{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_57840/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_57840","id":"gutenberg_57840","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/57840","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Other","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Precognition","Prophecies"],"text":"Produced by Mary Glenn Krause, MFR, University of Toronto\n- Robarts Library and the Online Distributed Proofreading\nTeam at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from\nimages generously made available by The Internet Archive)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n                                   THE\n                               PROPHECIES\n                                 OF THE\n                               BRAHAN SEER\n                      (COINNEACH ODHAR FIOSAICHE).\n\n                                   BY\n                   ALEXANDER MACKENZIE, F.S.A. SCOT.,\n     EDITOR OF THE \u201cCELTIC MAGAZINE\u201d; AUTHOR OF \u201cTHE HISTORY OF THE\n      MACKENZIES,\u201d \u201cTHE HISTORY OF THE MACDONALDS AND LORDS OF THE\n                           ISLES,\u201d ETC., ETC.\n\n                      Fourth Edition\u2014Much Enlarged.\n\n                                 WITH AN\n                     APPENDIX ON THE SUPERSTITION OF\n                            THE HIGHLANDERS,\n\n                                   BY\n                   THE REV. ALEXANDER MACGREGOR, M.A.\n\n                               INVERNESS:\n              A. & W. MACKENZIE, \u201cCELTIC MAGAZINE\u201d OFFICE.\n                                  1888.\n\n                     THE ABERDEEN UNIVERSITY PRESS:\n                  JOHN THOMSON AND J. F. THOMSON, M.A.\n\n\n\n\nDEDICATION TO FIRST EDITION.\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\nTO MY REVERED FRIEND, THE REV. ALEXANDER MACGREGOR, M.A.,\n\nOf the West Church, Inverness, as a humble tribute of my admiration of\nhis many virtues, his genial nature, and his manly Celtic spirit. He\nhas kept alive the smouldering embers of our Celtic Literature for half\na century by his contributions, under the signature of \u201cSgiathanach,\u201d\n\u201cAlastair Ruadh,\u201d and others, to the _Teachdaire Gaidhealach_, _Cuairtear\nnan Gleann_, _Fear Tathaich nan Beann_, _An Gaidheal_, _The Highlander_;\nand, latterly, his varied and interesting articles in the _Celtic\nMagazine_ have done much to secure to that Periodical its present, and\nrapidly increasing, popularity. He has now the pleasing satisfaction,\nin his ripe and mellow old age, of seeing the embers, which he so long\nand so carefully fostered, shining forth in the full blaze of a general\nadmiration of the long despised and ignored Literature of his countrymen;\nand to him no small share of the honour is due.\n\nThat he may yet live many years in the enjoyment of health and honour, is\nthe sincere desire of many a Highlander, and of none more so, than of his\nsincere friend,\n\n                                                     ALEXANDER MACKENZIE.\n\nINVERNESS, _May, 1877_.\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\nThe Second Edition of the \u201cProphecies\u201d has long been out of print, stray\ncopies of it selling at more than double the published price. We now\nplace another edition, considerably extended, and much improved in every\nrespect, at the disposal of the public, at a lower price.\n\nFifty Large paper copies are thrown off, printed on thick Crown Quarto,\ngiving a handsome margin, and making altogether a handsome unique\nvolume for the Library, or the Drawing-room table, of a work which the\n_Scotsman_, and all the press of the country, \u201crecommended to the lovers\nof the marvellous as a sweet morsel\u201d.\n\nOn the 19th of October, 1881, the author of the Appendix on \u201cThe\nSuperstition of the Highlanders\u201d passed over the majority, regretted and\nloved by all who knew him.\n\n                                                                    A. M.\n\nINVERNESS, _June, 1882_.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n                                                                     PAGE.\n\n    DEDICATION                                                         iii\n\n    PREFACE                                                              v\n\n    CONTENTS                                                           vii\n\n    GENERAL INTRODUCTION\u2014How Kenneth became a Seer\u2014Various Versions      1\n\n    PROPHECIES WHICH MIGHT BE ATTRIBUTED TO NATURAL SHREWDNESS           9\n\n    PROPHECIES UNFULFILLED                                              13\n\n    PROPHECIES AS TO THE FULFILMENT OF WHICH THERE IS A DOUBT           24\n\n    PROPHECIES WHOLLY OR PARTLY FULFILLED                               28\n\n    SKETCH OF THE FAMILY OF SEAFORTH                                    61\n\n    SEAFORTH\u2019S DOOM                                                     68\n\n    SEAFORTH\u2019S DREAM                                                    71\n\n    THE SEER\u2019S DEATH                                                    77\n\n    FULFILMENT OF THE SEAFORTH PROPHECY                                 82\n\n    APPENDIX\u2014\n\n        General Superstition                                            95\n\n        Druidism                                                       100\n\n        Fairies                                                        104\n\n        Witchcraft                                                     112\n\n        Second Sight                                                   117\n\n        Smaller Superstitions                                          125\n\n        New-Year Customs                                               134\n\n        Easter Customs                                                 135\n\n        May-day Customs                                                135\n\n        Hallowe\u2019en                                                     136\n\n        Sacred Wells and Lochs                                         147\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE PROPHECIES OF THE BRAHAN SEER: COINNEACH ODHAR FIOSAICHE.\n\n\nThe gift of prophecy, second-sight, or \u201cTaibh-searachd,\u201d claimed for\nand believed by many to have been possessed, in an eminent degree, by\nCoinneach Odhar, the Brahan Seer, is one, the belief in which scientific\nmen and others of the present day accept as unmistakable signs of\nlooming, if not of actual insanity. We all are, or would be considered,\nscientific in these days. It will, therefore, scarcely be deemed prudent\nfor any one who wishes to lay claim to the slightest modicum of common\nsense, to say nothing of an acquaintance with the elementary principles\nof science, to commit to paper his ideas on such a subject, unless he\nis prepared, in doing so, to follow the common horde in their all but\nuniversal scepticism.\n\nWithout committing ourselves to any specific faith on the subject,\nhowever difficult it may be to explain away what follows on strictly\nscientific grounds, we shall place before the reader the extraordinary\npredictions of the Brahan Seer. We have had slight experiences of our\nown, which we would hesitate to dignify by the name of second-sight. It\nis not, however, with our own experiences that we have at present to do,\nbut with the \u201cProphecies\u201d of Coinneach Odhar Fiosaiche. He is beyond\ncomparison the most distinguished of all our Highland Seers, and his\nprophecies have been known throughout the whole country for more than two\ncenturies. The popular faith in them has been, and still continues to be,\nstrong and wide-spread. Sir Walter Scott, Sir Humphrey Davy, Mr. Morrit,\nLockhart, and other eminent contemporaries of the \u201cLast of the Seaforths\u201d\nfirmly believed in them. Many of them were well known, and recited from\ngeneration to generation, centuries before they were fulfilled. Some of\nthem have been fulfilled in our own day, and many are still unfulfilled.\n\nNot so much with the view of protecting ourselves from the charge of a\nbelief in such superstitious folly (for we would hesitate to acknowledge\nany such belief), but as a slight palliation for obtruding such nonsense\non the public, we may point out, by the way, that the sacred writers\u2014who\nare now believed by many of the would-be-considered-wise to have been\nbehind the age, and not near so wise and far-seeing as we are\u2014believed\nin second-sight, witchcraft, and other visions of a supernatural kind.\nBut then we shall be told by our scientific friends that the Bible\nitself is becoming obsolete, and that it has already served its turn;\nbeing only suited for an unenlightened age in which men like Shakspere,\nMilton, Newton, Bacon, and such unscientific men could be considered\ndistinguished. The truth is that on more important topics than the\none we are now considering, the Bible is laid aside by many of our\nwould-be-scientific lights, whenever it treats of anything beyond the\npuny comprehension of the minds and intellectual vision of these\nomniscient gentlemen. We have all grown so scientific that the mere\nidea of supposing anything possible which is beyond the intellectual\ngrasp of the scientific enquirer cannot be entertained, although even\nhe must admit, that in many cases, the greatest men in science, and the\nmightiest intellects, find it impossible to understand or explain away\nmany things as to the existence of which they have no possible doubt. We\neven find the clergy slightly inconsistent in questions of this kind.\nThey solemnly desire to impress us with the fact that ministering spirits\nhover about the couches and apartments in which the dying Christian is\ndrawing near the close of his existence, and preparing to throw off his\nmortal coil; but were we to suggest the possibility of any mere human\nbeing, in any conceivable manner having had indications of the presence\nof these ghostly visitors, or discovering any signs or premonitions of\nthe early departure of a relative or of an intimate friend, our heathen\nideas and devious wanderings from the safe channel of clerical orthodoxy\nand consistent inconsistency, would be howled against, and paraded before\nthe faithful as the grossest superstition, with an enthusiasm and relish\npossible only to a strait-laced ecclesiastic. Clerical inconsistency is,\nhowever, not our present theme.\n\nMany able men have written on the Second-sight, and to some of them we\nshall refer in the following pages; meanwhile our purpose is to place\nbefore the reader the Prophecies of the Brahan Seer, as far as we have\nbeen able to procure them. We are informed that a considerable collection\nof them has been made by the late Alexander Cameron of Lochmaddy, author\nof the \u201cHistory and Traditions of the Isle of Skye,\u201d but we were unable\nto discover into whose possession the manuscript found its way; we hope,\nhowever, that this reference may bring it to light.\n\nKenneth Mackenzie, better known as Coinneach Odhar, the Brahan Seer\n(according to Mr. Maclennan), was born at Baile-na-Cille, in the Parish\nof Uig and Island of Lews, about the beginning of the seventeenth\ncentury. Nothing particular is recorded of his early life, but when he\nhad just entered his teens, he received a stone in the following manner,\nby which he could reveal the future destiny of man:\u2014While his mother\nwas one evening tending her cattle in a summer shealing on the side\nof a ridge called Cnoceothail, which overlooks the burying-ground of\nBaile-na-Cille, in Uig, she saw, about the still hour of midnight, the\nwhole of the graves in the churchyard opening, and a vast multitude of\npeople of every age, from the newly born babe to the grey-haired sage,\nrising from their graves, and going away in every conceivable direction.\nIn about an hour they began to return, and were all soon after back\nin their graves, which closed upon them as before. But, on scanning\nthe burying-place more closely, Kenneth\u2019s mother observed one grave,\nnear the side, still open. Being a courageous woman, she determined to\nascertain the cause of this singular circumstance, so, hastening to the\ngrave, and placing her \u201ccuigeal\u201d (distaff) athwart its mouth (for she\nhad heard it said that the spirit could not enter the grave again while\nthat instrument was upon it), she watched the result. She had not to\nwait long, for in a minute or two she noticed a fair lady coming in the\ndirection of the churchyard, rushing through the air, from the north. On\nher arrival, the fair one addressed her thus\u2014\u201cLift thy distaff from off\nmy grave, and let me enter my dwelling of the dead.\u201d \u201cI shall do so,\u201d\nanswered the other, \u201cwhen you explain to me what detained you so long\nafter your neighbours.\u201d \u201cThat you shall soon hear,\u201d the ghost replied;\n\u201cMy journey was much longer than theirs\u2014I had to go all the way to\nNorway.\u201d She then addressed her:\u2014\u201cI am a daughter of the King of Norway;\nI was drowned while bathing in that country; my body was found on the\nbeach close to where we now stand, and I was interred in this grave.\nIn remembrance of me, and as a small reward for your intrepidity and\ncourage, I shall possess you of a valuable secret\u2014go and find in yonder\nlake a small round blue stone, which give to your son, Kenneth, who by\nit shall reveal future events.\u201d She did as requested, found the stone,\nand gave it to her son, Kenneth. No sooner had he thus received the gift\nof divination than his fame spread far and wide. He was sought after by\nthe gentry throughout the length and breadth of the land, and no special\nassembly of theirs was complete unless Coinneach Odhar was amongst them.\nBeing born on the lands of Seaforth, in the Lews, he was more associated\nwith that family than with any other in the country, and he latterly\nremoved to the neighbourhood of Loch Ussie, on the Brahan estate, where\nhe worked as a common labourer on a neighbouring farm. He was very shrewd\nand clear-headed, for one in his menial position; was always ready with\na smart answer, and if any attempted to raise the laugh at his expense,\nseldom or ever did he fail to turn it against his tormentors.\n\nThere are various other versions of the manner in which he became\npossessed of the power of divination. According to one\u2014His mistress,\nthe farmer\u2019s wife, was unusually exacting with him, and he, in return,\ncontinually teased, and, on many occasions, expended much of his natural\nwit upon her, much to her annoyance and chagrin. Latterly, his conduct\nbecame so unbearable that she decided upon disposing of him in a manner\nwhich would save her any future annoyance. On one occasion, his master\nhaving sent him away to cut peats, which in those days were, as they\nnow are in more remote districts, the common article of fuel, it was\nnecessary to send him his dinner, he being too far from the house to come\nhome to his meals, and the farmer\u2019s wife so far carried out her intention\nof destroying him, that she poisoned his dinner. It was somewhat late\nin arriving, and the future prophet feeling exhausted from his honest\nexertions in his masters interest and from want of food, lay down on the\nheath and fell into a heavy slumber. In this position he was suddenly\nawakened by feeling something cold in his breast; which on examination\nhe found to be a small white stone, with a hole through the centre. He\nlooked through it, when a vision appeared to him which revealed the\ntreachery and diabolical intention of his mistress. To test the truth\nof the vision, he gave the dinner intended for himself to his faithful\ncollie; the poor brute writhed, and died soon after in the greatest agony.\n\nThe following version is supplied by Mr. Macintyre, teacher,\nArpafeelie:\u2014Although the various accounts as to the manner in which\nCoinneach Odhar became gifted with second-sight differ in some respects,\nyet they generally agree in this, that it was acquired while he was\nengaged in the humble occupation of cutting peats or divots, which\nwere in his day, and still are in many places, used as fuel throughout\nthe Highlands of Scotland. On the occasion referred to, being somewhat\nfatigued, he lay down, resting his head upon a little knoll, and waited\nthe arrival of his wife with his dinner, whereupon he fell fast asleep.\nOn awaking, he felt something hard under his head, and examining the\ncause of the uneasiness, discovered a small round stone with a hole\nthrough the middle. He picked it up, and looking through it, saw by the\naid of this prophetic stone that his wife was coming to him with a dinner\nconsisting of sowans and milk, polluted, though unknown to her, in a\nmanner which, as well as several other particulars connected with it, we\nforbear to mention. But Coinneach found that though this stone was the\nmeans by which a supernatural power had been conferred upon him, it had,\non its very first application, deprived him of the sight of that eye with\nwhich he looked through it, and he continued ever afterwards _cam_, or\nblind of an eye.\n\nIt would appear from this account that the intended murderer made use of\nthe Seer\u2019s wife to convey the poison to her own husband, thus adding to\nher diabolical and murderous intention, by making her who would feel the\nloss the keenest, the medium by which her husband was to lose his life.\n\nHugh Miller, in his \u201cScenes and Legends in the North of Scotland,\u201d\nsays:\u2014When serving as a field labourer with a wealthy clansman who\nresided somewhere near Brahan Castle, he made himself so formidable to\nthe clansman\u2019s wife by his shrewd, sarcastic humour, that she resolved\non destroying him by poison. With this design, she mixed a preparation\nof noxious herbs with his food, when he was one day employed in digging\nturf in a solitary morass, and brought it to him in a pitcher. She found\nhim lying asleep on one of those conical fairy hillocks which abound in\nsome parts of the Highlands, and her courage failing her, instead of\nawaking him, she set down the pitcher by his side and returned home. He\nwoke shortly after, and, seeing the food, would have begun his repast,\nbut feeling something press heavily against his heart, he opened his\nwaistcoat and found a beautiful smooth stone, resembling a pearl, but\nmuch larger, which had apparently been dropped into his breast while\nhe slept. He gazed at it in admiration, and became conscious as he\ngazed, that a strange faculty of seeing the future as distinctly as the\npresent, and men\u2019s real designs and motives as clearly as their actions,\nwas miraculously imparted to him; and it is well for him that he should\nbecome so knowing at such a crisis, for the first secret he became\nacquainted with was that of the treachery practised against him by his\nmistress.