreach of cattle taken from Badenoch.

Macpherson, who had grown in beauty, strength, and stature rarely equalled, then took his place in the clan, with the chief’s blood flowing in his veins, as a young Highland freebooter, who, in descending from the mountains with his followers, believed he was only asserting the independence of his tribe, and when they harried the Lowlands was only taking a lawful prey. Such acts were not, in the opinion of the “pretty men” of those times, to be confounded with pitiful thieving and stealing, but considered as deeds of spirit and boldness calculated to make a man famous in his country side and among his fellows.

Macpherson excelled in love as in war, and was the best fiddle player and the best swordsman of his name. Tradition asserts that, if it must be owned that his prowess was debased by the exploits of a freebooter, no act of cruelty, no robbery of the widow, the fatherless, or the distressed, and no murder were ever perpetrated under his command or by his knowledge.

His sword and shield are still preserved at Duff House, a residence of the Earl of Fife. The sword is one which none but a man of uncommon strength could wield. It is two-handed, six feet in length, and the blade nearly as broad as a common scythe. The shield is of wood, covered with bull’s hide, and studded with brass nails, and is both hacked and perforated in many places, telling a tale of many a hard fought fight. Tradition also asserts that he often gave the spoils of the rich to relieve the poor, and that his followers were restrained from many atrocities of rapine by the awe of his mighty arm. Indeed, it is said that a dispute with a foiled and savage member of his tribe, who wished to rob a gentleman’s house while his wife and two children lay on the bier for interment, was the cause of his first being betrayed within the power of the law. From this toil he escaped, to the vexation of the magistrates of Aberdeen, who bribed a girl of that city, of whom Macpherson was very fond, to allure and deliver him again into their hands, under pretence of hearing his wonderful performances on the violin. No sooner did the frantic girl understand the true state of the case than she made known, through a tribe of gipsies, the chief of whom was Peter Brown, a notorious vagrant, the capture of Macpherson to his comrades, when his cousin, Donald Macpherson, a gentleman of herculean powers, came from Badenoch in order to join the gipsy, Brown, in liberating the prisoner. On a market day they brought several assistants, and swift horses were stationed at convenient distances. There was a platform before the jail covering the door below. Donald Macpherson and Peter Brown forced the jail, and while Peter Brown went to help the heavily fettered prisoner, James Macpherson, in moving away, Donald Macpherson guarded the jail door with a drawn sword. Many persons assembled at the market had experienced James Macpherson’s humanity or shared his bounty in the past, and they crowded round the jail as if in mere curiosity, but, in fact, to obstruct the civil authorities in their attempt to prevent a rescue. A butcher, however, was resolved to detain Macpherson, expecting a large recompense from the magistrates. He sprung up the stairs, and leaped from the platform upon Donald Macpherson, whom he dashed to the ground by the force and weight of his body. Donald soon resolved to make a desperate resistance, and the combatants in their struggle tore off each other’s clothes. The butcher got a glimpse of his dog upon the platform, and called him to his aid, but Macpherson with admirable presence of mind snatched up his own plaid, which lay near, and threw it over the butcher, thus misleading the instinct of his canine adversary. The dog darted with fury upon the plaid and terribly lacerated his master’s thigh. In the meantime, James Macpherson had been carried out by Peter Brown, and was soon joined by Donald Macpherson, who was quickly covered by some friendly spectators with a bonnet and greatcoat. The magistrates ordered webs from the shops to be drawn across the Gallowgate, but Donald cut them with his sword, and James, the late prisoner, got off on horseback. Some time after he was brought into fatal companionship with gipsies, by the same power which led the old Grecian hero to change his club for a distaff. The Highlander fell in love with a gipsy girl, and with one companion, James Gordon, who eventually paid the penalty with him, he entered for a time into the roving company of the gipsy band. The Banffshire gentlemen, whom Macpherson had plundered of old, heard with delight that the most dreaded of their enemies had come almost unprotected into their boundaries. According to the evidence on the trial, he seems to have joined the gipsies on a rioting rather than on a plundering excursion in Keith market, when he fell into the hands of his watchful foes, the chief of whom was Duff of Braco. He was immediately thrown into prison, and brought to trial with three persons, Peter Brown, Donald Brown, and James Gordon, his companions, indited by the Procurator-Fiscal as “Egyptians or gipsies, and vagabonds; and sorners, and robbers, and known habit and repute guilty of theft, masterful bangstree, riot, and oppression.” When brought into Court at Banff the Laird of Grant attempted to rescue them from the claims of the law, by asserting his right to try them as being dwellers within the regality of Grant, over which he had the power of pit and gallows. The Sheriff, Nicholas Dunbar of Castlefield, however, over-ruled the claim, and sustaining himself as judge, ordered a jury to try the prisoners on the next day. This was accordingly done, when they were found guilty and condemned, more apparently from a bad name, than from any immediate crimes of which they had been guilty. The Sheriff passing over the two Browns, the captain of the gipsy band and his brother, sentenced Macpherson and Gordon to death, causing them to be taken from the Court to the Tolbooth of Banff, from which eight days afterwards they were to be conveyed to the gallows hill of Banff, and hanged by the neck to the death on gibbets erected there. This hurried sentence shows the influence which the fear of Macpherson, or private enmity, exercised over the minds of Dunbar, the Sheriff, and the jury, and hints at the influence exercised by Braco Duff upon Sheriff, jury, and magistrates, especially as the Browns, his companions, were not sentenced; in fact, they lay in jail for a year, and afterwards made their escape from prison. Macpherson was an admirable performer on the violin, and the ardent love for music was a fit ingredient in the character of one who could so idly risk his life in the pursuit of romantic love. His musical talent was evinced long before his capture in the composition of a pibroch that goes by his name; and he is said also to have composed the words and music, which, in his last moments, he gave to the world under the name of “Macpherson’s Farewell”—

My father was a gentleman Of fame and lineage high, Oh! mother, would you ne’er had born A wretch so doomed to die! But dantonly and wantonly And rantonly I’ll gae, I’ll play a tune and dance it roun’ Below the gallows tree.

