Folk-Lore and Legends. Scotland

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Unknown. Folk-Lore and Legends. Scotland

PREFATORY NOTE

CANOBIE DICK AND THOMAS OF ERCILDOUN

COINNACH OER

ELPHIN IRVING

THE GHOSTS OF CRAIG-AULNAIC

THE DOOMED RIDER

WHIPPETY STOURIE

THE WEIRD OF THE THREE ARROWS

THE LAIRD OF BALMACHIE’S WIFE

MICHAEL SCOTT

THE MINISTER AND THE FAIRY

THE FISHERMAN AND THE MERMAN

THE LAIRD O’ CO’

EWEN OF THE LITTLE HEAD

JOCK AND HIS MOTHER

SAINT COLUMBA

THE MERMAID WIFE

THE FIDDLER AND THE BOGLE OF BOGANDORAN

THOMAS THE RHYMER

FAIRY FRIENDS

THE SEAL-CATCHER’S ADVENTURE

THE FAIRIES OF MERLIN’S CRAIG

RORY MACGILLIVRAY

THE HAUNTED SHIPS

THE BROWNIE

MAUNS’ STANE

“HORSE AND HATTOCK.”

SECRET COMMONWEALTH

THE FAIRY BOY OF LEITH

THE DRACÆ

THE BOGLE

DAOINE SHIE, OR THE MEN OF PEACE

THE DEATH “BREE.”

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“You may see my dwelling if you will,” said the stranger; “but if you lose courage at what you see there, you will rue it all your life.”

“He that shall sound that horn and draw that sword,” said the stranger, who now intimated that he was the famous Thomas of Ercildoun, “shall, if his heart fail him not, be king over all broad Britain.  So speaks the tongue that cannot lie.  But all depends on courage, and much on your taking the sword or horn first.”

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“At the mention of her brother’s name she cried out, ‘Where is he?  Oh, where is he?’ gazed wildly round, and, shuddering from head to foot, fell senseless on the floor.  Other inhabitants of the valley, alarmed by the sudden swell of the river, which had augmented to a torrent, deep and impassable, now came in to inquire if any loss had been sustained, for numbers of sheep and teds of hay had been observed floating down about the dawn of the morning.  They assisted in reclaiming the unhappy maiden from her swoon; but insensibility was joy compared to the sorrow to which she awakened.  ‘They have ta’en him away, they have ta’en him away,’ she chanted, in a tone of delirious pathos; ‘him that was whiter and fairer than the lily on Lyddal Lee.  They have long sought, and they have long sued, and they had the power to prevail against my prayers at last.  They have ta’en him away; the flower is plucked from among the weeds, and the dove is slain amid a flock of ravens.  They came with shout, and they came with song, and they spread the charm, and they placed the spell, and the baptised brow has been bowed down to the unbaptised hand.  They have ta’en him away, they have ta’en him away; he was too lovely, and too good, and too noble, to bless us with his continuance on earth; for what are the sons of men compared to him?—the light of the moonbeam to the morning sun, the glowworm to the eastern star.  They have ta’en him away, the invisible dwellers of the earth.  I saw them come on him with shouting and with singing, and they charmed him where he sat, and away they bore him; and the horse he rode was never shod with iron, nor owned before the mastery of human hand.  They have ta’en him away over the water, and over the wood, and over the hill.  I got but ae look of his bonnie blue ee, but ae; ae look.  But as I have endured what never maiden endured, so will I undertake what never maiden undertook, I will win him from them all.  I know the invisible ones of the earth; I have heard their wild and wondrous music in the wild woods, and there shall a christened maiden seek him, and achieve his deliverance.’  She paused, and glancing around a circle of condoling faces, down which the tears were dropping like rain, said, in a calm and altered but still delirious tone: ‘Why do you weep, Mary Halliday? and why do you weep, John Graeme?  Ye think that Elphin Irving—oh, it’s a bonnie, bonnie name, and dear to many a maiden’s heart, as well as mine—ye think he is drowned in Corrie; and ye will seek in the deep, deep pools for the bonnie, bonnie corse, that ye may weep over it, as it lies in its last linen, and lay it, amid weeping and wailing in the dowie kirkyard.  Ye may seek, but ye shall never find; so leave me to trim up my hair, and prepare my dwelling, and make myself ready to watch for the hour of his return to upper earth.’  And she resumed her household labours with an alacrity which lessened not the sorrow of her friends.

“Meanwhile the rumour flew over the vale that Elphin Irving was drowned in Corriewater.  Matron and maid, old man and young, collected suddenly along the banks of the river, which now began to subside to its natural summer limits, and commenced their search; interrupted every now and then by calling from side to side, and from pool to pool, and by exclamations of sorrow for this misfortune.  The search was fruitless: five sheep, pertaining to the flock which he conducted to pasture, were found drowned in one of the deep eddies; but the river was still too brown, from the soil of its moorland sources, to enable them to see what its deep shelves, its pools, and its overhanging and hazelly banks concealed.  They remitted further search till the stream should become pure; and old man taking old man aside, began to whisper about the mystery of the youth’s disappearance; old women laid their lips to the ears of their coevals, and talked of Elphin Irving’s fairy parentage, and his having been dropped by an unearthly hand into a Christian cradle.  The young men and maids conversed on other themes; they grieved for the loss of the friend and the lover, and while the former thought that a heart so kind and true was not left in the vale, the latter thought, as maidens will, on his handsome person, gentle manners, and merry blue eye, and speculated with a sigh on the time when they might have hoped a return for their love.  They were soon joined by others who had heard the wild and delirious language of his sister: the old belief was added to the new assurance, and both again commented upon by minds full of superstitious feeling, and hearts full of supernatural fears, till the youths and maidens of Corrievale held no more love trysts for seven days and nights, lest, like Elphin Irving, they should be carried away to augment the ranks of the unchristened chivalry.

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