\n\nWe have thus several accounts of the manner in which our prophet obtained\npossession of his remarkable stone, white or blue, with or without a\nhole through its centre, it matters little; that he did obtain it, we\nmust assume to be beyond question; but it is a matter for consideration,\nand indeed open to considerable doubt, whether it had any real prophetic\nvirtue. If Kenneth was really possessed of the power of prophecy he more\nthan likely used the stone simply to impose upon the people, who would\nnever believe him possessed of such a gift, unless they saw with their\nown eyes the means by which he exercised it.\n\nWe shall, as far as possible, give the Prophecies under the following\nheadings\u2014Those which might be attributed to great penetration and natural\nshrewdness; those which are still unfulfilled; those that are doubtful;\nand those which have been unquestionably fulfilled, or partly fulfilled.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nPROPHECIES WHICH MIGHT BE ATTRIBUTED TO NATURAL SHREWDNESS.\n\n\nHe no doubt predicted many things which the unbeliever in his prophetic\ngifts may ascribe to great natural shrewdness. Among these may be\nplaced his prophecy, 150 years before the Caledonian Canal was built,\nthat ships would some day sail round the back of Tomnahurich Hill. A\ngentleman in Inverness sent for Coinneach to take down his prophecies.\nHe wrote several of them, but when he heard this one, he thought it so\nutterly absurd and impossible, that he threw the manuscript of what he\nhad already written into the fire, and gave up any further communication\nwith the Seer. Mr. Maclennan gives the following version of it:\u2014\u201cStrange\nas it may seem to you this day, the time will come, and it is not far\noff, when full-rigged ships will be seen sailing eastward and westward\nby the back of Tomnahurich, near Inverness.\u201d Mr. Macintyre supplies us\nwith a version in the Seer\u2019s vernacular Gaelic:\u2014\u201cThig an latha \u2019s am\nfaicear laraichean Sasunnach air an tarruing le srianan corcaich seachad\nair cul Tom-na-hiuraich.\u201d (The day will come when English mares, with\nhempen bridles, shall be led round the back of Tomnahurich.) It is quite\npossible that a man of penetration and great natural shrewdness might,\nfrom the appearance of the country, with its chain of great inland lakes,\npredict the future Caledonian Canal. Among others which might safely\nbe predicted, without the aid of any supernatural gift, are, \u201cthat the\nday will come when there will be a road through the hills of Ross-shire\nfrom sea to sea, and a bridge upon every stream\u201d. \u201cThat the people will\ndegenerate as their country improves.\u201d \u201cThat the clans will become so\neffeminate as to flee from their native country before an army of sheep.\u201d\nMr. Macintyre supplies the following version of the latter:\u2014Alluding\npossibly to the depopulation of the Highlands, Coinneach said \u201cthat the\nday will come when the Big Sheep will overrun the country until they\nstrike (meet) the northern sea\u201d. Big sheep here is commonly understood\nto mean deer, but whether the words signify sheep or deer, the prophecy\nhas been very strikingly fulfilled. The other two have also been only too\nliterally fulfilled.\n\nMr. Macintyre supplies another version, as follows: \u201cThe day will come\nwhen the hills of Ross will be strewed with ribbons\u201d. It is generally\naccepted that this prediction finds its fulfilment in the many good roads\nthat now intersect the various districts of the country. Other versions\nare given, such as \u2018a ribbon on every hill, and a bridge on every stream\u2019\n(Raoban air gach cnoc agus drochaid air gach alltan); \u2018a mill on every\nriver and a white house on every hillock\u2019 (Muillinn air gach abhainn agus\ntigh geal air gach cnocan); and \u2018that the hills of the country will be\ncrossed with shoulder-halts\u2019 (criosan guaille). Since Kenneth\u2019s day mills\nwere very common, and among the most useful industrial institutions of\nthe country, as may be evidenced by the fact that, even to this day, the\nproprietors of lands, where such establishments were once located, pay\nCrown and Bishop\u2019s rents for them. And may we not discover the fulfilment\nof \u201ca white house on every hillock\u201d in the many elegant shooting lodges,\nhotels, and school-houses now found in every corner of the Highlands.\n\nMr. Maclennan supplies the following:\u2014There is opposite the shore at\nFindon, Ferrintosh, two sand banks which were, in the time of the Seer,\nentirely covered over with the sea, even at the very lowest spring\nebbs. Regarding these, Coinneach said, \u201cthat the day will come, however\ndistant, when these banks will form the coast line; and when that\nhappens, know for a certainty that troublesome times are at hand\u201d. \u201cThese\nbanks,\u201d our correspondent continues, \u201chave been visibly approaching, for\nmany years back, nearer and nearer to the shore.\u201d This is another of the\nclass of predictions which might be attributed to natural shrewdness.\nIt is being gradually fulfilled, and it may be well to watch for the\n\u201ctroublesome times,\u201d and so test the powers of the Seer.\n\nOther predictions of this class may occur as we proceed, but we have\nno hesitation in saying that, however much natural penetration and\nshrewdness might have aided Kenneth in predicting such as these, it\nwould assist him little in prophesying \u201cthat the day will come when\nTomnahurich,\u201d or, as he called it, Tom-na-sithichean, or the Fairy Hill,\n\u201cwill be under lock and key, and the Fairies secured within\u201d. It would\nhardly assist him in foreseeing the beautiful and unique cemetery on the\ntop of the hill, and the spirits (of the dead) chained within, as we now\nsee it.\n\nSince the last edition of the \u201cProphecies\u201d appeared, our attention has\nbeen called to the following paragraph published in the _Inverness\nAdvertiser_, in 1859; that is _before_ it had been turned into a\nCemetery\u2014\u201cTomnahurich, the far-famed Fairies\u2019 Hill, has been sown with\noats. According to tradition, the Brahan prophet, who lived 200 years\nago, predicted that ships with unfurled sails would pass and repass\nTomnahurich; and further, that it would yet be placed under lock and\nkey. The first part of the prediction verified by the opening of the\nCaledonian Canal, and we seem to be on the eve of seeing the realization\nof the rest by the final closing up of the Fairies\u2019 Hill.\u201d This paragraph\nwas in print before the prediction was fulfilled.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nUNFULFILLED PROPHECIES.\n\n\nKenneth foretold \u201cthat, however unlikely it may now appear, the Island of\nLews will be laid waste by a destructive war, which will continue till\nthe contending armies, slaughtering each other as they proceed, shall\nreach Tarbert in Harris. In the Caws of Tarbert, the retreating host will\nsuddenly halt; an onslaught, led by a left-handed Macleod, called Donald,\nson of Donald, son of Donald, will then be made upon the pursuers. The\nonly weapon in this champion\u2019s hands will be a black sooty cabar, taken\noff a neighbouring hut; but his intrepidity and courage will so inspirit\nthe fugitives that they will fight like mighty men, and overpower their\npursuers. The Lews will then enjoy a long period of repose.\u201d It has not\nhitherto been suggested that this prophecy has been fulfilled, and we\nhere stake the reputation of our prophet upon its fulfilment, and that\nof the following predictions, which are still current throughout the\nNorthern Counties of Scotland.\n\nAnother, by which the faith of future generations may be tested, is the\none in which he predicted \u201cthat a Loch above Beauly will burst through\nits banks and destroy in its rush a village in its vicinity\u201d. We are not\naware that such a calamity as is here foretold has yet occurred, nor are\nwe aware of the locality of the loch or the village.\n\nWe have received various versions of the, as yet, unfulfilled prediction\nregarding \u201cClach an t-Seasaidh,\u201d near the Muir of Ord. This is an angular\nstone, sharp at the top, which at one time stood upright, and was of\nconsiderable height. It is now partly broken and lying on the ground.\n\u201cThe day will come when the ravens will, from the top of it, drink their\nthree fulls, for three successive days, of the blood of the Mackenzies.\u201d\n\nMr. Maclennan\u2019s version is:\u2014\u201cThe day will come when the ravens will drink\ntheir full of the Mackenzies\u2019 blood three times off the top of the \u2018Clach\nMhor,\u2019 and glad am I (continues the Seer) that I will not live to see\nthat day, for a bloody and destructive battle will be fought on the Muir\nof Ord. A squint-eyed (cam), pox-pitted tailor will originate the battle;\nfor men will become so scarce in those days that each of seven women will\nstrive hard for the squint-eyed tailor\u2019s heart and hand, and out of this\nstrife the conflict will originate.\u201d\n\nMr. Macintyre writes regarding these:\u2014\u201cThe prophecies that \u2018the raven\nwill drink from the top of \u2018Clach an t-Seasaidh,\u2019 its full of the blood\nof the Mackenzies for three successive days,\u2019 and \u2018that the Mackenzies\nwould be so reduced in numbers, that they would be all taken in an open\nfishing-boat (scuta dubh) back to Ireland from whence they originally\ncame,\u2019 remain still unfulfilled.\u201d\n\nIn the Kintail versions of these predictions they are made to apply to\nthe Macraes, who are to get so scarce that a cripple tailor of the name\nis to be in such request among the ladies as to cause a desperate battle\nin the district between themselves and the Maclennans, the result of\nwhich will be that a black fishing wherry or \u201cscuta dubh\u201d will carry\nback to Ireland all that remains of the clan Macrae, but no sooner do\nthey arrive than they again return to Kintail. Before this was to take\nplace, nine men of the name of Macmillan would arrive at manhood (assume\ntheir bonnets) in the district; assemble at a funeral at Cnoc-a-Chlachain\nin Kilduich, and originate a quarrel. At this exact period, the\nMacraes, would be at the height of their prosperity in Kintail, and\nhenceforth begin to lose their hold in the country of their ancestors.\nThe Macmillans have actually met in this spot and originated a quarrel\nas predicted, although nothing could have been more unlikely, for in\nthe Seer\u2019s day there was not a single one of the name in Kintail, nor\nfor several generations after. It is somewhat remarkable to find that\nthe Maclennans are at this very time actually supplanting the Macraes\nas foretold, for the last two of the ancient stock\u2014the late tenants of\nFernaig and Leachachan\u2014who left the district have been succeeded in their\nholdings by Maclennans; and other instances of the same kind, within\nrecent years, are well known.\n\nAt present, we are happy to say, there does not appear much probability\nof the Clan Mackenzie being reduced to such small dimensions as would\njustify us in expecting the fulfilment of the \u201cscuta dubh\u201d part of the\nprophecy on a very early date. If the prediction, however, be confined\nin its application to the Mackenzies of Seaforth, it may be said to have\nbeen already almost fulfilled. We have, indeed, been told that this is\na fragment of the unfulfilled prophecy uttered by Coinneach regarding\nthe ultimate doom and total extinction of the Seaforths, and which we\nhave been as yet unable to procure in detail. It was, however, known to\nBernard Burke, who makes the following reference to it:\u2014\u201cHe (the Seer)\nuttered it in all its horrible length; but I at present suppress the last\nportion of it, which is as yet unfulfilled. Every other part of the\nprediction has most literally and most accurately come to pass, but let\nus earnestly hope that the course of future events may at length give the\nlie to the avenging curse of the Seer. The last clause of the prophecy is\nwell known to many of those versed in Highland family tradition, and I\ntrust that it may remain unfulfilled.\u201d\n\nOne of our correspondents presumes that the mention of \u201cClach an\nt-Seasaidh\u201d refers to the remains of a Druidical circle to be seen still\non the right and left of the turnpike road at Windhill, near Beauly. As\na sign whereby to know when the latter prophecy would be accomplished,\nCoinneach said \u201cthat a mountain-ash tree will grow out of the walls of\nFairburn Tower, and when it becomes large enough to form a cart axle,\nthese things will come to pass\u201d. Not long ago, a party informed us that a\nmountain-ash, or rowan-tree, was actually growing out of the tower walls,\nand was about the thickness of a man\u2019s thumb.\n\nVarious other unfulfilled predictions of the Seer remain to be noticed.\nOne is regarding \u201cClach an Tiompain,\u201d a well-known stone in the\nimmediate vicinity of the far-famed Strathpeffer Wells. It is, like\n\u201cClach-an-t-Seasaidh,\u201d an upright, pillar-looking stone, which, when\nstruck, makes a great hollow sound or echo, and hence its designation,\nthe literal meaning of which is the \u201cstone of the hollow sound or echo\u201d.\nCoinneach said \u201cthat the day will come when ships will ride with their\ncables attached to \u2018Clach-an-Tiompain\u2019\u201d. It is perhaps superfluous to\npoint out that this has not yet come to pass; and we could only imagine\ntwo ways in which it was possible to happen, either by a canal being\nmade through the valley of Strathpeffer, passing in the neighbourhood of\nthe Clach, or by the removal of the stone some day by the authorities of\n\u201cBaile Chail\u201d to Dingwall pier. They may feel disposed to thus aid the\ngreat prophet of their country to secure the position as a great man,\nwhich we now claim in his behalf.\n\nWhile the first edition was going through the press we visited\nKnockfarrel, in the immediate vicinity of Loch Ussie, and we were told\nof another way in which this prediction might be fulfilled so peculiar\nthat, although it is altogether improbable, nay impossible, that it can\never take place, we shall reproduce it. Having found our way to the top\nof this magnificent and perfect specimen of a vitrified fort, we were so\nstruck with its great size, that we carefully paced it, and found it to\nbe one hundred and fifty paces in length, with a uniform width of forty,\nboth ends terminating in a semi-circle, from each of which projected for\na distance of sixty paces, vitrified matter, as if it were originally\na kind of promenade, thus making the whole length of the structure two\nhundred and seventy yards, or thereabout. On the summit of the hill we\nmet two boys herding cows, and as our previous experience taught us that\nboys, as a rule\u2014especially herd boys,\u2014are acquainted with the traditions\nand places of interest in the localities they frequent, we were curious\nenough to ask them if they ever heard of Coinneach Odhar in the district,\nand if he ever said anything regarding the fort on Knockfarrel. They\ndirected us to what they called \u201cFingal\u2019s Well,\u201d in the interior of the\nruined fort, and informed us that this well was used by the inhabitants\nof the fortress \u201cuntil Fingal, one day, drove them out, and placed a\nlarge stone over the well, which has ever since kept the water from\noozing up, after which he jumped to the other side of the (Strathpeffer)\nvalley\u201d. There being considerable rains for some days previous to our\nvisit, water could be seen in the \u201cwell\u201d. One of the boys drove down\na stick until it struck the stone, producing a hollow sound which\nunmistakably indicated the existence of a cavity beneath. \u201cCoinneach\nOdhar foretold,\u201d said the boy, \u201cthat if ever that stone was taken out\nof its place, Loch Ussie would ooze up through the well and flood the\nvalley below to such an extent that ships could sail up to Strathpeffer\nand be fastened to \u2018Clach-an-Tiompain\u2019; and this would happen after the\nstone had fallen three times. It has already fallen twice,\u201d continued\nour youthful informant, \u201cand you can now see it newly raised, strongly\nand carefully propped up, near the end of the doctor\u2019s house.\u201d And so it\nis, and can still be seen, on the right, a few paces from the roadside,\nas you proceed up to the Strathpeffer Wells. We think it right to give\nthis\u2014a third\u2014with the other versions, for probably the reader will admit\nthat the one is just as likely to happen as the other. We can quite\nunderstand Kenneth prophecying that the sea would yet reach Strathpeffer;\nfor to any one standing where we did, on the summit of Knockfarrel,\nthe bottom of the valley appears much lower than the Cromarty Firth\nbeyond Dingwall, and it looks as if it might, any day, break through the\napparently slender natural embankment below Tulloch Castle, which seemed,\nfrom where we stood, to be the only obstruction in its path. We need,\nhowever, hardly inform the reader in the district that the bottom of the\nStrathpeffer valley is, in reality, several feet above the present sea\nlevel.\n\nAnother prediction is that concerning the Canonry of Ross, which is still\nstanding\u2014\u201cThe day will come when, full of the Mackenzies, it will fall\nwith a fearful crash\u201d. This may come to pass in several ways. The Canonry\nis the principal burying-place of the Clan, and it may fall when full of\ndead Mackenzies, of when a large concourse of the Clan is present at the\nfuneral of a great chief.