The Laird o’ Grant with power aboon The royal majesty, He pled fu’ well for Peter Brown But let Macpherson die. But dantonly, &c.

But Braco Duff, in rage enough, He first laid hands on me; If death did not arrest my course, Avenged I should be. But dantonly, &c.

I’ve led a life o’ meikle strife, Sweet peace ne’er smiled on me, It grieves me sair that I maun gae An’ na avenged be. But dantonly, &c.

The verses of the song above given represent him as a musician, and as determined to display, which he certainly did, a mood of recklessness such as the boldest felon seldom evinces when below the fatal tree. Burns on his tour through the Highlands, it is very probable learned both the air and the tradition connected with it, and it may be that while composing, what Lockhart calls a grand lyric, he had Macpherson’s words in his mind. Burns has written—

Sae rantonly, sae wantonly, Sae dauntingly gaed he, He played a spring and danced it round Below the gallows tree.

I’ve lived a life of sturt and strife I die by treacherie, It burns my heart I must depart And not avenged be.

Now farewell light thou sunshine bright, And all beneath the sky, May coward shame disdain his name The wretch that dares not die.

Sae rantingly, sae wantonly, Sae dauntingly gaed he, He played a spring and danced it round Below the gallows tree.

On the eighth day after his trial he was brought with his companion, Gordon, to the foot of the fatal tree, several hours before the time specified in the sentence for his execution.

It is said that his death was hurried on by the Magistrates, and that they also caused the messenger intrusted with a reprieve to be stopped by the way, in consequence of which acts of injustice it is alleged the town of Banff was deprived of the power of trying and executing malefactors. When the freebooter came to the foot of the gallows tree in presence of the spectators who had come to witness his untimely end, he played with the utmost pathos the fine tune, “Macpherson’s Farewell,” which he had previously composed. When he had finished he asked if he had any friend in the crowd to whom a last gift of his violin would be acceptable on condition of his playing the same tune over his body at his lyke wake. No one had the hardihood to claim friendship with one in whose crimes the acknowledgment might imply a participation, and the freebooter saying that the instrument had been his solace in many a gloomy hour, and that it should now perish with him, broke it over his knee, and, scattering the fragments among the crowd, immediately flung himself off the ladder. Thus died James Macpherson, who, if he was a freebooter, possessed the heart of an errant knight. Donald Macpherson, his relative and friend, picked up the neck of the violin which is still preserved in the family of Cluny, Chief of the Macphersons. One thing is certain amid all the traditions which have come down regarding this bold and singular robber; his strength and stature far exceeded those of common men; and this was proved, when his grave was opened some years ago, by the examination of his bones.

THE FIRST GAUGER IN SKYE.

About one hundred and fifty years ago, there lived in Dumfries a worthy man of the name of Gillespie, who followed the honest, though highly unpopular, occupation of excise officer or gauger. At the time my tale begins, he had just been appointed to a new district in the Highlands, and it is while on his journey there that I first make his acquaintance. Behold him then, a tall, thin, ungainly figure, with a consequential, self-important air, dressed in a coat of bottle-green cloth, with large silver-gilt buttons, a striped yellow waistcoat, corduroy breeches, and top boots. A tall peaked hat, with narrow brim, a large drab overcoat, and a sword-stick, completed his costume. He was mounted on a small shaggy pony or “gearran,” with neither shoes, bit, nor saddle, whose head was secured by the taod, or Highland bridle, made of horse hair, and in lieu of a saddle was a housing of straw mat, on which was placed a wooden pack-saddle, called a “strathair,” having two projections like horns, on which was hung the luggage of the rider. This “strathair” was kept in position by girths of straw rope, and was prevented from going too far forward by an antique kind of crupper, consisting of a stick passing under the animal’s tail, and braced at each end to the “strathair.” Having jogged along for a considerable time through a lonely moor, without meeting any sign of human habitations, it occurred to Mr Gillespie that he had lost his way. While staring about for something to guide him, he was nearly dismounted by the sudden starting of his pony, and on pulling up, he discovered that he had almost ridden over a young red-headed Highlander, who was lying among the heather, indolently supporting his head on one hand, while with the other he leisurely picked the blaeberries that grew so plentifully around him. On seeing what he considered a duine-uasal, the lad started to his feet, and grasping a forelock of his curly hair, made a profound bow.

The equestrian stared a moment at the bare-legged, bare-footed, bare-headed figure who had so suddenly appeared, and after stiffly returning his curtsy, inquired how far it was to Dunvegan? The other, shaking his head, replied, ‘Chan ’eil Beurla agam’ (I have no English).

Now this was certainly very awkward, as the stranger did not know Gaelic, but it is surprising what people will do in desperate circumstances, so with the aid of nods and signs, and a little English that Eachainn had managed to pick up while at school, they made shift to understand one another.

‘Is it to Dunvegan, then, you’ll want to be going, sir?’ inquired Eachainn.

‘Yes, and I am afraid that I shall not be able to find my way there without your assistance,’ responded Gillespie.

‘And may be you’ll be stopping there for some time?’ proposed the lad, scratching one bare knee with his sharp uncut nails as he spoke.

‘What does it matter to you, my lad, whether my stay there will be long or short? All I want just now is to get there.’

‘Is it far you’ll be coming the day, sir?’ inquired the other, with an air of respectful deference, strangely inconsistent with the apparent bluntness of the question.

‘What business is that of yours? Is it necessary for your showing me the road that I should tell you all my history?’

‘May be you’ll be coming from the change-house of Loch-Easkin?’ pursued Eachainn, without appearing to notice the rebuke of the stranger’s reply.

‘May be I did,’ rejoined the gauger dryly, giving a hard blow to the poor gearran.

‘Beannachd-leibh’ (Good-bye to you), said the young man, pulling his forelock and bowing as before.

‘Why are you in such a hurry to be off all at once, before you have shown me the way?’

‘I’m no in a hurry, sir; I shust be doing my work, minding my mother’s cow and calf,’ answered the lad, lying down again, and commencing to pick more blaeberries. ‘But,’ he added, ‘it was no to offend you I was meaning.’

‘Offend me, man! for what? I am sure I have taken no offence.’