\n\n\u201cWhen two false teachers shall come across the seas who will\nrevolutionize the religion of the land, and nine bridges shall span the\nriver Ness, the Highlands will be overrun by ministers without grace\nand women without shame,\u201d is a prediction which some maintain has all\nthe appearance of being rapidly fulfilled at this moment. It has been\nsuggested that the two false teachers were no other than the great\nevangelists, Messrs. Moody and Sankey, who, no doubt, from Coinneach\nOdhar\u2019s standpoint of orthodoxy, who must have been a Roman Catholic\nor an Episcopalian, attempted to revolutionize the religion of the\nHighlands. If this be so, the other portions of the prophecy are looming\nnot far off in the immediate future. We have already eight bridges on\nthe Ness\u2014the eighth has only been completed last year\u2014and the ninth is\nalmost finished. If we are to accept the opinions of certain of the\nclergy themselves, \u201cministers without grace\u201d are becoming the rule, and\nas for a plenitude of \u201cwomen without shame,\u201d ask any ancient matron, and\nshe will at once tell you that Kenneth\u2019s prophecy may be held to have\nbeen fulfilled in that particular any time within the last half century.\nGleidh sinne!!\n\nIt is possible the following may have something to do with the same\ncalamity in the Highlands. Mr. Maclennan says:\u2014With reference to some\ngreat revolution which shall take place in the country, Coinneach Odhar\nsaid that \u201cbefore that event shall happen, the water of the river Beauly\nwill thrice cease to run. On one of these occasions a salmon, having\nshells instead of scales, will be found in the bed of the river.\u201d This\nprophecy has been in part fulfilled, for the Beauly has on two occasions\nceased to run, and a salmon of the kind mentioned has been found in the\nbed of the river.\n\nMr. Macintyre gives another version:\u2014\u201cWhen the river Beauly is dried up\nthree times, and a \u2018scaly salmon\u2019 or royal sturgeon, is caught in the\nriver, that will be a time of great trial.\u201d (Nuair a thraoghas abhainn\nna Manachain tri uairean, agus a ghlacair Bradan Sligeach air grunnd\nna h-aibhne, \u2019s ann an sin a bhitheas an deuchainn ghoirt.) The river\nhas been already dried up twice, the last time in 1826, and a \u2018Bradan\nSligeach,\u2019 or royal sturgeon, measuring nine feet in length, has been\ncaught in the estuary of the Beauly about two years ago.\n\nThe following is one which we trust may never be realized in all its\ndetails, though some may be disposed to think that signs are not wanting\nof its ultimate fulfilment:\u2014\u201cThe day will come when the jaw-bone of the\nbig sheep, or \u2018caoirich mhora,\u2019 will put the plough on the rafters (air\nan aradh); when sheep shall become so numerous that the bleating of the\none shall be heard by the other from Conchra in Lochalsh to Bun-da-Loch\nin Kintail they shall be at their height in price, and henceforth will\ngo back and deteriorate, until they disappear altogether, and be so\nthoroughly forgotten that a man finding the jaw-bone of a sheep in a\ncairn, will not recognise it, or be able to tell what animal it belonged\nto. The ancient proprietors of the soil shall give place to strange\nmerchant proprietors, and the whole Highlands will become one huge deer\nforest; the whole country will be so utterly desolated and depopulated\nthat the crow of a cock shall not be heard north of Druim-Uachdair;\nthe people will emigrate to Islands now unknown, but which shall yet\nbe discovered in the boundless oceans, after which the deer and other\nwild animals in the huge wilderness shall be exterminated and drowned by\nhorrid _black_ rains (siantan dubha). The people will then return and\ntake undisturbed possession of the lands of their ancestors.\u201d\n\nWe have yet to see the realization of the following:\u2014\u201cA dun, hornless,\ncow (supposed to mean a steamer) will appear in the Minch (off Carr\nPoint, in Gairloch), and make a \u2018geum,\u2019 or bellow, which will knock the\nsix chimneys off Gairloch House.\u201d (Thig bo mhaol odhar a steach an\nt-Aite-mor agus leigeas i geum aiste \u2019chuireas na se beannagan dheth an\nTigh Dhige.) Gairloch House, or the Tigh Dige of Coinneach\u2019s day, was\nthe old house which stood in the park on the right, as you proceed from\nthe bridge in the direction of the present mansion. The walls were of\nwattled twigs, wicker work, or plaited twig hurdles, thatched with turf\nor divots, and surrounded with a deep ditch, which could, in time of\napproaching danger, be filled with water from the river, hence the name\n\u201cTigh Dige,\u201d House of the Ditch. It has been suggested that the Seer\u2019s\nprediction referred to this stronghold, but a strong objection to this\nview appears in the circumstance that the ancient citadel had no chimneys\nto fall off. The present mansion is, however, also called the \u201cTigh\nDige,\u201d and it has the exact number of chimneys\u2014six.\n\n\u201cThe day will come when a river in Wester Ross shall be dried up.\u201d \u201cThe\nday will come when there shall be such dire persecution and bloodshed in\nthe county of Sutherland, that people can ford the river Oykel dryshod,\nover dead men\u2019s bodies.\u201d \u201cThe day will come when a raven, attired in\nplaid and bonnet, will drink his full of human blood on \u2018Fionn-bheinn,\u2019\nthree times a day, for three successive days.\u201d\n\n\u201cA battle will be fought at Ault-nan-Torcan, in the Lewis, which will be\na bloody one indeed. It will truly take place, though the time may be\nfar hence, but woe to the mothers of sucklings that day. The defeated\nhost will continue to be cut down till it reaches Ard-a-chaolais (a place\nnearly seven miles from Ault-nan-Torcan), and there the swords will make\nterrible havoc.\u201d This has not yet occurred.\n\nSpeaking of what should come to pass in the parish of Lochs, he\nsaid\u2014\u201cAt bleak Runish in Lochs, they will spoil and devour, at the foot\nof the crags, and will split heads by the score.\u201d He is also said to\nhave predicted \u201cthat the day will come when the raven will drink its\nthree fulls of the blood of the Clan Macdonald on the top of the Hills\nof Minaraidh in Parks, in the parish of Lochs\u201d. This looks as if the\none above predicted about the Mackenzies had been misapplied to the\nMacdonalds. \u201cThe day will come when there shall be a laird of Tulloch who\nwill kill four wives in succession, but the fifth shall kill him.\u201d\n\nRegarding the battle of Ard-nan-Ceann, at Benbecula, North Uist, he\nsaid\u2014\u201cOh, Ard-nan-Ceann, Ard-nan-Ceann, glad am I that I will not be at\nthe end of the South Clachan that day, when the young men will be weary\nand faint; for Ard-nan-Ceann will be the scene of a terrible conflict\u201d.\n\n\u201cA severe battle will be fought at the (present) Ardelve market stance,\nin Lochalsh, when the slaughter will be so great that people can cross\nthe ferry over dead men\u2019s bodies. The battle will be finally decided by a\npowerful man and his five sons, who will come across from the Strath (the\nAchamore district).\u201d\n\nCoinneach said\u2014\u201cWhen a holly bush (or tree) shall grow out of the face\nof the rock at Torr-a-Chuilinn (Kintail) to a size sufficiently large to\nmake a shaft for a \u2018carn-slaoid\u2019 (sledge-cart), a battle will be fought\nin the locality.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhen Loch Shiel, in Kintail, shall become so narrow that a man can leap\nacross it, the salmon shall desert the Loch and the River Shiel.\u201d We are\ntold that the Loch is rapidly getting narrower at a particular point,\nby the action of the water on the banks and bottom, and that if it goes\non as it has done in recent years it can easily be leaped at no distant\ndate. Prudence would suggest a short lease of these Salmon Fishings.\n\nHe also predicted that a large stone, standing on the hill opposite\nScallisaig farm-house, in Glenelg, \u201cwill fall and kill a man\u201d. This\nboulder is well known to people in the district, and the prophecy\nis of such a definite character, that there cannot possibly be any\nmistake about its meaning or its fulfilment should such a calamity ever\nunfortunately take place.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nPROPHECIES AS TO THE FULFILMENT OF WHICH THERE IS A DOUBT.\n\n\n\u201cWhen a magpie (pitheid) shall have made a nest for three successive\nyears in the gable of the Church of Ferrintosh, the church will fall when\nfull of people,\u201d is one of those regarding which we find it difficult\nto decide whether it has been already fulfilled or not. Mr. Macintyre,\nwho supplies this version, adds the following remarks:\u2014The Church of\nFerrintosh was known at an earlier period as the Parish Church of\nUrquhart and Loggie. Some maintain that this prediction refers to the\nChurch of Urray. Whether this be so or not, there were circumstances\nconnected with the Church of Ferrintosh in the time of the famous Rev.\nDr. Macdonald, which seemed to indicate the beginning of the fulfilment\nof the prophecy, and which led to very alarming consequences. A magpie\nactually did make her nest in the church gable, exactly as foretold.\nThis, together with a rent between the church wall and the stone stairs\nwhich led up to the gallery, seemed to favour the opinion that the\nprophecy was on the eve of being accomplished, and people felt uneasy\nwhen they glanced upon the ominous nest, the rent in the wall, and the\ncrowded congregation, and remembered Coinneach\u2019s prophecy, as they walked\ninto the church to hear the Doctor. It so happened one day that the\nchurch was unusually full of people, insomuch that it was found necessary\nto connect the ends of the seats with planks, in order to accommodate\nthem all. Unfortunately, one of those temporary seats was either too\nweak, or too heavily burdened: it snapped in two with a loud report and\nstartled the audience. Coinneach Odhar\u2019s prophecy flashed across their\nminds, and a simultaneous rush was made by the panic-struck congregation\nto the door. Many fell, and were trampled underfoot, while others\nfainted, being seriously crushed and bruised.\n\nAmong a rural population, sayings and doings, applicable to a particular\nparish, crop up, and, in after times, are applied to occurrences in\nneighbouring parishes. Having regard to this, may it not be suggested\nthat, what is current locally in regard to Ferrintosh and Coinneach\u2019s\nsayings, may only be a transcript of an event now matter of history in\na parish on the northern side of the Cromarty Firth. We refer to the\ndestruction of the Abbey Church at Fearn by lightning, October 10, 1742.\nWe have never seen a detailed account of this sad accident in print,\nand have no doubt the reader will be glad to have a graphic description\nof it from the pen of Bishop Forbes, the famous author of the \u201cJacobite\nMemoirs,\u201d who visited his diocese of Ross and Caithness in the summer of\n1762. This account is taken from his unpublished MS. Journal, now the\nproperty of the College of Bishops of the Scottish Episcopal Church, and\npresently in the hands of the Rev. F. Smith, Arpafeelie, who has kindly\npermitted us to make the following extract:\u2014\n\n\u201cThe ruinous Church of Ferne was of old an Abbacy of White Friars (see\nKeith\u2019s Catalogue, p. 247). The roof of flagstones, with part of a side\nwall, was beat down in an instant by thunder and lightning on Sunday,\nOctober 10th, 1742, and so crushed and bruised forty persons, that they\nwere scarcely to be discovered, who or what they were, and therefore,\nwere buried promiscuously, without any manner of distinction. The\ngentry, having luckily their seats in the niches, were saved from the\nsudden crash, as was the preacher by the sounding-boards falling upon\nthe pulpit, and his bowing down under it. Great numbers were wounded\n(see Scot\u2019s Magazine for 1742, p. 485). But there is a most material\ncircumstance not mentioned, which has been carefully concealed from the\npublishers, and it is this: By a Providential event, this was the first\nSunday that the Rev. and often-mentioned Mr. Stewart, had a congregation\nnear Cadboll, in view of Ferne, whereby many lives were saved, as the\nkirk was far from being so throng as usual, and that he and his people,\nupon coming out from worship, and seeing the dismal falling-in just when\nit happened, hastened with all speed to the afflictive spot, and dragged\nmany of the wounded out of the rubbish, whose cries would have pierced a\nheart of adamant. Had not this been the happy case, I speak within bounds\nwhen I say two, if not three, to one, would have perished. Some of the\nwounded died. This church has been a large and lofty building, as the\nwalls are very high, and still standing.\u201d\n\nIt has been suggested that the prediction was fulfilled by the falling to\npieces of the Church at the Disruption; but we would be loth to stake the\nreputation of our prophet on this assumption.\n\nAnother, supposed by some to be fulfilled by the annual visits of the\nmilitia for their annual drill, is\u2014\u201cThat when a wood on the Muir of Ord\ngrows to a man\u2019s height, regiments of soldiers shall be seen there drawn\nup in battle order.\u201d\n\nIn connection with the battle, or battles, at Cille-Chriosd and the Muir\nof Ord, Mr. Macintyre says:\u2014The Seer foretold that \u201cFear Ruadh an Uird\n(the Red Laird of Ord) would be carried home, wounded, on blankets\u201d.\nWhether this saying has reference to an event looming in the distant\nfuture, or is a fragment of a tradition regarding sanguinary events well\nknown in the history of Cille-Chriosd, and of which a full and graphic\naccount, both in prose and verse, can be seen on pp. 82-86 and 136-139,\nVol. I. of the _Celtic Magazine_, it is impossible to say.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nPROPHECIES WHOLLY OR PARTLY FULFILLED.\n\n\nHere are several additional predictions which have been wholly or partly\nfulfilled. \u201cThe day will come when the Mackenzies will lose all their\npossessions in Lochalsh, after which it will fall into the hands of an\nEnglishman, who shall be distinguished by great liberality to his people,\nand lavish expenditure of money. He will have one son and two daughters;\nand, after his death, the property will revert to the Mathesons, its\noriginal possessors, who will build a Castle on Druim-a-Dubh, at\nBalmacarra.\u201d The late Mr. Lillingstone was an Englishman. He was truly\ndistinguished for kindness and liberality to his tenants, and he had a\nson and two daughters, although, we are informed, he had been married for\nseventeen years before he had any family. When he came into possession,\nold people thought they discerned the fulfilment of a part of Kenneth\u2019s\nprediction in his person, until it was remarked that he had no family as\nforetold by the Seer. At last, a son and two daughters were successively\nborn to Mr. Lillingstone. After his death, the son sold the whole of\nLochalsh to Alexander Matheson, M.P. for the Counties of Ross and\nCromarty, and, so far, the prediction has been realized. A castle has\nbeen built at Duncraig, a considerable distance from the spot predicted\nby the Seer; but if Kenneth is to be depended upon, a castle will yet be\nbuilt by one of the Mathesons oh Druim-a-Dubh, at Balmacarra. Had this\nprophecy been got up after the event, the reputation of the Seer would\ncertainly not have been staked on the erection of another castle in the\nremote future, when the Mathesons already possess such a magnificent\nmansion at Duncraig.\n\nDuring a recent visit to the Island of Raasay we received a peculiar\nprediction regarding the Macleods from an old man there, over eighty\nyears of age, who remembered seven proprietors of Raasay, and who sorely\nlamented the fulfilment of the prophecy, and the decline of the good\nold stock, entirely in consequence of their own folly and extravagance.\nSince then, we had the prediction repeated by a Kintail man in identical\nterms; and as it is hardly translatable, we shall give it in the original\nvernacular:\u2014\u201cDar a thig Mac-Dhomhnuill Duibh b\u00e0n; MacShimidh ceann-dearg;\nSisealach claon ruadh; Mac-Coinnich mor bodhar; agus Mac-Gille-challum\ncama-chasach, iar-ogha Ian bhig \u00e0 Ruiga, \u2019se sin a Mac-Gille-challum is\nmiosa \u2019thainig na thig; cha bhi mi ann ri linn, \u2019s cha\u2019n fhearr leam\nair a bhith.\u201d (When we shall have a fair-haired Lochiel; a red-haired\nLovat; a squint-eyed, fair-haired Chisholm; a big deaf Mackenzie; and a\nbow-crooked-legged Mac-Gille-challum, who shall be the great-grand-son\nof John Beg, or little John, of Ruiga: that Mac-Gille-challum will be\nthe worst that ever came or ever will come; I shall not be in existence\nin his day, and I have no desire that I should.) Ruiga is the name\nof a place in Skye. When the last Macleod of Raasay was born, an old\nsage in the district called upon his neighbour, and told him, with an\nexpression of great sorrow, that Mac-Gille-challum of Raasay now had an\nheir, and his birth was a certain forerunner of the extinction of his\nhouse. Such an event as the birth of an heir had been hitherto, in this\nas in all other Highland families, universally considered an occasion\nfor great rejoicing among the retainers. The other old man was amazed,\nand asked the sage what he meant by such unusual and disloyal remarks.\n\u201cOh!\u201d answered he, \u201cdo you not know that this is the grand-grandson of\nJohn Beg of Ruiga whom Coinneach Odhar predicted would be the worst of\nhis race.\u201d And so he undoubtedly proved himself to be, for he lost for\never the ancient inheritance of his house, and acted generally in such a\nmanner as to fully justify the Seer\u2019s prediction; and what is still more\nremarkable, the Highland lairds, with the peculiar characteristics and\nmalformations foretold by Kenneth, preceded or were the contemporaries of\nthe last MacGille-challum of Raasay.\n\nHere is a prediction of the downfall of another distinguished Highland\nfamily\u2014Clan Ranald of the Isles. \u201cThe day will come when the old wife\nwith the footless stocking (cailleach nam mogan) will drive the Lady\nof Clan Ranald from Nunton House, in Benbecula.\u201d We are informed that\nthis was fulfilled when the Macdonalds took the farm of Nunton, locally\nknown as \u201cBaile na Caillich\u201d. Old Mrs. Macdonald was in the habit of\nwearing these primitive articles of dress, and was generally known in\nthe district as \u201cCailleach nam Mogan\u201d. Clan Ranald and his lady, like\nmany more of our Highland chiefs, ultimately went to the wall, and the\ndescendants of the \u201cold wife with the footless stocking\u201d occupied,\nand, for anything we know, still occupy the ancient residence of the\nlong-distinguished race of Clan Ranald of the Isles.