‘Haven’t you, sir,’ exclaimed the other, jumping up; ‘I thocht you had, for you didn’t seem pleased when I was asking what could I be doing for you.’

‘My good lad,’ answered Gillespie, ‘I see customs differ, and what may be considered ill manners on the streets of Dumfries is perhaps a different thing on a Highland moor, and I shall be very glad of your company and assistance.’

‘Then you must tell me where is it you’ll be wanting to go to.’

‘Man alive! Have I not told you already that I want to reach Dunvegan?’

‘But I’m no sure if you’re fit to do it before night, if you don’t tell me where you came from the day.’

‘There is some reason in that,’ said the gauger; ‘and yet,’ he muttered, ‘it is a sly way of demonstrating the necessity of his endless questions.’

After going some distance in silence, Eachainn, thinking himself bound to say something, began with, ‘You’ll be a stranger to this country, sir.’

‘You may say that, man; but what sort of a place is this Dunvegan?’

‘It’s a bonny place eneuch, and no want of what’s right, and the uisge-beatha is plenty, and she’s rail goot; but I doubt it’ll no be so goot and so plenty now, for they say that a sgimilear of a gauger is coming to live among us; I hope he may break his neck on the way.’

Here Mr Gillespie appeared suddenly to have seen something amiss with the bridle, which necessitated his bending down for a moment or two, and no doubt this accounted for his face being slightly flushed when he raised his head, and, giving the unconscious Eachainn an indignant look, said, ‘Hem, ahem! what right has a mere lad like you to speak so disrespectfully of one you never saw, and who never harmed you.’

‘May his gallows be high and his halter tight!’ was the laconic but emphatic reply.

‘You young heathen, how dare you say so of a stranger, and without any reason either.’

‘Reason in plenty. Is he not coming to stop us from making our whusky? And there is my uncle Donald has a still in Craig-bheatha, and my mother helps him to make the malt, and gets a piggie (jar) for herself at the New-Year; and there’s Somhairle Dubh, at the change house, has a still in his barnyard near the——’

‘Hush, friend!’ interrupted Gillespie, clapping his hand on the Highlander’s mouth, ‘Dinna betray secrets so.’ He then added with great dignity, ‘Young man, you have abused me, and called me vile names to my face, but for that I forgive you, as it was done in ignorance, but you should be more respectful in referring to His Majesty’s revenue service, for I am that very excise officer, or gauger, as you call me, who am appointed by my king and country to watch over the interests of the revenue in this most outlandish corner of his dominions. Heaven help me withal! Now friend, understand me, I will do my duty without fear, favour, or affection; yes,’ he continued, rising into energy as he spoke, and, to Eachainn’s consternation, drawing his sword and flourishing it over his head, ‘yes, I will do so even unto death; but,’ he added after a pause, ‘I am no hunter after unguarded information, and God forbid the poor should want their New-Year whisky because I am in the parish. But be more discreet in future, for assuredly I must do my duty, and grasp, seize, capture, and retain unlawful liquor and implements of its manufacture, whenever I find them, for I am sworn to do this; but,’ he concluded, with a bow to his pack-saddle, ‘I will always strive to do my duty like a gentleman.’

Eachainn’s emotions during this oration were of a mingled character. At first pure shame was uppermost, for having, as he unwittingly discovered he had done, insulted a duine-uasal. Accordingly an honest blush spread over his sun-freckled face, and he hung down his head. Then came concern for having, as he apprehended, betrayed the private affairs of his uncle and Somhairle Dubh to the hands of the spoiler. When the gauger flourished his sword, Eachainn thought it was all over with him; but when he heard the conclusion of the speech, which he tried hard to comprehend, it was with a feeling of great respect he replied, repeating his bow, ‘I thocht you was a duine-uasal from the first, sir; and I beg your pardon a thousand times for foolish words spoke without thinkin’, and I could cut my tongue off for having spoke.’

‘Friend, that would not be right; no man has a right to maim himself,’ said the gauger, as he pulled out of an enormous pocket of his greatcoat a box that looked like a large flute case, which he opened, and, to the admiration of Eachainn, took out of it, first the stock and then the tube of a short single-barrelled fowling-piece, which, after duly joining together, he went through the process of priming and loading. These preparations were apparently caused by a curlew alighting at a little distance, but which, as if aware that evil was not far away, resumed its flight, and soon disappeared.

‘She’s a very pretty gun, indeed, sir,’ began Eachainn, anxious to renew the conversation on a more agreeable topic than the last. ‘By your leave, may I ask where you got her?’

‘Got her,’ said the other, ‘why, I made it, man. In my country we think nothing of making a gun before breakfast.’ As this was said with the utmost gravity, Eachainn was considerably staggered by it, for the Highlander, naturally credulous, intending none, he suspected no deception; but if a hoax was being played upon him, and he found it out, he was sure to repay it with interest, and the biter would be keenly bit.

‘One before breakfast, sir! a gun like her made before breakfast!’ he repeated, looking anxiously into the other’s face, ‘surely the thing is just impossible?’

‘No, friend,’ replied the other, internally chuckling at finding the youth so ductile, ‘I tell you, I frequently make one of a morning.’

‘Then,’ said the guide, ‘I suppose, sir, you’ll be come to the Highlands to make a big pusness with them!’

‘May be, may be, friend. I daresay there are not many such in this country; but what would still more surprise you is to hear by whom I was taught the art of making them.’

‘Who she’ll be, sir?’

‘Why, Luno, the son of Leven, who made Fingal’s famous sword, which went by his name, and every stroke of which was mortal.’

‘Och! yes, sir,’ exclaimed Eachainn, his eyes sparkling, ‘ye mean Mac-an-Luinn,’ and in his excitement he forgot the little English he had, and continued in his own expressive vernacular, ‘that was the sword of swords, and they say that the sound of his anvils is still heard in the silence of midnight by the wanderer of Lochlin; and his well-known giant form is at times seen crossing the heath, clad in its dark mantle of hide, with apron of the same, and the face of the apparition as dark as the mantle, and frowning fiercely, while, with staff in hand, he bounds along on one leg, with the fleetness of a roe, his black mantle flap, flapping for an instant, and then vanishing, as, with a few bounds, black Luno enters his unapproachable cave.’

‘But are there any hereabouts who know how to use such a thing as this?’ asked the gauger, putting the piece to his eye.

‘Och! aye, sir; there’s Duncan Sealgair can hit a fox, an otter, or a seal, at a hunderd yards, easy.’

‘I am not speaking,’ said the gauger, with an air of sovereign contempt, ‘of otters, and foxes, and such low vermin; I ask you, man, as to shooting of game!’

‘Aye, sir, a goot lot of that too. There’s old Kenneth Matheson, she’ll be very goot at killing a buck.’

‘Pshaw! man, cannot you get your ideas above coarse four-footed beasts, great sprawling objects that there is no merit in killing.’

Eachainn scratched his head, at a loss what to answer next; but at length, with the air of a man who thinks he has made a discovery, exclaimed, ‘You’ll be meaning the wild goose, sir!’

‘You’re a wild goose yourself; I mean no such thing; I am asking ye, man, about grouse, red grouse.’

The guide was as puzzled as if he had heard Hebrew; but just then, as if to relieve his embarrassment, there arose a ‘Ca-ca!’ kind of sound among the heather. ‘She’ll shust be the muir-hens, sir, perhaps you’ll like to have shoot at them.’

‘Moor-hens! what’s that, lad?’ but further explanation was unnecessary, for the eye of the traveller caught the very red grouse he had appeared so anxious to find. The sight seemed to have a very agitating effect upon him, for he instantly stopped, dismounted, and gave his nag to the keeping of his companion; he then crept forward a few paces, his heart beating with the greatness of the occasion. At length, getting closer to the birds than most sportsmen would deem quite necessary, he knelt on one knee, and took a most deliberate, rifleman-like aim. On placing his finger on the trigger, his face was turned a little to one side—perhaps to avoid the expected smoke. He at length pulled the trigger, but, instead of a report, there was merely a snap in the pan. At this, the eldest, apparently, of the birds gave a ‘Ca-ca!’ and peered about to see what was the matter; and, to avoid being seen, the sportsman sunk down among the heather. Tying the gearran to a juniper root, Eachainn now cautiously crept up, and inquired in a whisper, ‘Has she refused, sir?’

‘Hush!’ said the other, shaking his hand for silence; ‘has who refused?’

‘I mean, sir,’ again whispered his guide, ‘has the musket refused?’

‘Which, I suppose,’ responded the other, ‘is as much as to say, has it missed fire? Yes, certainly it has; did you not hear the snap in the pan?’

‘Yes, sir, but there was no fire; may be ’twas the fault of the flint.’

‘Pish, no; there is not a better flint on this side of the Grampians.’

‘But the pooder, sir?’

‘No better powder in the world, unless it has been damped by your horrid Highland mist.’

‘There’s no a mist at all the day, sir,’ answered Eachainn, looking quietly down at the gun lock, and discovering, for the first time, that there was no flint at all. He smiled aside, and then turning to the would-be sportsman, who was kneeling for another attempt, pointed out the circumstance to him. The latter, on seeing it, stared, and then added, apparently recollecting himself, ‘Dash it, neither there is! I recollect now, here it is, I put it in my waistcoat pocket this morning, while cleaning my gun, and forgot to fix it again.’ So saying, he screwed it tight into its proper place and kneeling as before, gave a second snap in the pan.

‘The primin’ fell oot when she first refused, sir, and you forgot to put in another.’

‘And ye gowk, couldn’t you tell me that before?’ said the wrathful gauger, as he recovered his arms for another attempt. This time, however, he was successful, for his volley levelled the cock leader and two of his family, while the remainder took flight.

‘I dare say, friend bare-legs, you do not often see such shots as that in these quarters?’

‘’Deed, sir, I’ll no say I do,’ returned the other with a look and manner somewhat equivocal.

‘In sooth, I suppose no one hereabouts knows anything of grouse shooting; but for myself, as I have already said, give me but the birds within tolerable reach, and I am sure to hit them.’

‘Na doot, sir, especially if ye always make it a fashion to shoot them sittin’.’

‘And have you any hereabouts that can shoot them any other gait, callant?’

‘May be, sir, the young laird, and the minister’s son, and the major, and——’

‘Weel, sir, and pray how does the young laird find out the game? Has he any pointers?’

‘Pinters, sir, what’s that?’ inquired his companion, affecting ignorance.

‘You fool, and do you not know what a pointer is? Precious country I am come to, and perhaps to lay my bones in—not to know what a pointer is?’

‘And d’ye ken, sir, what a bochan is?’

‘Not I, friend bare-legs, nor do I care.’

‘My name, sir, is Eachainn, and you see there’ll be some things that folks who are very clever don’t know. A bochan, sir, is what you call in Beurla a hobgobolin.’

‘I see your drift, man, I see your drift, and care not what a bochan or a fiddlestick means; but a pointer is a dog of right Spanish breed, which has such instinct that he smells out the birds without seeing them, so that when he has got one in a covey within reach of his nose, he holds up his leg, and stands stock still, until his master comes up and bleezes away at them.’

‘Sitting, sir?’ asked Eachainn, with a roguish look.

‘Aye, man, sitting or standing, ’tis all the same.’

‘You’ll maybe be wanting such dogs in the low country, but they’ll no be wanted in the Highlands. Here, sir,’ continued he, remembering the hoax about Luno and gunmaking; ‘here, sir, the people can smell the game as good as your dogs.’

‘What’s that you say man? D’ye think of clishmaclavering me with any of your big Hielan’ lees?’

‘Would you like me to smell out some muir-hens for you, sir?’

‘You smell out game! smell out your grandmother! D’ye think to deceive me with such havers?’

‘Do you s’pose you could hit the poor craters—sittin’ too—if I hadn’t smelt them out for you, sir?’

‘Faith, friend you’re no blate—smell out indeed! And pray, callant, can you smell out any more of them?’

‘I begin to think it’s no a very thankful job.’

‘And do you often amuse yourself with nosing it in this way over these vile moors, through which I am so heartily tired of trudging?’