\n\nIn the beginning of the seventeenth century, and during the Seer\u2019s\nlifetime, there lived in Kintail an old man\u2014Duncan Macrae\u2014who was curious\nto know by what means he should end his days. He applied to a local\nfemale Seer, who informed him that he \u201cwould die by the sword\u201d (le b\u00e0s a\nchlaidheamh). This appeared so improbable in the case of such an old man,\nwho had taken part in so many bloody frays and invariably escaped unhurt,\nthat the matter was referred to the greater authority, Coinneach Odhar.\nHe corroborated the woman, but still the matter was almost universally\ndiscredited in the district, and by none more so than by old Duncan\nhimself. However, years after, conviction was forced upon them; for,\naccording to the \u201cGenealogy of the Macraes,\u201d written by the Rev. John\nMacrae, minister of Dingwall, who died in 1704\u2014\u201cDuncan being an old man\nin the year 1654, when General Monk, afterwards Duke of Albemarle, came\nto Kintail, retired from his house in Glenshiel to the hills, where,\nbeing found by some of the soldiers who had straggled from the body of\nthe army in hopes of plunder, and who, speaking to him roughly, in a\nlanguage he did not understand, he, like Old Orimanus, drew his sword,\n&c., and was immediately killed by them. This was all the blood that\nGeneral Monk or his soldiers, amounting to 1500 men, had drawn, and all\nthe opposition he met with, although the Earl of Middleton and Sir George\nMonro were within a few miles of them, and advertised of their coming,\nSeaforth having been sent by Middleton to the Isle of Skye and parts\nadjoining, to treat with the Macdonalds and the Macleods, &c.\u201d\n\nRegarding the evictions which would take place in the Parish of Petty, he\nsaid, \u201cThe day will come, and it is not far off, when farm-steadings will\nbe so few and far between, that the crow of a cock shall not be heard\nfrom the one steading to the other\u201d. This prediction has certainly been\nfulfilled, for, in the days of the Seer there were no fewer than sixteen\ntenants on the farm of Morayston alone.\n\nOn the south of the bay, at Petty, is an immense stone, of at least\neight tons weight, which formerly marked the boundary between the\nestates of Culloden and Moray. On the 20th of February, 1799, it was\nmysteriously removed from its former position, and carried about 260\nyards into the sea. It is supposed by some that this was brought about\nby an earthquake; others think that the stone was carried off by the\naction of ice, combined with the influence of a tremendous hurricane,\nwhich blew from the shore, during that fearful and stormy night. It was\ncurrently reported, and pretty generally believed at the time, that his\nSatanic Majesty had a finger in this work. Be that as it may, there is\nno doubt whatever that the Brahan Seer predicted \u201cthat the day will come\nwhen the Stone of Petty, large though it is, and high and dry upon the\nland as it appears to people this day, will be suddenly found as far\nadvanced into the sea as it now lies away from it inland, and no one\nwill see it removed, or be able to account for its sudden and marvellous\ntransportation\u201d.\n\nThe Seer was at one time in the Culloden district on some important\nbusiness. While passing over what is now so well known as the Battlefield\nof Culloden, he exclaimed, \u201cOh! Drummossie, thy bleak moor shall, ere\nmany generations have passed away, be stained with the best blood of\nthe Highlands. Glad am I that I will not see that day, for it will be a\nfearful period; heads will be lopped off by the score, and no mercy will\nbe shown or quarter given on either side.\u201d It is perhaps unnecessary to\npoint out how literally this prophecy has been fulfilled on the occasion\nof the last battle fought on British soil. We have received several\nother versions of it from different parts of the country, almost all in\nidentical terms.\n\n\u201cThe time will come when whisky or dram shops will be so plentiful that\none may be met with almost at the head of every plough furrow.\u201d (Thig\nan latha \u2019s am bi tighean-oil cho lionmhor \u2019s nach mor nach fhaicear\ntigh-osda aig ceann gach claise.) \u201cPolicemen will become so numerous in\nevery town that they may be met with at the corner of every street.\u201d\n\u201cTravelling merchants\u201d [pedlars and hawkers] \u201cwill be so plentiful that a\nperson can scarcely walk a mile on the public highway without meeting one\nof them.\u201d\n\nThe following is from \u201cA Summer in Skye,\u201d by the late Alex. Smith, author\nof \u201cA Life Drama\u201d. Describing Dunvegan Castle and its surroundings, he\nsays:\u2014\u201cDun Kenneth\u2019s prophecy has come to pass\u2014\u2018In the days of Norman,\nson of the third Norman, there will be a noise in the doors of the\npeople, and wailing in the house of the widow; and Macleod will not have\nso many gentlemen of his name as will row a five-oared boat round the\nMaidens\u2019. If the last trumpet had been sounded at the end of the French\nwar, no one but a Macleod would have risen out of the churchyard of\nDunvegan. If you want to see a chief (of the Macleods) now-a-days you\nmust go to London for him.\u201d There can be no question as to these having\nbeen fulfilled to the letter.\n\n\u201cThe day will come when a fox will rear a litter of cubs on the\nhearthstone of Castle Downie.\u201d \u201cThe day will come when a fox, white as\nsnow, will be killed on the west coast of Sutherlandshire.\u201d \u201cThe day will\ncome when a wild deer will be caught alive at Chanonry Point, in the\nBlack Isle.\u201d All these things have come to pass.\n\nWith respect to the clearances in Lewis, he said\u2014\u201cMany a long waste\nfeannag (rig, once arable) will yet be seen between Uig of the Mountains\nand Ness of the Plains.\u201d That this prediction has been fulfilled to the\nletter, no one acquainted with the country will deny.\n\nThe following would appear to have been made solely on account of the\nunlikelihood of the occurrence:\u2014\u201cA Lochalsh woman shall weep over the\ngrave of a Frenchman in the burying-place of Lochalsh.\u201d People imagined\nthey could discern in this an allusion to some battle on the West Coast,\nin which French troops would be engaged; but there was an occurrence\nwhich gave it a very different interpretation. A native of Lochalsh\nmarried a French footman, who died, shortly after this event, and was\ninterred in the burying-ground of Lochalsh, thus leaving his widow to\nmourn over his grave. This may appear a commonplace matter enough, but\nit must be remembered that a Frenchman in Lochalsh, and especially a\nFrenchman whom a Highland woman would mourn over, in Coinneach\u2019s day,\nwas a very different phenomenon to what it is in our days of railways,\ntourists, and steamboats.\n\nThe Seer also predicted the formation of a railway through the Muir of\nOrd, handed down in the following stanza:\u2014\n\n    Nuair a bhios da eaglais an Sgire na Toiseachd,\n    A\u2019s lamh da ordaig an I-Stian\u2019,\n    Da dhrochaid aig Sguideal nan geocaire,\n    As fear da imleag an Dunean,\n    Thig Miltearan a Carn a-chlarsair,\n    Air Carbad gun each gun srian,\n    A dh-fhagas am Blar-dubh na fhasach,\n    \u2019Dortadh fuil le iomadh sgian;\n    A\u2019s olaidh am fitheach a thri saitheachd\n    De dh-fhuil nan Gaidheal, bho clach nam Fionn.\n\nHere is a literal translation:\u2014\n\n    When there shall be two churches in the Parish of Ferrintosh,\n    And a hand with two thumbs in \u2018I-Stiana,\u2019\n    Two bridges at \u201cSguideal\u201d (Conon) of the gormandizers,\n    And a man with two navels at Dunean,\n    Soldiers will come from \u201cCarn a Chlarsair\u201d (Tarradale)\n    On a chariot without horse or bridle,\n    Which will leave the \u201cBlar-dubh\u201d (Muir of Ord) a wilderness,\n    Spilling blood with many knives;\n    And the raven shall drink his three fulls\n    Of the blood of the Gael from the Stone of Fionn.\n\nWe already have two churches in the Parish of Ferrintosh, two bridges\nat Conon, and we are told by an eye-witness, that there is actually at\nthis very time a man with two thumbs on each hand in \u201cI-Stiana,\u201d in the\nBlack Isle, and a man in the neighbourhood of Dunean who has two navels.\nThe \u201cchariot without horse or bridle\u201d is undoubtedly the \u201ciron horse\u201d.\nWhat particular event the latter part of the prediction refers to, it is\nimpossible to say; but if we are to have any faith in the Seer, something\nserious is looming not very remotely in the future.\n\nMr. Macintyre supplies the following, which is clearly a fragment of\nthe one above given:\u2014Coinneach Odhar foresaw the formation of a railway\nthrough the Muir of Ord which he said \u201cwould be a sign of calamitous\ntimes\u201d. The prophecy regarding this is handed down to us in the following\nform:\u2014\u201cI would not like to live when a black bridleless horse shall pass\nthrough the Muir of Ord.\u201d \u201cFearchair a Ghunna\u201d (Farquhar of the Gun, an\nidiotic simpleton who lived during the latter part of his extraordinary\nlife on the Muir of Tarradale) seems, in his own quaint way, to have\nentered into the spirit of this prophecy, when he compared the train,\nas it first passed through the district, to the funeral of \u201cOld Nick\u201d.\nTradition gives another version, viz.:\u2014\u201cthat after four successive dry\nsummers, a fiery chariot shall pass through the \u2018Blar Dubh,\u2019\u201d which has\nbeen very literally fulfilled. Coinneach Odhar was not the only person\nthat had a view beforehand of this railway line, for it is commonly\nreported that a man residing in the neighbourhood of Beauly, gifted\nwith second-sight, had a vision of the train, moving along in all its\nheadlong speed, when he was on his way home one dark autumn night,\nseveral years before the question of forming a railway in those parts was\nmooted.\n\nHere are two other Gaelic stanzas having undoubted reference to the\nMackenzies of Rosehaugh:\u2014\n\n    Bheir Tanaistear Chlann Choinnich\n    Rocus _b\u00e0n_ \u00e1s a choille;\n    \u2019S bheir e ceile bho tigh-ciuil\n    Le a mhuinntir \u2019na aghaidh;\n    \u2019S gum bi\u2019 n Tanaistear mor\n    Ann an gniomh \u2019s an ceann-labhairt,\n    \u2019Nuair bhios am Pap\u2019 anns an Roimh\n    Air a thilgeadh dheth chathair,\n\n    Thall fa chomhar Creag-a-Chodh\n    Comhnuichidh taillear caol odhar;\n    \u2019S Seumas gorach mar thighearn,\n    \u2019S Seumas glic mar fhear tomhais\u2014\n    A mharcaicheas gun srian\n    Air loth fhiadhaich a roghainn;\n    Ach cuiridh mor-chuis gun chiall\n    \u2019N aite siol nam fiadh siol nan gobhar;\n    \u2019S tuitidh an t-Eilean-dubh briagha\n    Fuidh riaghladh iasgairean A\u016dch.\n\nLiteral translation:\u2014\n\n    The heir (or chief) of the Mackenzies will take\n    A _white_ rook out of the wood,\n    And will take a wife from a music house (dancing saloon),\n    With his people against him:\n    And the heir will be great\n    In deeds and as an orator,\n    When the Pope in Rome\n    Will be thrown off his throne.\n\n    Over opposite _Creag-a-Chow_\n    Will dwell a diminutive lean tailor,\n    Also Foolish James as the laird,\n    And Wise James as a measurer.\n    Who will ride without a bridle\n    The wild colt of his choice;\n    But foolish pride without sense\n    Will put in the place of the seed of the deer the seed of the goat;\n    And the beautiful Black Isle will fall\n    Under the management of the fishermen of Avoch.\n\nWe have not learnt that any of the Rosehaugh Mackenzies has yet taken a\n_white_ rook from the woods; nor have we heard anything suggested as to\nwhat this part of the prophecy may refer to. We are, however, credibly\ninformed that one of the late Mackenzies of Rosehaugh had taken his wife\nfrom a music saloon in one of our southern cities, and that his people\nwere very much against him for so doing. One of them, Sir George, no\ndoubt was \u201cgreat in deeds and as an orator,\u201d but we fail to discover any\nconnection between the time in which he lived and the time \u201cwhen the\nPope in Rome will be thrown off his throne\u201d. We were unable in the first\nedition to suggest the meaning of the first six lines of the last stanza,\nbut Mr. Maclennan supplies us with the following explanation:\u2014\u201cI have\nbeen hearing these lines discussed since I was a boy, and being a native\nof Rosehaugh, I took a special interest in everything concerning it. The\nfirst two lines I was repeatedly informed, referred to a pious man who\nlived on the estate of Bennetsfield, opposite Craigiehow, when \u2018Seumas\nGorach\u2019 (Foolish James referred to in the third line), was proprietor\nof Rosehaugh. This godly man, who was contemporary with Foolish James,\noften warned him of his end, and predicted his fate if he did not mend\nhis ways; and as he thus _cut_ his bounds for him, he is supposed to\nbe the \u2018diminutive lean tailor\u2019. He is still in life. We all knew\n\u2018Foolish James\u2019. The fourth line refers to James Maclaren, who lived at\nRosehaugh most of the time during which the last two Mackenzies ruled\nover it, and only died two years ago. He was an odd character, but a\nvery straightforward man; often rebuked \u2018Foolish James\u2019 for the reckless\nand fearless manner in which he rode about, and set bounds before the\n\u2018foolish laird,\u2019 which he was not allowed to pass. Maclaren was, on that\naccount, believed to be the \u2018measurer\u2019 referred to by the Seer. The fifth\nand sixth lines are supposed to apply to the wife fancied by Mackenzie\nin a \u2018dancing saloon,\u2019 who was always considered the \u2018wild colt,\u2019 at\nwhose instigation he rode so recklessly and foolishly.\u201d We wish the\nrealizations of our prophet\u2019s predictions in this case were a little less\nfanciful.\n\nThose in the seventh and eighth lines have been most literally fulfilled,\nfor there can be no doubt that \u201cfoolish pride without sense\u201d has brought\nabout what the Seer predicted, and secured, for the present at least,\nthe seed of the goat where the seed of the deer used to rule. The deer,\nand the deer\u2019s horns, as is well known, are the armorial bearings of the\nMackenzies, while the goat is that of the Fletchers, who now rule in\nRosehaugh, on the ruins of its once great and famous \u201cCabair-feidh\u201d.\n\nPart of the beautiful Black Isle has already fallen under the management\nof the son of a fisherman of Avoch; and who knows but other fishermen\nfrom that humble village may yet amass sufficient wealth to buy the\nwhole. The old proprietors, we regret, are rapidly making way with their\n\u201cfoolish pride without sense,\u201d for some one to purchase it.\n\nWe are informed that the present proprietor of Rosehaugh is the son of\nan Avoch fisherman\u2014the son of a Mr. Jack, who followed that honourable\navocation in this humble village for many years; afterwards left the\nplace and went to reside in Elgin, where he commenced business as a small\ngeneral dealer, or \u201chuckster\u201d; that some of the boys\u2014his sons\u2014exhibited\na peculiar smartness while in school; that this was noticed by a\nlady relative of their mother, an aunt, of the name of Fletcher, who\nencouraged and helped on the education of the boys, and who took one or\nmore of them to her own home, and brought them up; afterwards they found\ntheir way south, and ultimately became successful merchants and landed\nproprietors.[1] These are facts of which we were entirely ignorant when\nfirst writing down the stanzas already given. The verses were sent to\nus from various quarters, and they have undoubtedly been floating about\nthe country for generations. So much for the Seer\u2019s prophetic power in\nthis instance. Were we better acquainted with the history of the other\nfamilies referred to in the stanzas, it is probable that more light could\nbe thrown upon what they refer to than we are at present able to do.\n\nWhile we are dealing with the \u201cwonderful\u201d in connection with the House\nof Rosehaugh, it may not be out of place to give a few instances of the\nsomewhat extraordinary experiences of the famous Sir George Mackenzie\nof Rosehaugh already referred to. He was one of the most distinguished\nmembers of the Scottish Bar, was Lord-Advocate for Scotland in the\nreign of Charles the Second, and was, indeed, a contemporary of the\nBrahan Seer. His \u201cInstitutes\u201d are still considered a standing authority\nby the legal profession:\u2014On one occasion, while at Rosehaugh, a poor\nwidow from a neighbouring estate called to consult him regarding her\nbeing repeatedly warned to remove from a small croft which she held\nunder a lease of several years; but as some time had yet to run before\nits expiry, and being threatened with summary ejection from the croft,\nshe went to solicit his advice. Having examined the tenor of the lease,\nSir George informed her that it contained a flaw, which, in case of\nopposition, would render her success exceedingly doubtful; and although\nit was certainly an oppressive act to deprive her of her croft, he\nthought her best plan was to submit. However, seeing the distressed state\nof mind in which the poor woman was on hearing his opinion, he desired\nher to call upon him the following day, when he would consider her case\nmore carefully. His clerk, who always slept in the same room as his\nlordship, was not a little surprised, about midnight, to discover him\nrising from his bed fast asleep, lighting a candle which stood on his\ntable, drawing in his chair, and commencing to write very busily, as if\nhe had been all the time wide awake. The clerk saw how he was employed,\nbut he never spoke a word, and, when he had finished, he saw him place\nwhat he had written in his private desk, locking it, extinguishing\nthe candle, and then retiring to bed as if nothing had happened. Next\nmorning at breakfast, Sir George remarked that he had had a very strange\ndream about the poor widow\u2019s threatened ejectment, which, he could now\nremember, and he had now no doubt of making out a clear case in her\nfavour. His clerk rose from the table, asked for the key of his desk, and\nbrought therefrom several pages of manuscript; and, as he handed them to\nSir George, enquired\u2014\u201cIs that like your dream?\u201d On looking over it for\na few seconds, Sir George said, \u201cDear me, this is singular; this is my\nvery dream!