‘Whenever the laird, sir, goes out after the muir-hens, I go with him to smell them out.’

‘Weel man, convince me of the bare fact—smell out another covey, and then I’ll no gainsay your gift.’

Eachainn, shrugging up his shoulders, scratching his head, and affecting to make some difficulty, said the wind had gone down, and that the scent was dull. The sly rascal, however, having an exceedingly acute ear, continued walking over bog and heather with long strides, until at length, at a considerable distance, and a little to one side of the track, he thought he heard the ‘ca-ca’ of a bird. He then turned to his companion and said, ‘If I’ll be smelling out a prasgan for ye, sir, will ye let me have a shoot at them?’

‘Give you a shot! weel but that passes a’. I dinna ken what you might make with a claymore, as ye ca’ a braidsword; but a gun is another sort of thing altogether. What! Donald, could you hit a peat stack, man?’

‘My name’s Eachainn, sir; and as to shooting a peatstack, I don’t know, but if ye like I’ll try.’

‘Weel, Donald or Eachainn, or whatever your name is, I don’t care if I indulge you, so there’s the gun; but mind, when you aim, you turn the barrel away, and the stock to yourself. Now you may bleeze awa’ at anything but me and the pony.’ The guide, having by this time a shrewd guess where the birds were to be found, went on several paces cautiously, and pretending to scent something. At length he made a stand, cocking one leg, while he beckoned to the stranger, who was some little distance in the rear, to dismount and come up.

The latter accordingly did so, and there were the birds sure enough. The stranger, whose less practised eye and ear were not aware of the trick, now not doubting the truth of the Highlander’s gift, uttered his admiration in whispers, ‘Weel, but yon’s quite extraordinar’; all real birds too, and no glamour; I doot it’s nae canny.’

The Gael, not being such a desperate pot-hunter as his comrade, gave a ‘Hurrah!’ which raised the birds at once, then taking a good aim, brought down two, and wounded one or two more, which flew, quaking, away.

The Highlander, anxious to secure the wounded birds, went bounding in the direction in which they had flown. As he hastily stepped forward he did not perceive that a viper was directly in his path, and, before he was aware of its being near him, the reptile had bitten his bare foot. Striking it off with the point of the barrel, he uttered not a word, but giving one glance round, as if looking for something, he took to his heels with a swiftness not unworthy of Luno himself.

The gauger, seeing his fowling-piece in Eachainn’s possession, who was running as if a lion were at his heels, naturally concluded that he had run off with it.

‘Stop, thief!’ shouted he, at the top of his voice, ‘stop, ye confounded Hielan’ cateran! How fast the vagabond runs; gude’s me, he is already out of sight. Haud there, ye scamp, ye traitorous reever, ye!’

Out of breath with his own indignant exertions, Gillespie turned to mount his gearran. That sagacious beast, however, considered the whole thing as an arrangement for his own especial benefit, and whenever his would-be rider approached to mount, would edge off, and trot to a little distance, and then quietly graze, until poor Gillespie would again get close to him, when the same little performance would be repeated. All this was naturally very provoking, and added intense bitterness to the gauger’s other reflections.

He now eagerly followed Eachainn on foot, but in such a chase he was no match for the fleet-footed Highlander.

The day was hot, the moor boggy, and his greatcoat, which he still clung to, as if it were a part of his nature, was very heavy. ‘The scoundrel!’ he muttered, as he plodded wearily along, ‘the bare-legged rascal, to rob me of my gun in open day on the King’s highway; but I’ll have him by the heels for it, as sure as there’s letters of horning and caption to be had in Scotland; aye, he shall hang as high as Haman, if there’s a tree in all the island—but I doot there’s nane. It’s ower vile for even a tree to make a gallows of to grow in it. Then I doot after a’ if the law can make much of the case, seeing that this canna be said to be the highway. The rascal has not absolutely put me in bodily fear either, except fear of losing my gun. No, I doot I canna hang him, and to transport him from such a slough of despond, would only be conferring an acceptable obligation on the young thief.’

Thus he hurried on, lamenting his loss, until his further progress was interrupted by a stream or burn, that ran gurgling between mossy banks, fringed with junipers and dwarf rowans. There the worthy man stood panting and blowing for about a minute, when some yards below him, at a shallower part of the burn, kneeling at the water’s edge, and gulping in the pure element, he beheld the runaway Highlander.

The gauger’s anger was, however, considerably mollified on seeing no effort on the part of Eachainn to continue his flight, and also by seeing his gun lying safely on a dried part of the bank. ‘Ye villain,’ he exclaimed, clutching his fowling-piece, ‘and have I caught you at last!’

The Highlander, without answering, took another copious draught of the limpid stream, then washed his wounded foot, on which was distinctly visible the marks of the viper’s fangs.

Gillespie, too, observed that notwithstanding his warm race, the lad looked deadly pale. The latter, now slowly rising, expressed with rueful tone and looks his hope ‘that he had got to the water before her.’

‘Before me! faith that ye did; and ye deserve to be hanged for it too, ye thieving loon. Why did you run awa’ that gait?’

‘Och, sir!’ groaned the other, ‘can you be telling me where the baiste is?’

‘Beast! what beast, idiot? I ken only one on the moor besides yon brute now feeding up there. I shouldn’t wonder if he took it into his head to run off with the rest of my property.’

‘No, no, sir; the nathair! the nathair! we’ll shust be going back to be look for her.’

‘Gude’s me, but I begin to think after a’ that the puir chiel’s demented,’ observed the other with a look of pity.

At length, with an appearance of great anxiety, the lad, accompanied by the exciseman, returned to the spot from which they started, where writhing in the agonies of death, from the blow the former had instinctively, but almost unconsciously, given it, lay the snake or nathair. It was only now that the gauger began to comprehend what had happened to his guide. When Eachainn saw the snake on the spot where he had left it, now quite dead, his joy became as great as previously had been his dejection.

‘Ah, sir!’ he said, turning to the other, ‘it’s all right, and I’m shust quite safe.’

‘Pray how is that?’ returned the stranger, ‘I should like to know by what process of reasoning ye make that out?’