\u201d He was no less surprised when his clerk informed him of the\nmanner in which he had acted; and, sending for the widow, he told her\nwhat steps to adopt to frustrate the efforts of her oppressors. Acting\non the counsel thus given, the poor widow was ultimately successful, and,\nwith her young family, was allowed to remain in possession of her \u201cwee\nbit croftie\u201d without molestation.\n\nSir George principally resided at this time in Edinburgh, and, before\ndinner, invariably walked for half-an-hour. The place he selected for\nthis was Leith Walk, then almost a solitary place. One day, while taking\nhis accustomed exercise, he was met by a venerable-looking, grey-headed\nold gentleman, who accosted him and, without introduction or apology,\nsaid\u2014\u201cThere is a very important case to come off in London fourteen\ndays hence, at which your presence will be required. It is a case of\nheirship to a very extensive estate in the neighbourhood of London, and\na pretended claimant is doing his utmost to disinherit the real heir,\non the ground of his inability to produce proper titles thereto. It is\nnecessary that you be there on the day mentioned; and in one of the\nattics of the mansion-house on the estate there is an old oak chest with\ntwo bottoms; between these you will find the necessary titles, written\non parchment.\u201d Having given this information, the old man disappeared,\nleaving Sir George quite bewildered; but the latter, resuming his walk,\nsoon recovered his previous equanimity, and thought nothing further of\nthe matter.\n\nNext day, while taking his walk in the same place, he was again met by\nthe same old gentleman, who earnestly urged him not to delay another\nday in repairing to London, assuring him that he would be handsomely\nrewarded for his trouble; but to this Sir George paid no particular\nattention. The third day he was again met by the same hoary-headed\nsire, who energetically pleaded with him not to lose a day in setting\nout, otherwise the case would be lost. His singular deportment, and his\nanxiety that Sir George should be present at the discussion of the\ncase, in which he seemed so deeply interested, induced Sir George to\ngive in to his earnest importunities, and accordingly he started next\nmorning on horseback, arriving in London on the day preceding that on\nwhich the case was to come on. In a few hours he was pacing in front of\nthe mansion-house described by the old man at Leith Walk, where he met\ntwo gentlemen engaged in earnest conversation\u2014one of the claimants to\nthe property, and a celebrated London barrister\u2014to whom he immediately\nintroduced himself as the principal law-officer of the crown for\nScotland. The barrister, no doubt supposing that Sir George was coming\nto take the bread out of his mouth, addressed him in a surly manner,\nand spoke disrespectfully of his country; to which the latter replied,\n\u201cthat, lame and ignorant as his learned friend took the Scotch to be,\nyet in law, as well as in other respects, they would effect what would\ndefy him and all his London clique\u201d. This disagreeable dialogue was put\nan end to by the other gentleman\u2014the claimant to the property\u2014taking Sir\nGeorge into the house. After sitting and conversing for some minutes,\nSir George expressed a wish to be shown over the house. The drawing-room\nwas hung all round with magnificent pictures and drawings, which Sir\nGeorge greatly admired; but there was one which particularly attracted\nhis attention; and after examining it very minutely, he, with a surprised\nexpression, inquired of his conductor whose picture it was? and received\nanswer\u2014\u201cIt is my great-great-grandfather\u2019s\u201d. \u201cMy goodness!\u201d exclaimed Sir\nGeorge, \u201cthe very man who spoke to me three times on three successive\ndays in Leith Walk, and at whose urgent request I came here!\u201d Sir George,\nat his own request, was then conducted to the attics, in one of which\nthere was a large mass of old papers, which was turned up and examined\nwithout discovering anything to assist them in prosecuting the claim\nto the heirship of the property. However, as they were about giving up\nthe search, Sir George noticed an old trunk lying in a corner, which,\nhis companion told him, had lain there for many a year as lumber, and\ncontained nothing. The Leith Walk gentleman\u2019s information recurring to\nSir George, he gave the old moth-eaten chest a good hearty kick, such\nas he could wish to have been received by his \u201clearned friend\u201d the\nbarrister, who spoke so disrespectfully of his country. The bottom flew\nout of the trunk, with a quantity of chaff, among which the original\ntitles to the property were discovered. Next morning, Sir George entered\nthe court just as the case was about to be called and addressed the\npretended claimant\u2019s counsel\u2014\u201cWell, sir, what shall I offer you to\nabandon this action?\u201d \u201cNo sum, or any consideration whatever, would\ninduce me to give it up,\u201d answered his learned opponent. \u201cWell, sir,\u201d\nsaid Sir George, at the same time pulling out his snuff-horn and taking\na pinch, \u201cI will not even hazard a pinch on it.\u201d The case was called.\nSir George, in reply to the claimant\u2019s counsel, in an eloquent speech,\naddressed the bench; exposed most effectually the means which had been\nadopted to deprive his client of his birthright; concluded by producing\nthe titles found in the old chest; and the case was at once decided in\nfavour of his client. The decision being announced, Sir George took\nthe young heir\u2019s arm, and, bowing to his learned friend the barrister,\nremarked, \u201cYou see now what a Scotsman has done, and let me tell you\nthat I wish a countryman of mine anything but a London barrister\u201d. Sir\nGeorge immediately returned to Edinburgh, well paid for his trouble; but\nhe never again, in his favourite walk, encountered the old grey-headed\ngentleman.\n\nThe following two stanzas refer to the Mackenzies of Kilcoy and their\nproperty:\u2014\n\n    Nuair a ghlaodhas paisdean tigh Chulchallaidh,\n    \u2018Tha slige ar mortairean dol thairis!\u2019\n    Thig bho Chr\u00f2idh madadh ruadh\n    Bhi\u2019s \u2019measg an t-sluaigh mar mhadadh-alluidh,\n    R\u00e8 da-fhichead bliadhna a\u2019s corr,\n    \u2019S gum bi na ch\u00f2ta iomadh mallachd;\n    \u2019N sin tilgear e gu falamh br\u00f2nach\n    Mar shean sguab air c\u00f9l an doruis;\n    A\u2019s bithidh an tuath mhor mar eunlaith sporsail,\n    \u2019S an tighearnan cho bochd ris na sporais\u2014\n    Tha beannachd \u2019san onair bhoidhich,\n    A\u2019s mallachd an dortadh na fola.\n\n    Nuair bhitheas caisteal ciar Chulchallaidh\n    Na sheasaidh fuar, agus falamh,\n    \u2019S na cathagan \u2019s na rocuis\n    Gu seolta sgiathail thairis,\n    Gabhaidh duine graineal comhnuidh,\n    Ri thaobh, mi-bheusal a\u2019s salach,\n    Nach gleidh guidhe stal-phosaidh,\n    \u2019S nach eisd ri cleireach no caraid,\n    Ach bho Chreag-a-chodh gu Sgire na Toiseachd\n    Gum bi muisean air toir gach caileag\u2014\n    A\u2019s ochan! ochan! s\u2019 ma leon,\n    Sluigidh am balgaire suas moran talamh!\n\nLiterally translated:\u2014\n\n    When the girls of Kilcoy house cry out,\n    \u2018The shell (cup) of our murderers is flowing over.\u2019\n    A fox from Croy will come\n    Who shall be like a wolf among the people\n    During forty years and more,\n    And in his coat shall be many curses;\n    He shall then be thrown empty and sorrowful,\n    Like an old besom behind the door;\n    The large farmers will be like sportful birds,\n    And the lairds as poor as the sparrows\u2014\n    There\u2019s a blessing in handsome honesty\n    And curses in the shedding of blood.\n\n    When the stern Castle of Kilcoy\n    Shall stand cold and empty,\n    And the jackdaws and the rooks\n    Are artfully flying past it,\n    A loathsome man shall then dwell\n    Beside it, indecent and filthy,\n    Who will not keep the vow of the marriage coif,\n    Listen neither to cleric nor friend;\n    But from Creag-a-Chow to Ferrintosh\n    The dirty fellow will be after every girl\u2014\n    Ochan! Ochan!! woe\u2019s me,\n    The cunning dog will swallow up much land.\n\nThe history of the Kilcoy family has been an unfortunate one in late\nyears, and the second and last lines of the first stanza clearly refer\nto a well-known tragic incident in the recent history of this once\nhighly-favoured and popular Highland family.\n\nMr. Maclennan applies them to an earlier event, and says:\u2014\u201cThe second\nand last line of the first stanza refer to the following story\u2014Towards\nthe latter end of the seventeenth century a large number of cattle, in\nthe Black Isle, were attacked with a strange malady, which invariably\nended in madness and in death. The disease was particularly destructive\non the Kilcoy and Redcastle estates, and the proprietors offered a\nlarge sum of money as a reward to any who should find a remedy. An old\nwarlock belonging to the parish agreed to protect the cattle from the\nravages of this unknown disease, for the sum offered, if they provided\nhim with a human sacrifice. To this ghastly proposal the lairds agreed.\nA large barn at Parkton was, from its secluded position, selected as\na suitable place for the horrid crime, where a poor friendless man,\nwho lived at Linwood, close to the site of the present Free Church\nmanse, was requested, under some pretence, to appear on a certain day.\nThe unsuspecting creature obeyed the summons of his superiors; he was\ninstantly bound and disembowelled alive by the horrid wizard, who dried\nthe heart, liver, kidneys, pancreas, and reduced them to powder, of\nwhich he ordered a little to be given to the diseased animals in water.\nBefore the unfortunate victim breathed his last, he ejaculated the\nfollowing imprecation:\u2014\u2018Gum b\u2019 ann nach tig an latha \u2019bhitheas teaghlach\na Chaisteil Ruaidh gun oinseach, na teaghlach Chulchallaidh gun amadan\u2019.\n(Let the day never come when the family of Redcastle shall be without a\nfemale idiot, or the family of Kilcoy without a fool.) It appears, not\nonly that this wild imprecation was to some extent realised, but also\nthat the Brahan Seer, years before, knew and predicted that it would be\nmade, and that its prayer would be ultimately granted.\u201d\n\nWho the \u201cfox from Croy\u201d is, we are at present unable to suggest; but\ntaking the two stanzas as they stand, it would be difficult to describe\nthe position of the family and the state of the castle, with our\npresent knowledge of their history, and in their present position, more\nfaithfully than Coinneach Odhar has done more than two centuries ago.\nWhat a faithful picture of the respective positions of the great farmers\nand the lairds of the present day! And what a contrast between their\nrelative positions now and at the time when the Seer predicted the change!\n\nIn the appendix to the Life of the late Dr. Norman Macleod, by his\nbrother, the Rev. Donald Macleod, D.D., a series of autobiographical\nreminiscences are given, which the famous Rev. Norman, the Doctor\u2019s\nfather, dictated in his old age to one of his daughters. In the summer\nof 1799 he visited Dunvegan Castle, the stronghold of the Macleods, in\nthe Isle of Skye. Those of the prophecies already given in verse are,\nundoubtedly, fragments of the long rhythmical productions of Coinneach\nOdhar Fiosaiche\u2019s prophecies regarding most of our Highland families,\nto which the Rev. Norman refers, and of which the prophecy given in his\nreminiscences is as follows:\u2014\n\n\u201cOne circumstance took place at the Castle (Dunvegan) on this occasion\nwhich I think worth recording, especially as I am the only person now\nliving who can attest the truth of it. There had been a traditionary\nprophecy, couched in Gaelic verse, regarding the family of Macleod, which\non this occasion, received a most extraordinary fulfilment. This prophecy\nI have heard repeated by several persons, and most deeply do I regret\nthat I did not take a copy of it when I could have got it. The worthy Mr.\nCampbell of Knock, in Mull, had a very beautiful version of it, as also\nhad my father, and so, I think, had likewise Dr. Campbell of Killinver.\nSuch prophecies were current regarding almost all old families in the\nHighlands; the Argyll family were of the number; and there is a prophecy\nregarding the Breadalbane family as yet unfulfilled which I hope may\nremain so. The present Marquis of Breadalbane is fully aware of it, as\nare many of the connections of the family. Of the Macleod family, it was\nprophesied at least a hundred years prior to the circumstance which I am\nabout to relate.\n\n\u201cIn the prophecy to which I am about to allude, it was foretold that when\nNorman, the Third Norman (\u2018Tormad nan \u2019tri Tormaid\u2019), the son of the\nhard-boned English lady (\u2018Mac na mnatha caoile cruaidhe Shassunaich\u2019)\nwould perish by an accidental death; that when the \u2018Maidens of Macleod\u2019\n(certain well-known rocks on the coast of Macleod\u2019s country) became the\nproperty of a Campbell; when a fox had young ones in one of the turrets\nof the Castle, and particularly when the Fairy enchanted banner should be\nfor the last time exhibited, then the glory of the Macleod family should\ndepart; a great part of the estate should be sold to others; so that a\nsmall \u2018curragh,\u2019 a boat, would carry all gentlemen of the name of Macleod\nacross Loch Dunvegan; but that in times far distant another John Breac\nshould arise, who should redeem those estates, and raise the power and\nhonours of the house to a higher pitch than ever. Such in general terms\nwas the prophecy. And now as to the curious coincidence of its fulfilment.\n\n\u201cThere was, at that time, at Dunvegan, an English smith, with whom I\nbecame a favourite, and who told me, in solemn secrecy, that the iron\nchest which contained the \u2018fairy flag\u2019 was to be forced open next\nmorning; that he had arranged with Mr. Hector Macdonald Buchanan to be\nthere with his tools for that purpose.\n\n\u201cI was most anxious to be present, and I asked permission to that effect\nof Mr. Buchanan (Macleod\u2019s man of business), who granted me leave on\ncondition that I should not inform anyone of the name of Macleod that\nsuch was intended, and should keep it a profound secret from the chief.\nThis I promised and most faithfully acted on. Next morning we proceeded\nto the chamber in the East Turret, where was the iron chest that\ncontained the famous flag, about which there is an interesting tradition.\n\n\u201cWith great violence the smith tore open the lid of this iron chest; but,\nin doing so, a key was found under part of the covering, which would have\nopened the chest, had it been found in time. There was an inner case, in\nwhich was found the flag, enclosed in a wooden box of strongly-scented\nwood. The flag consisted of a square piece of very rich silk, with\ncrosses wrought with gold thread, and several elf-pots stitched with\ngreat care on different parts of it.\n\n\u201cOn this occasion, the melancholy news of the death of the young and\npromising heir of Macleod reached the Castle. \u2018Norman, the third Norman,\u2019\nwas a lieutenant of H.M.S., the \u2018Queen Charlotte,\u2019 which was blown up at\nsea, and he and the rest perished. At the same time, the rocks called\n\u2018Macleod\u2019s Maidens\u2019 were sold, in the course of that very week, to Angus\nCampbell of Ensay, and they are still in possession of his grandson. A\nfox in possession of a Lieutenant Maclean, residing in the West Turret\nof the Castle, had young ones, which I handled, and thus all that was\nsaid in the prophecy alluded to was so far fulfilled, although I am glad\nthe family of my chief still enjoy their ancestral possessions, and the\nworst part of the prophecy accordingly remains unverified. I merely state\nthe facts of the case as they occurred, without expressing any opinion\nwhatever as to the nature of these traditionary legends with which they\nwere connected.\u201d\n\nThe estates are still, we are glad to say, in possession of the ancient\nfamily of Macleod, and the present chief is rapidly improving the\nprospects of his house. The probabilities are therefore at present\nagainst our prophet. The hold of the Macleods on their estates is getting\nstronger instead of weaker, and the John Breac who is to be the future\ndeliverer has not only not yet appeared, but the undesirable position of\naffairs requiring his services is yet, we hope, in the distant future.\n\nThe Seer predicted that \u201cwhen the big-thumbed Sheriff-Officer and the\nblind [man] of the twenty-four fingers shall be together in Barra,\nMacneil of Barra may be making ready for the flitting\u201d (Nuair a bhitheas\nmaor nan ordagan mora agus dall nan ceithir-meoraibh-fichead comhla\nann am Barraidh, faodaidh MacNeill Bharraidh \u2019bhi deanamh deiseil na\nh-imirich.) This prediction, which was known in Barra for generations,\nhas been most literally fulfilled. On a certain occasion, \u201cthe blind of\nthe twenty-four fingers,\u201d so called from having six fingers on each hand,\nand six toes on each foot, left Benbecula on a tour, to collect alms\nin South Uist. Being successful there, he decided upon visiting Barra\nbefore returning home. Arriving at the Ferry\u2014the isthmus which separates\nSouth Uist from Barra,\u2014he met \u201cMaor nan Ordagan mora,\u201d and they crossed\nthe kyle in the same boat. It was afterwards found that the officer was\nactually on his way to serve a summons of ejectment on the laird of\nBarra; and poor Macneil not only had to make ready for, but had indeed\nto make the flitting. The man who had acted as guide to the blind on\nthe occasion is, we are informed, still living and in excellent health,\nthough considerably over eighty years of age.\n\nThe following is said to have been fulfilled by the conduct of the Duke\nof Cumberland at and after the battle of Culloden. The Seer was, on one\noccasion, passing Millburn, on his way from Inverness to Petty, and\nnoticing the old mill, which was a very primitive building, thatched with\ndivots, he said:\u2014\u201cThe day will come when thy wheel shall be turned for\nthree successive days by water red with human blood; for on the banks\nof thy lade a fierce battle shall be fought, at which much blood shall\nbe spilt\u201d. Some say that this is as yet unfulfilled; and it has been\nsuggested that the battle may yet be fought in connection with the new\nBarracks now building at the Hut of Health.\n\nCoinneach also prophesied remarkable things regarding the Mackenzies of\nFairburn and Fairburn Tower. \u201cThe day will come when the Mackenzies of\nFairburn shall lose their entire possessions, and that branch of the clan\nshall disappear almost to a man from the face of the earth. Their Castle\nshall become uninhabited, desolate, and forsaken, and a cow shall give\nbirth to a calf in the uppermost chamber in Fairburn Tower.\u201d The first\npart of this prophecy has only too literally come to pass; and within\nthe memory of hundreds now living, and who knew Coinneach\u2019s prophecy\nyears before it was fulfilled, the latter part\u2014that referring to the cow\ncalving in the uppermost chamber\u2014has also been undoubtedly realised. We\nare personally acquainted with people whose veracity is beyond question,\nwho knew the prophecy, and who actually took the trouble at the time to\ngo all the way from Inverness to see the cow-mother and her offspring\nin the Tower, before they were taken down. Mr. Maclennan supplies the\nfollowing version:\u2014Coinneach said, addressing a large concourse of\npeople\u2014\u201cStrange as it may appear to all those who may hear me this day,\nyet what I am about to tell you is true and will come to pass at the\nappointed time. The day will come when a cow shall give birth to a calf\nin the uppermost chamber (seomar uachdarach) of Fairburn Castle. The\nchild now unborn will see it.\u201d\n\nWhen the Seer uttered this prediction, the Castle of Fairburn was in the\npossession of, and occupied by, a very rich and powerful chieftain, to\nwhom homage was paid by many of the neighbouring lairds. Its halls rang\nloud with sounds of music and of mirth, and happiness reigned within\nits portals. On its winding stone stairs trod and passed carelessly to\nand fro pages and liveried servants in their wigs and golden trimmings.\nNothing in the world was more unlikely to happen, to all appearance, than\nwhat the Seer predicted, and Coinneach was universally ridiculed for\nhaving given utterance to what was apparently so nonsensical; but this\nabuse and ridicule the Seer bore with the patient self-satisfied air\nof one who was fully convinced of the truth of what he uttered. Years\npassed by, but no sign of the fulfilment of the prophecy. The Seer,\nthe Laird of Fairburn, and the whole of that generation were gathered\nto their fathers, and still no signs of the curious prediction being\nrealised. The Laird of Fairburn\u2019s immediate successors also followed\ntheir predecessors, and the Seer, to all appearance, was fast losing his\nreputation as a prophet. The tower was latterly left uninhabited, and it\nsoon fell into a dilapidated state of repair\u2014its doors decayed and fell\naway from their hinges, one by one, until at last there was no door on\nthe main stair from the floor to the roof. Some years after, and not long\nago, the Fairburn tenant-farmer stored away some straw in the uppermost\nchamber of the tower; in the process, some of the straw dropped, and was\nleft strewn on the staircase. One of his cows on a certain day chanced to\nfind her way to the main door of the tower, and finding it open, began to\npick up the straw scattered along the stair. The animal proceeded thus,\ntill she had actually arrived at the uppermost chamber, whence, being\nheavy in calf, she was unable to descend. She was consequently left in\nthe tower until she gave birth to a fine healthy calf. They were allowed\nto remain there for several days, where many went to see them, after\nwhich the cow and her progeny were brought down; and Coinneach Odhar\u2019s\nprophecy was thus fulfilled to the letter.\n\n\u201cThe day will come when the Lewsmen shall go forth with their hosts\nto battle, but they will be turned back by the jaw-bone of an animal\nsmaller than an ass,\u201d was a prediction accounted ridiculous and quite\nincomprehensible until it was fulfilled in a remarkable but very simple\nmanner. Seaforth and the leading men of the Clan, as is well known,\nwere \u201cout in the \u201915 and \u201919,\u201d and had their estates forfeited; and\nit was only a few years before the \u201945 that their lands were again\nrestored to Seaforth, and to Mackenzie, 11th Baron of Hilton. The Rev.\nColin Mackenzie, a brother of Hilton, minister of Fodderty and Laird of\nGlack, in Aberdeenshire, was the first in the neighborhood of Brahan\nwho received information of Prince Charlie\u2019s landing in 1745. Seaforth\nhad still a warm feeling for the Prince. His reverend friend, though\na thorough Jacobite himself, was an intimate friend of Lord President\nForbes, with whom he kept up a regular correspondence. He decided, no\ndoubt mainly through his influence, to remain neutral himself; and\nfearing that his friend of Brahan might be led to join the Prince, he\ninstantly, on receipt of the news, started for Brahan Castle. Although\nit was very late at night when he received the information, he crossed\nKnockfarrel, entered Seaforth\u2019s bedroom by the window\u2014for he had already\ngone to rest for the night\u2014and without awakening his lady, informed him\nof the landing of Charles. They decided upon getting out of the way,\nand both immediately disappeared. Seaforth was well known to have had\nprevious correspondence with the Prince, and to have sent private orders\nto the Lews to have his men there in readiness; and Fodderty impressed\nupon him the prudence of getting out of sight altogether in the meantime.\nThey started through the mountains in the direction of Poolewe, and some\ntime afterwards, when there together in concealment near the shore, they\nsaw two ships entering the bay, having on board a large number of armed\nmen, whom they at once recognised as Seaforth\u2019s followers from the Lews,\nraised and commanded by Captain Colin Mackenzie, the great-grandfather of\nMajor Thomas Mackenzie of the 78th Highlanders. Lord Seaforth had just\nbeen making a repast of a sheep\u2019s head, when he espied his retainers,\nand approaching the ships with the sheep\u2019s jaw-bone in his hand, he\nwaved it towards them, and ordered them to return to their homes at once,\nwhich command they obeyed by making at once for Stornoway; and thus was\nfulfilled Coinneach Odhar\u2019s apparently ludicrous prediction, that the\nbrave Lewsmen would be turned back from battle with the jaw-bone of an\nanimal smaller than an ass.\n\nMr. Maclennan supplies us also with the following:\u2014\u201cIn the parish of\nAvoch is a well of beautiful clear water, out of which the Brahan Seer,\nupon one occasion, took a refreshing draught. So pleased was he with the\nwater, that he looked at his Blue Stone, and said\u2014\u2018Whoever he be that\ndrinketh of thy water henceforth, if suffering from any disease, shall,\nby placing two pieces of straw or wood on thy surface, ascertain whether\nhe will recover or not. If he is to recover, the straws will whirl\nround in opposite directions; if he is to die soon, they will remain\nstationary.\u2019 The writer (continues Mr. Maclennan) knew people who went\nto the well and made the experiment. He was himself once unwell, and\nsupposed to be at the point of death; he got of the water of the well,\nand he still lives. Whether it did him good or not, it is impossible to\nsay, but this he does know, that the water pleased him uncommonly well.\u201d\n\nWith reference to Lady Hill, in the same parish, the Seer said\u2014\u201cThy name\nhas gone far and wide; but though thy owners were brave on the field of\nbattle, they never decked thy brow. The day will come, however, when a\nwhite collar shall be put upon thee. The child that is unborn shall see\nit, but I shall not.\u201d This prediction has been fulfilled a few years ago,\nby the construction of a fine drive right round the hill.\n\nThe Seer said, speaking of Beauly\u2014\u201cThe day will come, however distant,\nwhen \u2018Cnoc na Rath\u2019 will be in the centre of the village\u201d. It certainly\nwould appear incredible, and even absurd, to suggest such a thing in\nCoinneach\u2019s day, for the \u201cvillage\u201d then stood at a place south of the\npresent railway station, called, in Gaelic, \u201cBealaidh-Achadh,\u201d or the\nBroom field, quite a mile from Cnoc na Rath. The prophecy has to some\nextent been fulfilled, for the last erection at Beauly\u2014the new public\nschool\u2014is within a few yards of the Cnoc; and the increasing enterprise\nof the inhabitants is rapidly aiding, and, indeed, will soon secure, the\nabsolute realisation of the Seer\u2019s prediction. In connection with this\nprophecy we think that we have discovered a Celtic origin for the term\nBeauly. It is generally supposed to have been derived from the French\nword \u201cBeaulieu\u201d. The village being originally at \u201cBealaidh-Achadh,\u201d and\nso called when the present Beauly was nowhere, what can be more natural\nthan the supposition that the inhabitants carried the original name of\ntheir original village along with them, and now present us with the\nGaelic \u201cBealaidh,\u201d anglified into Beauly. This is not such a fine theory\nas the French one, but it is more likely to be the true one, and is more\nsatisfactory to the student of Gaelic topography.\n\nWe have several versions of the prophecy regarding the carrying away\nof the Stone Bridge across the River Ness, which stood near the place\nwhere the present Suspension Bridge stands. Mr. Macintyre supplies\nthe following, and Mr. Maclennan\u2019s version is very much the same:\u2014\u201cHe\nforetold that the Ness bridge would be swept away by a great flood, while\ncrowded with people, and while a man riding a white horse and a woman\n\u2018enciente\u2019 were crossing it. Either the prophet\u2019s second-sight failed him\non the occasion, or tradition has not preserved the correct version of\nthe prediction, for it is well known that no human being was carried away\nby the bridge when it was swept by the extraordinary flood of 1849.\u201d\n\nAs a matter of fact, there was no man riding a white horse on the bridge\nat the time, but a man\u2014Matthew Campbell\u2014and a woman were crossing it,\nthe arches tumbling one by one at their heels as they flew across; but\nmanaged to reach the western shore in safety, just as the last arch was\ncrumbling under their feet. Campbell, who was behind, coming up to the\nwoman, caught her in his arms, and with a desperate bound cleared the\ncrumbling structure.\n\nThe Seer also foretold that before the latter prediction was fulfilled\n\u201cpeople shall pick gooseberries from a bush growing on the stone ledge\nof one of the arches\u201d. There are many now living who remember this\ngooseberry bush, and who have seen it in bloom and blossom, and with\nfruit upon it. It grew on the south side of the bridge, on the third or\nfourth pier, and near the iron grating which supplied a dismal light to\nthe dungeon which in those days was the Inverness prison. Maclean, \u201cA\nNonagenarian,\u201d writing forty years ago, says nothing of the bush, but,\nwhile writing of the predicted fall of the bridge, states, with regard to\nit, that \u201can old tradition or prophecy is, that many lives will be lost\nat its fall, and that this shall take place when there are seven females\non the bridge, in a state poetically described as that \u2018in which ladies\nwish to be who love their lords\u2019.\u201d This was written, as will be seen by\ncomparing dates, several years before the bridge was carried away in\n1849, showing unmistakably that the prophecy was not concocted after the\nevent.\n\n\u201cThe natural arch, or \u2018Clach tholl,\u2019 near Storehead in Assynt, will\nfall with a crash so loud as to cause the laird of Leadmore\u2019s cattle,\ntwenty miles away, to break their tethers.\u201d This was fulfilled in 1841,\nLeadmore\u2019s cattle having one day strayed from home to within a few\nhundred yards of the arch, when it fell with such a crash as to send\nthem home in a frantic fright, tearing everything before them. Hugh\nMiller refers to this prediction, as also to several others, in the work\nalready alluded to\u2014\u201cScenes and Legends of the North of Scotland,\u201d pp.\n161, 162, 163.\n\nAbout sixteen years ago, there lived in the village of \u201cBaile Mhuilinn,\u201d\nin the West of Sutherlandshire, an old woman of about 95 years of age,\nknown as Baraball n\u2019ic Coinnich (Annabella Mackenzie). From her position,\nhistory, and various personal peculiarities, it was universally believed\nin the district that she was no other than the Baraball n\u2019ic Coinnich of\nwhom the Brahan Seer predicted that she would die of the measles. She\nhad, however, arrived at such an advanced age, without any appearance or\nlikelihood of her ever having that disease, that the prophet was rapidly\nlosing credit in the district. About this time the measles had just gone\nthe round of the place, and had made considerable havoc among old and\nyoung; but when the district was, so to speak, convalescent, the measles\npaid Baraball a visit, and actually carried her away, when within a few\nyears of five score, leaving no doubt whatever in the minds of the people\nthat she had died as foretold centuries before by the famous Coinneach\nOdhar.\n\nThe Seer, one day, pointing to the now celebrated Strathpeffer mineral\nwells, said:\u2014\u201cUninviting and disagreeable as it now is, with its thick\ncrusted surface and unpleasant smell, the day will come when it shall be\nunder lock and key, and crowds of pleasure and health seekers shall be\nseen thronging its portals, in their eagerness to get a draught of its\nwaters.\u201d\n\nRegarding the \u201cland-grasping\u201d Urquharts of Cromarty he predicted \u201cthat,\nextensive though their possessions in the Black Isle now are, the day\nwill come\u2014and it is close at hand\u2014when they will not own twenty acres in\nthe district.\u201d This, like many of his other predictions, literally came\nto pass, although nothing could then have been more unlikely; for, at the\ntime, the Urquharts possessed the estates of Kinbeachie, Braelangwell,\nNewhall, and Monteagle, but at this moment their only possession in the\nBlack Isle is a small piece of Braelangwell.\n\nThat \u201cthe day will come when fire and water shall run in streams through\nall the streets and lanes of Inverness,\u201d was a prediction, the fulfilment\nof which was quite incomprehensible, until the introduction of gas and\nwater through pipes into every corner of the town.\n\n\u201cThe day will come when long strings of carriages without horses shall\nrun between Dingwall and Inverness, and more wonderful still, between\nDingwall and the Isle of Skye.\u201d It is hardly necessary to point out that\nthis refers to the railway carriages now running in those districts.\n\nThat \u201ca bald black girl will be born at the back of the Church of\nGairloch\u201d (Beirear nighean mhaol dubh air c\u00f9l Eaglais Ghearrloch),\nhas been fulfilled. During one of the usual large gatherings at the\nSacramental Communion a well-known young woman was taken in labour, and\nbefore she could be removed she gave birth to the \u201cnighean mhaol dubh,\u201d\nwhose descendants are well known and pointed out in the district to this\nday as the fulfilment of Coinneach\u2019s prophecy.\n\nThat \u201ca white cow will give birth to a calf in the garden behind Gairloch\nHouse,\u201d has taken place within the memory of people still living; that,\nin Fowerdale, \u201ca black hornless cow (Bo mhaol dubh) will give birth to\na calf with two heads,\u201d happened within our own recollection. These\npredictions were well known to people before they came to pass.\n\nThe following are evidently fragments regarding the Lovat Estates. He\nsaid:\u2014\n\n    Thig fear tagair bho dheas,\n    Mar eun bho phreas.\n    Fasaidh e mar luibh,\n    \u2019S sgaoilidh e mar shiol,\n    \u2019S cuiridh e teine ri Ardrois.\n\n    (A Claimant will come from the South\n    Like a bird from a bush;\n    He will grow like an herb;\n    He will spread like seed,\n    And set fire to Ardross.)[2]\n\n\u201cMhac Shimidh ball-dubh, a dh\u2019fhagus an oighreachd gun an t-oighre\ndligheach.\u201d (Mac Shimidh (Lovat), the black-spotted, who will leave the\nEstate without the rightful heir.) \u201cAn Sisealach claon ruadh, a dh\u2019fhagus\nan oighreachd gun an t-oighre dligheach.\u201d (Chisholm, the squint-eyed,\nwho will leave the estate without the rightful heir.) \u201cAn tighearna\nst\u00f2rach a dh\u2019fhagus oighreachd Ghearrloch gun an t-oighre dligheach.\u201d\n(The buck-toothed laird who will leave the estate of Gairloch without the\nrightful heir), are also fragments.\n\nWe do not know whether there has been any Lovat or Chisholm with the\npeculiar personal characteristics mentioned by the Seer,[3] and shall\nbe glad to receive information on the point, as well as a fuller and\nmore particular version of the prophecy. We are aware, however, that Sir\nHector Mackenzie of Gairloch was buck-toothed, and that he was always\nknown among his tenants in the west, as \u201cAn tighearna st\u00f2rach\u201d. We heard\nold people maintaining that Coinneach was correct even in this instance,\nand that his prediction has been actually fulfilled; but, at present,\nwe abstain from going into that part of this family history which would\nthrow light on the subject. A gentleman is trying to assert rights to the\nLovat estates at the present moment.\n\nBefore proceeding to give such of the prophecies regarding the family\nof Seaforth as have been so literally fulfilled in the later annals of\nthat once great and powerful house\u2014the history of the family being so\nintimately interwoven with, and being itself really the fulfilment of the\nSeer\u2019s predictions\u2014it may interest the reader to have a cursory glance at\nit from the earliest period in which the family appears in history.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nSKETCH OF THE FAMILY OF SEAFORTH.\n\n\nThe most popularly-received theory regarding the Mackenzies is that they\nare descended from an Irishman of the name of Colinas Fitzgerald, son of\nthe Earl of Kildare or Desmond, who distinguished himself by his bravery\nat the battle of Largs, in 1263. It is said that his courage and valour\nwere so singularly distinguished that King Alexander the Third took him\nunder his special protection, and granted him a charter of the lands of\nKintail, in Wester Ross, bearing date from Kincardine, January the 9th,\n1263.