‘I’ll shust be telling you, sir. You see if a body will be stung by a nathair, and if they’ll be clever to the water, and drink of it before the nathair (and she’ll be very clever at running herself, too), the mans will be quite better, and the nathair will die and burst; but if the nathair will be get to the water first, then the mans will die and burst.’

‘And do you believe all this nonsense?’

‘It’s shust quite true, sir; and I’ll be always believing it; and maybe I’ll be forgiven, I hope ’twas not for joking you about my smelling oot the birds, that this judgment was coming on me; but as you was mocking me about making the guns, I thocht it was no harm to mock you too.’

‘And so it was all a sham, about you pointing the birds, was it?’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Eachainn, with an abashed look.

‘But ye dinna think I was such a fule as to believe you, eh?’

‘I cannot tell that, sir,’ replied the other, a smile stealing over his lips, though he tried to prevent it.

‘Hout, man!’ said the gauger, but not without a leetle twinge of conscience, ‘I saw through the trick the whole time, but I had a mind to humour you, just to see how far you would go. But, friend, was it your belief in havers about vipers bursting, and a’ that sort of stuff, that sent you scouring awa’ to the burn’s side in sic haste?’

‘Surely, sir; I’ll be running for my life when the baiste will stung me.’

‘Hoot, toot, man, but you need not have taken my gun with you; that hadna been stung, and wouldna have bursted had the beast, as you call it, drank all the water in Coruisg.’

‘Och! sir, I was shust forgot the gun, I’ll be so frightened, but the running saved my life, for the nathair is shust quite dead.’

‘Yes, man, but it is not bursted.’

‘But she’ll burst by and bye, and she’ll be making a noise as big as your gun, so people say, but I’ll never was hearing her myself.’

‘Weel, weel, friend, I’ll believe a’ the rest of your story when the reptile bursts, but not till then. As for the creature’s death, I daur to say you gave it a good clout over the head with the gun, which you had in your hand, for it does not take much, I believe, to kill them.’

‘I’ll not be doing that at all, that I know of,’ said Eachainn, ‘and may be if I had, it’ll be the worst for me and for you as well.’

‘How so, man?’

‘’Cause I might shust struck her on the tail instead of her head, and then she’d jump up ever so high, and then she’ll be come down, more deadly than she’ll be before. Ye need not be shaking your head, sir; it’s shust quite true; but we must be clever, for we’ll be having a long way to go before we’ll come to Dunvegan. I must do shust one thing first, if you please,’

So saying, Eachainn pulled out his core or dirk, and proceeded with great deliberation to cut off the head of the viper, and then he divided the body into five equal parts.

‘I doot,’ muttered the gauger, with a look of disgust, ‘I doot he is going to cook it! Ugh, it’s quite awfu’.’

The honest man’s apprehensions were, however, somewhat premature, for after hewing the reptile to pieces, as described, Eachainn cut with his knife six holes in the turf, into each of which he placed a bit of the snake, and filling up the holes again, stamped down these viperine graves with his heel.

‘Indeed, friend, I think you have taken a good deal of unnecessary trouble in giving that reptile Christian burial.’

‘No, no,’ answered Eachainn, ‘I’ll be thinking of the lives of other peoples, and their hells too.’

‘And what can your hacking away at yon reptile have to do with the health or lives of others, friend Donald?’

‘I tell you again, sir, my name is Eachainn, and no Donald, and I’ll no be wondering that you don’t know about this, for the Southern duine-uasal, she’ll often not be knowing the things that the poor Highlander herself’ll be knowing all aboot.’

‘And prythee what good is there in your wasting twenty minutes in cutting up and burying a snake?’

‘As you’ll be a stranger, sir,’ said Eachainn, after he had succeeded in catching the traveller’s nag for him, which the other mounted, and trotted on in the path pointed out to him, ‘as you’ll be a stranger, sir, I must be of good manners, and shust be telling you the things you’ll not know yourself. I may tell you that if you’ll not be cutting a nathair in five pieces, besides her head, she’ll be sure to come alive again, and bigger and more stronger than she’ll was before, and if you’ll be leaving the pieces on the ground, they’ll shust be creeping together again and join. Sometimes her head will join where her tail was before, and her tail in the place where her head was before, and then she’ll be shust awful, worst than she’ll be before twenty times. But that’ll not be all we’ll be burying them for. If the bits of the nathair will be left on the ground, in the sun and in the moonlight, they’ll turn into awful bad and great big flies, dark green and yellow, with spots like the nathair herself, and they’ll be so poison that when they touch a mans or a baiste, there will come a cancer, which no doctor can cure.’

While thus speaking, Eachainn began to grow very pale, his voice trembled, and at last, sitting down on the heather, he groaned aloud.

‘Why, my poor fellow, what’s the matter with you?’ kindly inquired the exciseman.

‘I doot, sir,’ said Eachainn in a feeble tone, ‘I doot, sir, the sting of the nathair has been stronger on me than I’ll be thinking, I’m shust crippled, sir, and my leg is stiff and sore like, and I’m sick, sick at my heart.’ Poor Eachainn, in finishing these words, attempted to rise, but immediately staggered, and fell down insensible.