\n\nAccording to the fragmentary \u201cRecord of Icolmkill,\u201d upon which the claim\nof the Irish origin of the clan is founded, a personage, described as\n\u201cPeregrinus et Hibernus nobilis ex familia Geraldinorum\u201d\u2014that is \u201ca\nnoble stranger and Hibernian, of the family of the Geraldines\u201d\u2014being\ndriven from Ireland with a considerable number of his followers was,\nabout 1261, very graciously received by the King, and afterwards remained\nat his court. Having given powerful aid to the Scots at the Battle of\nLargs, two years afterwards he was rewarded by a grant of the lands of\nKintail, which were erected into a free barony by royal charter, dated\nas above mentioned. Mr. Skene, however, says that no such document as\nthis Icolmkill Fragment was ever known to exist, as nobody has ever seen\nit; and as for Alexander\u2019s charter, he declares (Highlanders, vol. ii.,\np. 235) that it \u201cbears the most palpable marks of having been a forgery\nof a later date, and one by no means happy in the execution\u201d. Besides,\nthe words \u201cColino Hiberno\u201d contained in it do not prove this Colin to\nhave been an Irishman, as Hiberni was at that period a common appellation\nfor the Gael of Scotland. Burke, in the \u201cPeerage\u201d has adopted the Irish\norigin of the clan, and the chiefs themselves seem to have adopted this\ntheory, without having made any particular inquiry as to whether it was\nwell founded or not. The Mackenzie chiefs were thus not exempt from\nthe almost universal, but most unpatriotic, fondness exhibited by many\nother Highland chiefs for a foreign origin. In examining the traditions\nof our country, we are forcibly struck with this peculiarity of taste.\nHighlanders despising a Caledonian source trace their ancestors from\nIreland, Norway, Sweden, or Normandy. The progenitors of the Mackenzies\ncan be traced with greater certainty, and with no less claim to\nantiquity, from a native ancestor, Gillean (Cailean) Og, or Colin the\nYounger, a son of Cailean na h\u2019Airde, ancestor of the Earls of Ross; and,\nfrom the MS. of 1450, their Gaelic descent may now be considered beyond\ndispute.[4]\n\nUntil the forfeiture of the Lords of the Isles, the Mackenzies always\nheld their lands from the Earls of Ross, and followed their banner in\nthe field, but after the forfeiture of that great and powerful earldom,\nthe Mackenzies rapidly rose on the ruins of the Macdonalds to the great\npower, extent of territorial possession, and almost regal magnificence\nfor which they were afterwards distinguished among the other great\nclans of the north. They, in the reign of James the First, acquired a\nvery powerful influence in the Highlands, and became independent of any\nsuperior but the Crown. Mackenzie and his followers were, in fact, about\nthe most potent chief and clan in the whole Highlands.\n\nKenneth, son of Angus, is supposed to have commenced his rule in Kintail\nabout 1278, and was succeeded by his son, John, in 1304, who was in his\nturn succeeded by his son, Kenneth. John, Kenneth\u2019s son, was called Iain\nMacChoinnich, John MacKenneth, or John son of Kenneth, hence the family\nname Mackenny or Mackenzie. The name Kenneth in course of time became\nsoftened down to Kenny or Kenzie. It is well known that, not so very long\nago, _z_ in this and all other names continued to be of the same value as\nthe letter _y_, just as we still find it in Menzies, MacFadzean, and many\nothers. There seems to be no doubt whatever that this is the real origin\nof the Mackenzies, and of their name.\n\nMurchadh, or Murdo, son of Kenneth, it is said, received a charter of the\nlands of Kintail from David II.\n\nIn 1463, Alexander Mackenzie of Kintail obtained the lands of\nStrathgarve, and other possessions, from John, Earl of Ross. They\nafterwards strenuously and successfully opposed every attempt made by\nthe Macdonalds to obtain possession of the forfeited earldom. Alexander\nwas succeeded by his son, Kenneth, who married Lady Margaret Macdonald,\ndaughter of the forfeited Earl John, Lord of the Isles; but through\nsome cause,[5] Mackenzie divorced the lady, and sent her home in a most\nignominious and degrading manner. She had only one eye, and Kintail sent\nher home riding a one-eyed steed, accompanied by a one-eyed servant,\nfollowed by a one-eyed dog. All these circumstances exasperated the\nlady\u2019s family to such an extent as to make them ever after the mortal and\nsworn enemies of the Mackenzies.\n\nKenneth Og, his son by the divorced wife, became chief in 1493. Two\nyears afterwards, he and Farquhar Mackintosh were imprisoned by James\nV. in Edinburgh Castle. In 1497, however, they both made their escape,\nbut were, on their way to the Highlands, seized, in a most treacherous\nmanner, at Torwood, by the laird of Buchanan. Kenneth Og made a stout\nresistance, but he was ultimately slain, and Buchanan sent his head as a\npresent to the King.\n\nLeaving no issue, Kenneth was succeeded by his brother John, whose\nmother, Agnes Fraser, his father\u2019s second wife, was a daughter of Lovat.\nHe had several other sons, from whom have sprung other branches of the\nMackenzies. As John was very young, his uncle, Hector Roy (Eachainn\nRuadh) Mackenzie, progenitor of the house of Gairloch, assumed command\nof the clan and the guardianship of the young chief. Gregory informs\nus, that \u201cunder his rule the Clan Kenzie became involved in feuds with\nthe Munroes and other clans; and Hector Roy himself became obnoxious\nto the Government as a disturber of the public peace. His intentions\ntowards the young chief of Kintail were considered very dubious, and the\napprehensions of the latter and his friends having been roused, Hector\nwas compelled by law to yield up the estate and the command of the tribe\nto the proper heir.\u201d[6] John, the lawful heir, on obtaining possession,\nat the call of James IV., marched at the head of his clan to the\nfatal field of Flodden, where he was made prisoner by the English, but\nafterwards escaped.\n\nOn King James the Fifth\u2019s expedition to the Western Isles in 1540, John\njoined him at Kintail, and accompanied him throughout his whole journey.\nHe fought with his clan at the battle of Pinkie in 1547, and died in\n1561, when he was succeeded by his son, Kenneth, who had two sons by a\ndaughter of the Earl of Athole\u2014Colin and Roderick\u2014the latter becoming\nancestor of the Mackenzies of Redcastle, Kincraig, Rosend, and several\nother branches. This Colin, who was the eleventh chief, fought for Queen\nMary at the battle of Langside. He was twice married. By his first wife,\nBarbara Grant of Grant\u2014whose elopement with him will be found described\nin a poem in the _Highland Ceilidh_, Vol. I., pp. 215-220, of the _Celtic\nMagazine_\u2014he had four sons and three daughters, namely\u2014Kenneth, who\nbecame his successor; Sir Roderick Mackenzie of Tarbat, ancestor of the\nEarls of Cromartie; Colin, ancestor of the Mackenzies of Kennock and\nPitlundie; and Alexander, ancestor of the Mackenzies of Kilcoy, and other\nfamilies of the name. By Mary, eldest daughter of Roderick Mackenzie of\nDavochmaluag, he had a natural son, Alexander, from whom descended the\nMackenzies of Applecross, Coul, Delvin, Assynt, and others of note in\nhistory.\n\nKenneth, the eldest son, soon after succeeding his father, was engaged\nin supporting Torquil Macleod of Lewis, surnamed the \u201cConanach,\u201d the\ndisinherited son of the Macleod of Lewis, and who was closely related\nto himself. Torquil conveyed the barony of Lewis to the Chief of the\nMackenzies by formal deed, the latter causing the usurper to the\nestate, and his followers, to be beheaded in 1597. He afterwards, in\nthe following year, joined Macleod of Harris and Macdonald of Sleat, in\nopposing James the Sixth\u2019s project for the colonisation of the Lewis by\nthe well-known adventurers from the \u201cKingdom of Fife\u201d.\n\nIn 1602, the old and long-standing feud between the Mackenzies and the\nMacdonalds of Glengarry, concerning their lands in Wester Ross, was\nrenewed with infuriated violence. Ultimately, after great bloodshed\nand carnage on both sides, an arrangement was arrived at by which\nGlengarry renounced for ever, in favour of Mackenzie, the Castle of\nStrome and all his lands in Lochalsh, Lochcarron, and other places in\nthe vicinity, so long the bone of contention between these powerful\nand ferocious chieftains. In 1607, a Crown charter for these lands was\ngranted to Kenneth, thus materially adding to his previous possessions,\npower, and influence. \u201cAll the Highlands and Isles, from Ardnamurchan\nto Strathnaver, were either the Mackenzies\u2019 property or under their\nvassalage, some few excepted,\u201d and all around them were bound to them \u201cby\nvery strict bonds of friendship\u201d. In this same year Kenneth received,\nthrough some influence at Court, a gift, under the Great Seal, of the\nIsland of Lewis, in virtue of, and thus confirming, the resignation of\nthis valuable and extensive property previously made in his favour by\nTorquil Macleod. A complaint was, however, made to his Majesty by those\nof the colonists who survived, and Mackenzie was again forced to resign\nit. By patent, dated the 19th of November, 1609, he was created a peer\nof the realm, as Lord Mackenzie of Kintail. Soon after, the colonists\ngave up all hopes of being able to colonize the Lewis, and the remaining\nadventurers\u2014Sir George Hay and Sir James Spens\u2014were easily prevailed upon\nto sell their rights to Lord Mackenzie, who at the same time succeeded\nin securing a grant from the king of that part of the island forfeited\nby Lord Balmerino, another of the adventurers. He (Lord Mackenzie) now\nsecured a commission of fire and sword against the islanders, soon\narrived with a strong force, and speedily reduced them to obedience,\nwith the exception of Neil Macleod and a few of his followers. The\nstruggle between these two continued for a time, but ultimately Mackenzie\nmanaged to obtain possession of the whole island, and it remained in the\npossession of the family until it was sold by the \u201cLast of the Seaforths\u201d.\n\nThis, the first, Lord Mackenzie of Kintail died in 1611. One of his sons,\nSimon Mackenzie of Lochslin, by his second wife, Isabella, daughter\nof Sir Alexander Ogilvie of Powrie, was the father of the celebrated\nSir George Mackenzie, already referred to. His eldest son, Colin, who\nsucceeded him as second Lord Mackenzie of Kintail, was created first\nEarl of Seaforth, by patent dated the 3rd December, 1623, to himself and\nhis heirs male. Kenneth, Colin\u2019s grandson, and third Earl of Seaforth,\ndistinguished himself by his loyalty to Charles the Second during the\nCommonwealth. He supported the cause of the Royalists so long as there\nwas an opportunity of fighting for it in the field, and when forced\nto submit to the ruling powers, he was committed to prison, where,\nwith much firmness of mind and nobility of soul, he endured a tedious\ncaptivity during many years, until he was ultimately released, after\nthe Restoration, by authority of the king. He married a lady descended\nfrom a branch of his own family, Isabella Mackenzie, daughter of Sir\nJohn Mackenzie of Tarbat, and sister of the first Earl of Cromartie. To\nher cruel and violent conduct may undoubtedly be traced the remarkable\ndoom which awaited the family of Seaforth, which was predicted in such\nan extraordinary manner by Coinneach Odhar, fulfilled in its minutest\ndetails, and which we are, in the following pages, to place before the\nreader.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nSEAFORTH\u2019S DREAM.\n\n\nBefore proceeding to relate the Seer\u2019s remarkable prediction, and the\nextraordinary minuteness with which it has been fulfilled, we shall give\nthe particulars of a curious dream by Lord Seaforth, which was a peculiar\nforecast of the loss of his faculties of speech and hearing during the\nlatter part of his eventful life. It has been supplied by a member of the\nfamily,[7] who shows an unmistakable interest in everything calculated to\nthrow light on the \u201cprophecies,\u201d and who evidently believes them not to\nbe merely an old wife\u2019s tale. We give it _verbatim et literatim_:\u2014\u201cThe\nlast Lord Seaforth was born in full possession of all his faculties. When\nabout twelve years of age scarlet fever broke out in the school at which\nhe was boarding. All the boys who were able to be sent away were returned\nto their homes at once, and some fifteen or twenty boys who had taken\nthe infection were moved into a large room, and there treated. After a\nweek had passed, some boys naturally became worse than others, and some\nof them were in great danger. One evening, before dark, the attendant\nnurse, having left the dormitory, for a few minutes, was alarmed by a\ncry. She instantly returned, and found Lord Seaforth in a state of\ngreat excitement. After he became calmer, he told the nurse that he had\nseen, soon after she had left the room, the door opposite to his bed\nsilently open, and a hideous old woman came in. She had a wallet full of\nsomething hanging from her neck in front of her. She paused on entering,\nthen turned to the bed close to the door, and stared steadily at one of\nthe boys lying in it. She then passed to the foot of the next boy\u2019s bed,\nand, after a moment, stealthily moved up to the head, and taking from her\nwallet a mallet and peg, drove the peg into his forehead. Young Seaforth\nsaid he heard the crash of the bones, though the boy never stirred.\nShe then proceeded round the room, looking at some boys longer than at\nothers. When she came to him, his suspense was awful. He felt he could\nnot resist or even cry out, and he never could forget, in years after,\nthat moment\u2019s agony, when he saw her hand reaching down for a nail,\nand feeling his ears. At last, after a look, she slunk off, and slowly\ncompleting the circuit of the room, disappeared noiselessly through the\nsame door by which she had entered. Then he felt the spell seemed to be\ntaken off, and uttered the cry which had alarmed the nurse. The latter\nlaughed at the lad\u2019s story, and told him to go to sleep. When the doctor\ncame, an hour later, to make his rounds, he observed that the boy was\nfeverish and excited, and asked the nurse afterwards if she knew the\ncause, whereupon she reported what had occurred. The doctor, struck with\nthe story, returned to the boy\u2019s bedside and made him repeat his dream.\nHe took it down in writing at the moment. The following day nothing\neventful happened, but, in course of time, some got worse, a few indeed\ndied, others suffered but slightly, while some, though they recovered,\nbore some evil trace and consequence of the fever for the rest of their\nlives. The doctor, to his horror, found that those whom Lord Seaforth\nhad described as having a peg driven into their foreheads, were those\nwho died from the fever; those whom the old hag passed by recovered, and\nwere none the worse; whereas those she appeared to look at intently, or\nhandled, all suffered afterwards. Lord Seaforth left his bed of sickness\nalmost stone deaf; and, in later years, grieving over the loss of his\nfour sons, absolutely and entirely ceased to speak.\u201d\n\nWe shall now relate the circumstances connected with the prophecy, and\ncontinue an account of the Seaforths\u2019 connection with it to the end of\nthe chapter.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nSEAFORTH\u2019S DOOM.\n\n\nKenneth, the third Earl, had occasion to visit Paris on some business\nafter the Restoration of King Charles the Second, and after having\nsecured his liberty. He left the Countess at Brahan Castle, unattended\nby her lord, and, as she thought, forgotten, while he was enjoying the\ndissipations and amusements of the French capital, which seemed to have\nmany attractions for him, for he prolonged his stay far beyond his\noriginal intention. Lady Seaforth had become very uneasy concerning\nhis prolonged absence, more especially as she received no letters from\nhim for several months. Her anxiety became too strong for her power of\nendurance, and led her to have recourse to the services of the local\nprophet. She accordingly sent messages to Strathpeffer, summoning\nCoinneach to her presence, to obtain from him, if possible, some tidings\nof her absent lord. Coinneach, as we have seen, was already celebrated,\nfar and wide, throughout the whole Highlands, for his great powers of\ndivination, and his relations with the invisible world.\n\nObeying the orders of Lady Seaforth, Kenneth arrived at the Castle,\nand presented himself to the Countess, who required him to give her\ninformation concerning her absent lord. Coinneach asked where Seaforth\nwas supposed to be, and said, that he thought he would be able to find\nhim if he was still alive. He applied the divination stone to his eye,\nand laughed loudly, saying to the Countess, \u201cFear not for your lord, he\nis safe and sound, well and hearty, merry and happy\u201d. Being now satisfied\nthat her husband\u2019s life was safe, she wished Kenneth to describe\nhis appearance; to tell her where he was now engaged, and all his\nsurroundings. \u201cBe satisfied,\u201d he said, \u201cask no questions, let it suffice\nyou to know that your lord is well and merry.\u201d \u201cBut,\u201d demanded the\nlady, \u201cwhere is he? with whom is he? and is he making any preparations\nfor coming home?\u201d \u201cYour lord,\u201d replied the seer, \u201cis in a magnificent\nroom, in very fine company, and far too agreeably employed at present to\nthink of leaving Paris.\u201d The Countess, finding that her lord was well\nand happy, began to fret that she had no share in his happiness and\namusements, and to feel even the pangs of jealousy and wounded pride.\nShe thought there was something in the seer\u2019s looks and expression which\nseemed to justify such feelings. He spoke sneeringly and maliciously\nof her husband\u2019s occupations, as much as to say, that he could tell a\ndisagreeable tale if he would. The lady tried entreaties, bribes, and\nthreats to induce Coinneach to give a true account of her husband, as\nhe had seen him, to tell who was with him, and all about him. Kenneth\npulled himself together, and proceeded to say\u2014\u201cAs you will know that\nwhich will make you unhappy, I must tell you the truth. My lord seems to\nhave little thought of you, or of his children, or of his Highland home.