The gauger, greatly disconcerted, threw himself from his steed with such alacrity that he almost overturned the gearran, as well as himself. ‘What?’ he exclaimed: ‘Hoot, toot, man, never give way; ’tis but a dwam, puir fellow! His jaw drops just like Fraser, the supervisor, when Red Chisholm, the smuggler, stuck his dirk into his doup. If the lad should die here, and no one but me with him, why, what would folk say? Gude save us! how swelled his leg is, and all black and green; ’tis fearsome; would to heaven I were weel out o’ the scrape, or had never entered the vile country!’ Here, however, a bright idea struck the alarmed traveller, and hastily going to the bundle suspended from the right horn of the strathair, he hurriedly turned over its miscellaneous contents, until he found his whisky flask, which he uncorked, and poured with a trembling hand, for fear of the remedy being too late, a good portion of the liquor down the throat of the unconscious Highlander. The stimulus was powerful. The fainting lad, in spite of himself, gave a desperate gulp, which caused some of the spirit to enter his windpipe, consequently the first symptoms of returning animation on the part of Eachainn was a succession of hideous gaspings. For fully two minutes he choked and coughed, until the bewildered gauger feared he had done for him in earnest. At length, to his unspeakable relief, Eachainn opened his eyes, and getting the use of his tongue once more, he most zealously and piously recommended the Southron to the good offices of his majesty, Domhnull Dubh. As he, however, spoke in his native tongue, Gillespie could not appreciate the extent of the kindness intended for him. The first use Eachainn made of his hands was, with the left to gently scratch the bitten foot, and with the right he took the flask from the still confused gauger, and taking a good pull at the contents, again attempted to rise, but found he was unable to walk. On perceiving this, the gauger insisted on his mounting behind him. The gearran, however, apparently resenting that his consent had not been asked to the new arrangement, gave a sharp smarting neigh, and commenced to back. These hostile demonstrations on the part of the pony were not at all displeasing to Eachainn, who thought that if the gearran continued restive, he might have him all to himself. He accordingly kept giving sly kicks with his uninjured foot in the animal’s groin. The consequence was that every moment the pony became more indignant and unmanageable; but the gauger, recollecting that he was in his Majesty’s service, strove to maintain his position with the dignity due to that office. He pulled hard at the taod, but finding that of no use, he followed the example of honest John Gilpin, and grasped the animal’s mane with both hands, receiving, through every kick-up of the pony, sore thumps from the strathair, which caused him much uneasiness. Eachainn, holding on ‘like grim death,’ continued teasing the gearran, at the same time pretending to coax him by saying ‘Sheo! sheo!’ The pony heeded neither that, nor the ‘Huish! huish!’ of the exciseman, but kept kicking, prancing, and rearing with a zeal and energy worthy of a better cause. The commotion at length ended by the gauger tumbling over the animal’s head.

Eachainn, beginning to think that he had carried the joke too far, dismounted, and seeing the discomfited Southron lying at full length without signs of life, in his turn became frightened. At this trying moment he bethought him of the specific, which had proved so useful in his own case. He had no difficulty in finding the flask, and was about to administer a dose, when the gauger, who had been only a little confused at his sudden fall, got on his feet; but nothing would induce him to remount, so Eachainn rode at his ease, while the annoyed gauger stalked along with heavy strides, cordially abusing the country, its moors, its gearrans, and its whisky. The shades of evening began to lengthen, the scene gradually changed, our travellers began to leave the heathery moor behind, and enter on arable land, with patches here and there under cultivation, chiefly oats and potatoes, while an occasional cow grazing, or a horse tethered, showed them that they were approaching their journey’s end.

All at once they heard the peculiar note of the

CORN-CRAIK,

Or Trian-ri-Trian, as it is called in Gaelic.

The gauger, always anxious to show off his skill as a marksman, began to handle his fowling-piece. Eachainn looked on with evident uneasiness, and at last said, ‘Surely, surely, sir, you’ll not be going to shoot her?’

‘And why not, my friend?’

‘What, sir! shoot a trian-ri-trian! it’s shust awful to think on.’

‘And what is the great harm of shooting such a blethering, craiking thing as that?’

‘The harm, sir! why, she’ll be a sacred bird; I’d as soon think of shooting a cuckoo herself, as to be doing the trian-ri-trian any hurt! She’ll be different to any other bird, and when she’ll cry, she’ll be lying on her back, with her feets lifted up to the sky, and the sky would fall down if she’ll not be doing that.’

‘Well, I must have a shot at him, even if the firmament were to come about our ears in consequence,’ and so saying, our sportsman took his usual kneeling shot, and getting a good and near level, fired, when a handful of flying feathers evinced the success of the shot.

The gauger ran to the spot, and Eachainn on the pony trotted after him, but on coming up they could see no bird, or no evidence of the shot having taken effect. Eachainn looked suddenly aghast.

‘What can the gommeril be staring at now?’ exclaimed the disappointed gauger.

‘Och! sir,’ groaned Eachainn, in great agitation, ‘the tàsg! the tàsg!’

‘The what? you confounded idiot!’

‘I’ll tell you, sir,’ replied the Highlander, with great solemnity, ‘the tàsg, she’ll shust be a death bird, and the warning’ll never fail to come true—’tis awful, ’tis shust awful!’

‘Weel, confound me,’ said Gillespie, who was now tired and heated, and panting with his exercise, ‘confound me if I can make out the creature. He’s no wanting in gumption either, but what havers are these he has got in his noddle?’ Then addressing his companion, he said, ‘Weel, now, I have listened to all your nonsense, and now you must tell me in plain words what you mean by all this blether and talk about your trian-ri-trian and your tàsg.’

To this appeal Eachainn did not reply for some minutes, but dismounting, he hobbled up the best way he could to the very spot where the bird had stood when shot at, and picking up the few feathers which had been started, stood looking at them with an anxious expression, amounting almost to horror. Then turning to the gauger, he replied, in a voice broken with agitation—‘I thocht, sir, that everybody know that the tàsg is a spirit bird, and she’ll always be coming to the mans when they’ll be going to die. She’ll come different to different peoples. Old Murdo Urquhart, the fisherman, saw her shust like a grey gull, and that very night he took ill, and died in two or three days. And Barabal N’ic’Ivor, she’ll be the bonniest lassie in the place, saw the tàsg shust like a beautiful white dove, and surely poor Barabal she’ll knew she’ll be going to die, so she made her death shift, and indeed it was very soon she was wearing it. The tàsg’ll always be coming in the gloamin’, she’ll fly low and slow like, and she’ll no make any noise with her wings, but if you’ll shoot at her, you’ll shust get nothing but a small handful of feathers.’ Here the guide paused a moment, and looking first at the feathers he held in his hand, and then in the face of the gauger, he continued, ‘I’ll be thinking, sir, that you’ll no be living very long. I am shust afraid the tàsg will be coming to you like a trian-ri-trian. Och, sir! indeed I’ll be very sorry for you, surely, surely.’

‘Look to yourself, man. You say it is my tàsg, but I don’t see how you make that out; why shouldn’t it be your own tàsg as well as mine?’

‘Mine, sir?’ exclaimed Eachainn. ‘No, no; I did not shoot her. If you’ll shoot her, she’ll be your own tàsg surely, and nobody’s else, and she’ll be shust like a duine-uasal’s tàsg, a long-legged bird, and she’ll shust come like the Southron, at certain times, and then she’ll shust speak a craik, craik kind of talk, and that’ll not be Gaelic; it’ll be the Gaelic that the mavis and the blackbird will be speaking. A lad like me will no get a gran’ tàsg like her. Oh! no, a crow, or a duck, or a sgarbh, is more like what I’ll be getting.’

The gauger, seeing the anxiety of Eachainn to decline the honour of the tàsg, was commencing to rally him about it, but in the earnestness of their conversation, they had not observed the change in the appearance of the weather which had been gradually taking place; their attention was now, however, called to it by feeling some heavy drops of rain, and they soon saw that a severe storm was looming. They ceased talking, and used their breath and energies to better purpose, by hurrying forward as fast as they could. In spite of their utmost exertions, the storm soon overtook them, and in half-an-hour they were both drenched to the skin. Eachainn took it very philosophically, for to the well-developed, hardy ‘son of the mist,’ an occasional shower-bath was no hardship. He was too well acquainted with Nature in all her changing moods to care much when she frowned. But the poor, town-bred gauger was in a pitiable plight, as he plodded along in a most unenviable state of body and mind, vowing he should catch his death of cold. In about an hour and a-half they arrived, to the intense relief of Gillespie, at the hamlet of Dunvegan, and gladly availed themselves of the hospitality of Somhairle Dubh, at the hostelrie, or change house of the village.

The worthy hostess of the

DUNVEGAN HOTEL

met the gauger at the door, and dropping a curtsy, gave him a hearty welcome, while Somhairle Dubh told Eachainn to lead the pony to the stable; but seeing the poor lad hardly able to stand, and having been told the reason, he immediately helped him into the kitchen, and seating him by the fire, called for the whisky bottle—the usual panacea in those days for all evils in the Highlands—and giving Eachainn a good dram, he applied the same remedy to the wounded limb, rubbing it in before the fire, while a messenger was dispatched for his mother, who was noted for her skill in the use of herbs.

In the meantime Mr Gillespie had been shown to his bedroom, to change his wet clothes, while his dinner was preparing. Before he began his meal, the landlord brought out his own peculiar bottle—a mixture of whisky, camomile flowers, and coriander seeds—and offered his guest a glass as an appetiser, which was gladly accepted, for he was feeling far from well. He ate but little of the good plain dinner provided for him, and soon after went to his bed. Before doing so, however, he asked for Eachainn, wishing to give him a trifle for his guidance, but on being told that the lad had gone home with his mother, he gave Somhairle Dubh a shilling to give to him.

Although Gillespie was very tired, he could not sleep. He tossed and turned, and only as the day was breaking did he fall asleep, but it did not refresh him, for the incidents of his journey haunted him in his sleep. He was again riding the pony, going at a furious rate, while Eachainn sat at his back holding him in a grasp of iron. There arose before him the figure of a snake of gigantic proportions, which, writhing round his neck, was nearly strangling him, but instead of hissing, it uttered the ‘craik,’ ‘craik,’ of the trian-ri-trian. With an effort he awoke, and found himself stiff and feverish, and his throat very sore. In a word, the honest man was in for a bad attack of quinsey or inflammation of the throat. After a few days had elapsed, he expressed his surprise that Eachainn had not called to inquire for him; but he was told the lad had gone to a village ten miles off to spend his shilling. Somhairle Dubh and his goodwife became very concerned about their guest, and nothing could exceed their kindness and attention to him. They sent for the doctor, but he was away some distance and could not come at once. On the fourth day of Gillespie’s illness, Somhairle Dubh, seating himself by the sick man, with great solemnity of manner, said, ‘Sir, we must all die. Now, sir, I am come to do to you as I would like to be done by; for sore, sore would it be to me to think that my body should not be put in the grave of my fathers in Kilmuir. So, sir, by your leave, where would you choose to be buried?’

‘Buried!’ exclaimed the gauger, aghast, sitting up in his bed, and staring at his host. ‘Buried! surely I am not so bad as that?’

Without noticing his emotion, the worthy man continued, ‘Folk have different ways in different countries; but you may depend upon it, sir, it’s no my father’s son that would suffer the corpse of a duine-uasal not to be treated in every way most honourably. You shall be properly washed and stretched, that you may be sure of; and you shall not want for the dead shirt, for by my faith, and I’ll do as I promise, sir, you shall have my own dead shirt, that my wife made with her own hands, of real good linen, and beautifully sewed too. And we’ll keep you, sir, for seven days and seven nights, and I’ll get Ian Saor to make as good a chest for you as ever he made, with brass-headed nails all round it, and with shining handles like silver, and you shall lie in your chest like a duine-uasal should, with two large candles at your head, and two at your feet, and a plateful of salt on your breast.’

Here poor Gillespie could contain himself no longer, but groaned aloud at this dismal recital of what was to be done to his corpse.

‘What, sir? you’re may be thinking the alaire, or death feast, will not be good enough; but ye need not trouble yourself for that, there shall be plenty whisky and plenty meat, and my wife shall make good bannocks.’

‘Yes, indeed, I will,’ said the good woman, wiping her eyes with her apron as she sobbed out. ‘Ochan, ochan! little does his mother know how her son is the night.’

‘But,’ continued her husband, ‘think what a comfort it’ll be to her to hear of his being buried so decent like; for, sir, you shall be put in my own grandfather’s grave, and that’s what I’d not do to many, but I’ll do it to you, for though you are a gauger you’re a stranger far from your own people, and I’d like to show kindness to you.’

Indeed the worthy man never doubted but he had afforded Gillespie the greatest comfort in thus having settled all the particulars of his funeral; for an intense anxiety about the proper disposal of his remains, and the complete fulfilling of all the customary ceremonies of death, is a characteristic trait of the Highlander.