\nI saw him in a gay-gilded room, grandly decked out in velvets, with silks\nand cloth of gold, and on his knees before a fair lady, his arm round\nher waist, and her hand pressed to his lips.\u201d At this unexpected and\npainful disclosure, the rage of the lady knew no bounds. It was natural\nand well merited, but its object was a mistake. All the anger which ought\nto have been directed against her husband, and which should have been\nconcentrated in her breast, to be poured out upon him after his return,\nwas spent upon poor Coinneach Odhar. She felt the more keenly, that the\ndisclosures of her husband\u2019s infidelity had not been made to herself in\nprivate, but in the presence of the principal retainers of her house,\nso that the Earl\u2019s moral character was blasted, and her own charms\nslighted, before the whole clan; and her husband\u2019s desertion of her for a\nFrench lady was certain to become the public scandal of all the North of\nScotland. She formed a sudden resolution with equal presence of mind and\ncruelty. She determined to discredit the revelations of the seer, and to\ndenounce him as a vile slanderer of her husband\u2019s character. She trusted\nthat the signal vengeance she was about to inflict upon him as a liar and\ndefamer would impress the minds, not only of her own clan, but of all the\ninhabitants of the counties of Ross and Inverness, with a sense of her\nthorough disbelief in the scandalous story, to which she nevertheless\nsecretly attached full credit. Turning to the seer, she said, \u201cYou have\nspoken evil of dignities, you have vilified the mighty of the land; you\nhave defamed a mighty chief in the midst of his vassals, you have abused\nmy hospitality and outraged my feelings, you have sullied the good name\nof my lord in the halls of his ancestors, and you shall suffer the most\nsignal vengeance I can inflict\u2014you shall suffer the death\u201d.\n\nCoinneach was filled with astonishment and dismay at this fatal result of\nhis art. He had expected far other rewards from his art of divination.\nHowever, he could not at first believe the rage of the Countess to be\nserious; at all events, he expected that it would soon evaporate, and\nthat, in the course of a few hours, he would be allowed to depart in\npeace. He even so far understood her feelings that he thought she was\nmaking a parade of anger in order to discredit the report of her lord\u2019s\nshame before the clan; and he expected that when this object was served,\nhe might at length be dismissed without personal injury. But the decision\nof the Countess was no less violently conceived than it was promptly\nexecuted. The doom of Coinneach was sealed. No time was to be allowed for\nremorseless compunction. No preparation was permitted to the wretched\nman. No opportunity was given for intercession in his favour. The\nmiserable seer was led out for immediate execution.\n\nSuch a stretch of feudal oppression, at a time so little remote as\nthe reign of Charles II., may appear strange. A castle may be pointed\nout, however, viz., Menzies Castle, much less remote from the seat of\nauthority, and the Courts of Law, than Brahan, where, half a century\nlater, an odious vassal was starved to death by order of the wife of the\nchief, the sister of the great and patriotic Duke of Argyll!\n\nWhen Coinneach found that no mercy was to be expected either from the\nvindictive lady or her subservient vassals, he resigned himself to his\nfate. He drew forth his white stone, so long the instrument of his\nsupernatural intelligence, and once more applying it to his eye, said\u2014\u201cI\nsee into the far future, and I read the doom of the race of my oppressor.\nThe long-descended line of Seaforth will, ere many generations have\npassed, end in extinction and in sorrow. I see a chief, the last of his\nhouse, both deaf and dumb. He will be the father of four fair sons,\nall of whom he will follow to the tomb. He will live careworn and die\nmourning, knowing that the honours of his line are to be extinguished\nfor ever, and that no future chief of the Mackenzies shall bear rule at\nBrahan or in Kintail. After lamenting over the last and most promising of\nhis sons, he himself shall sink into the grave, and the remnant of his\npossessions shall be inherited by a white-coifed (or white-hooded) lassie\nfrom the East, and she is to kill her sister. And as a sign by which it\nmay be known that these things are coming to pass, there shall be four\ngreat lairds in the days of the last deaf and dumb Seaforth\u2014Gairloch,\nChisholm, Grant, and Raasay\u2014of whom one shall be buck-toothed, another\nhare-lipped, another half-witted, and the fourth a stammerer. Chiefs\ndistinguished by these personal marks shall be the allies and neighbours\nof the last Seaforth; and when he looks around him and sees them, he may\nknow that his sons are doomed to death, that his broad lands shall pass\naway to the stranger, and that his race shall come to an end.\u201d\n\nWhen the seer had ended this prediction, he threw his white stone into\na small loch, and declared that whoever should find that stone would be\nsimilarly gifted. Then submitting to his fate, he was at once executed,\nand this wild and fearful doom ended his strange and uncanny life.\n\nSir Bernard Burke, to whose \u201cVicissitudes of Families\u201d we are mainly\nindebted for this part of the Prophecies, says:\u2014With regard to the four\nHighland lairds, who were to be buck-toothed, hare-lipped, half-witted,\nand a stammerer\u2014Mackenzie, Baronet of Gairloch; Chisholm of Chisholm;\nGrant, Baronet of Grant; and Macleod of Raasay\u2014I am uncertain which\nwas which. Suffice it to say, that the four lairds were marked by the\nabove-mentioned distinguishing personal peculiarities, and all four were\nthe contemporaries of the last of the Seaforths.\n\nWe believe Sir Hector Mackenzie of Gairloch was the buck-toothed laird\n(an Tighearna St\u00f2rach); the Chisholm, the hare-lipped; Grant, the\nhalf-witted; and Raasay, the stammerer, all of whom were contemporaries\nof the last Lord Seaforth.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE SEER\u2019S DEATH\n\n\nMr. Macintyre supplies the following account of the Seaforth prophecy and\nthe Seer\u2019s death, as related at this day, in the Black Isle:\u2014\n\nCoinneach\u2019s supernatural power was at length the cause which led to his\nuntimely and cruel death. At a time when there was a convivial gathering\nin Brahan Castle, a large concourse of local aristocratic guests was\npresent. As the youthful portion were amusing themselves in the beautiful\ngrounds or park surrounding the castle, and displaying their noble\nforms and features as they thought to full advantage, a party remarked\nin Coinneach Odhar\u2019s hearing, that such a gathering of gentlemen\u2019s\nchildren could rarely be seen. The seer answered with a sneer, \u201cthat\nhe saw more in the company of the children of footmen and grooms than\nof the children of gentlemen,\u201d (Is mo th\u2019ann do chlann ghillean-buird\nagus do chlann ghillean-stabuil na th\u2019ann do chlann dhaoin\u2019 uaisle), a\nremark which soon came to the ears of Lady Seaforth and the other ladies\npresent, who were so much offended and provoked at this base insinuation\nas to the paternity of the Brahan guests, that they determined at once\nto have condign punishment on the once respected seer. He was forthwith\nordered to be seized; and, after eluding the search of his infuriated\npursuers for some time, was at last apprehended. Seeing he had no way\nof escape, he once more applied the magic stone to his eye, and uttered\nthe well-known prophetic curse [already given] against the Brahan family,\nand then threw the stone into a cow\u2019s footmark, which was full of water,\ndeclaring that a child would be born with two navels, or as some say,\nwith four thumbs and six toes, who would in course of time discover it\ninside a pike, and who then would be gifted with Coinneach\u2019s prophetic\npower. As it was the purpose of his pursuers to obtain possession of this\nwonderful stone, as well as of the prophet\u2019s person, search was eagerly\nmade for it in the muddy waters in the footprint, when, lo! it was found\nthat more water was copiously oozing from the boggy ground around, and\nrapidly forming a considerable lake, that effectually concealed the\nmuch-coveted stone. The waters steadily increased, and the result, as the\nstory goes, was the formation of Loch Ussie (Oozie). The poor prophet\nwas then taken to Chanonry Point, where the stern arm of ecclesiastical\nauthority, with unrelenting severity, burnt him to death in a tar-barrel\nfor witchcraft.\n\nIt is currently reported that a person answering to the foregoing\ndescription was actually born in the neighbourhood of Conon, near Loch\nUssie, and is still living. Of this I have been credibly informed by a\nperson who saw him several times at the Muir of Ord markets.\n\nWe see from the public prints, our correspondent humorously continues,\nthat the Magistrates and Police Commissioners of Dingwall contemplate\nto bring a supply of water for \u201cBaile-\u2019Chail\u201d from Loch Ussie. Might\nwe humbly suggest with such a view in prospect, as some comfort to the\nburdened ratepayers, that there may be, to say the least, a probability\nin the course of such an undertaking of recovering the mystic stone,\nso long compelled to hide its prophetic light in the depths of Loch\nUssie, and so present the world with the novel sight of having not only\nan individual gifted with second-sight, but also a Corporation; and,\nfurther, what would be a greater terror to evil-doers, a magistracy\ncapable, in the widest sense of the word, of discerning between right and\nwrong, good and evil, and thus compelling the lieges in the surrounding\ntowns and villages to exclaim involuntarily\u2014_O si sic omnes!_ They might\ngo the length even of lending it out, and giving you the use of it\noccasionally in Inverness.\n\nWhen Coinneach Odhar was being led to the stake, fast bound with cords,\nLady Seaforth exultingly declared that, having had so much unhallowed\nintercourse with the unseen world, he would never go to Heaven. But the\nseer, looking round upon her with an eye from which his impending fate\nhad not banished the ray of a joyful hope of rest in a future state,\ngravely answered\u2014\u201c_I_ will go to Heaven, but _you_ never shall; and this\nwill be a sign whereby you can determine whether my condition after\ndeath is one of everlasting happiness or of eternal misery; a raven\nand a dove, swiftly flying in opposite directions will meet, and for a\nsecond hover over my ashes, on which they will instantly alight. If the\nraven be foremost, you have spoken truly; but if the dove, then my hope\nis well-founded.\u201d And, accordingly, tradition relates, that after the\ncruel sentence of his hard-hearted enemies had been executed upon the\nBrahan Seer, and his ashes lay scattered among the smouldering embers\nof the fagot, his last prophecy was most literally fulfilled; for those\nmessengers, emblematically denoting\u2014the one sorrow, the other joy\u2014came\nspeeding to the fatal spot, when the dove, with characteristic flight,\nclosely followed by the raven, darted downwards and was first to alight\non the dust of the departed Coinneach Odhar; thus completely disproving\nthe positive and uncharitable assertion of the proud and vindictive Lady\nof Brahan, to the wonder and consternation of all the beholders.\n\nMr. Maclennan describes the cause of Coinneach\u2019s doom in almost identical\nterms; the only difference being, that while the former has the young\nladies amusing themselves on the green outside, the latter describes them\nhaving a grand dance in the great hall of the Castle. The following is\nhis account of the prophet\u2019s end:\u2014\n\nIn terms of her expressed resolution, Lady Seaforth, some days after\nthis magnificent entertainment, caused the seer to be seized, bound hand\nand foot, and carried forthwith to the Ness of Chanonry, where, despite\nhis pitiful looks and lamentable cries, he was inhumanly thrown, head\nforemost, into a barrel of burning tar, the inside of which was thickly\nstudded with sharp and long spikes driven in from the outside. On the\nvery day upon which Coinneach was sent away from the castle to meet his\ncruel fate, Lord Seaforth arrived, and was immediately informed of his\nLady\u2019s resolution, and that Coinneach was already well on his way to\nthe Chanonry, where he was to be burned that very day, under clerical\nsupervision and approval. My lord, knowing well the vindictive and\ncruel nature of his Countess, believed the story to be only too true.\nHe waited neither for food nor refreshment; called neither for groom\nnor for servant, but hastened immediately to the stable, saddled his\nfavourite steed with his own hands, for lairds were not so proud in those\ndays, and set off at full speed, hoping to reach Chanonry Point before\nthe diabolical intention of her ladyship and her religious (!) advisers\nshould be carried into effect. Never before nor since did Seaforth ride\nso furiously as he did on that day. He was soon at Fortrose, when he\nobserved a dense smoke rising higher and higher from the promontory\nbelow. He felt his whole frame giving way, and a cold sweat came over\nhis body, for he felt that the foul deed was, or was about to be,\nperpetrated. He pulled himself together, however, and with fresh energy\nand redoubled vigour, spurred his steed, which had already been driven\nalmost beyond its powers of endurance, to reach the fatal spot to save\nthe seer\u2019s life. Within a few paces of where the smoke was rising the\npoor brute could endure the strain no longer; it fell down under him and\ndied on the spot. Still determined, if possible, to arrive in time, he\nrushed forward on foot, crying out at the height of his voice to those\ncongregated at the spot, to save their victim. It was, however, too late,\nfor whether Seaforth\u2019s cries were heard or not, the victim of his lady\u2019s\nrage and vindictive nature had been thrown into the burning barrel a few\nmoments before his intended deliverer had reached the fatal spot.\n\nThe time when this happened is not so very remote as to lead us to\nsuppose that tradition could so grossly blunder as to record such a\nhorrible and barbarous murder by a lady so widely and well-known as Lady\nSeaforth was, had it not taken place.\n\nIt is too much to suppose that if the seer had been allowed to die\na peaceful and natural death, that such a story as this would have\never originated, be carried down and believed in from generation to\ngeneration, and be so well authenticated in many quarters as it now is.\nIt may be stated that a large stone slab, now covered under the sand,\nlies a few yards east from the road leading from Fortrose to Fort-George\nFerry, and about 250 yards north-west from the lighthouse, which is\nstill pointed out as marking the spot where this inhuman tragedy was\nconsummated, under the eyes and with the full approval of the highest\ndignitaries of the Church.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE FULFILMENT OF THE SEAFORTH PROPHECY.\n\n\nHaving thus disposed of the seer himself, we next proceed to give in\ndetail the fulfilment of the prophecies regarding the family of his cruel\nmurderer. And we regret to say that the family of Seaforth will, in this\nconnection, fall to be disposed of finally and for ever, and in the\nmanner which Coinneach had unquestionably predicted. As already remarked,\nin due time the Earl returned to his home, after the fascinations of\nParis had paled, and when he felt disposed to exchange frivolous or\nvicious enjoyment abroad for the exercise of despotic authority in the\nsociety of a jealous Countess at home. He was gathered to his fathers\nin 1678, and was succeeded by his eldest son, the fourth Earl. It is\nnot our purpose to relate here the vicissitudes of the family which are\nunconnected with the curse of Coinneach Odhar, further than by giving\na brief outline, though they are sufficiently remarkable to supply a\nstrange chapter of domestic history.\n\nThe fourth Earl married a daughter of the illustrious family of Herbert,\nMarquis of Powis, and he himself was created a Marquis by the abdicated\nKing of St. Germains, while his wife\u2019s brother was created a Duke. His\nson, the fifth Earl, having engaged in the rebellion of 1715, forfeited\nhis estate and titles to the Crown; but in 1726 his lands were restored\nto him, and he, and his son after him, lived in wealth and honour as\ngreat Highland chiefs. The latter, who was by courtesy styled Lord\nFortrose, represented his native county of Ross in several Parliaments\nabout the middle of last century. In 1766, the honours of the peerage\nwere restored to his son, who was created Viscount Fortrose, and in 1771,\nEarl of Seaforth; but those titles, which were Irish, did not last long,\nand became extinct at his death, in 1781. None of these vicissitudes were\nforetold in the seer\u2019s prophecy; and, in spite of them all, the family\ncontinued to prosper. That ruin which the unsuccessful rising in 1715\nhad brought upon many other great houses, was retrieved in the case of\nSeaforth, by the exercise of sovereign favour; and restored possessions\nand renewed honours preserved the grandeur of the race. But on the death\nof the last Earl, his second cousin, descended from a younger son of the\nthird Earl and his vindictive Countess, inherited the family estates and\nthe chiefdom of the Mackenzies, which he held for two short years, but\nnever actually enjoyed, being slain at sea by the Mahrattas, at Gheriah,\nin the south of India, in 1783, after a gallant resistance. He was\nsucceeded by his brother, in whom, as the last of his race, the seer\u2019s\nprophecy was accomplished.\n\nFrancis Humberston Mackenzie was a very remarkable man. He was born in\n1794, and although deaf, and latterly dumb, he was, by the force of his\nnatural abilities and the favour of fortune, able to fill an important\nposition in the world. It would have been already observed that the \u201cLast\nof the Seaforths\u201d was born in full possession of all his faculties,\nand that he only became deaf from the effects of a severe attack of\nscarlet fever, while a boy in school, which we have previously noticed in\nconnection with his remarkable dream. He continued to speak a little, and\nit was only towards the close of his life, and particularly during the\nlast two years, that he was unable to articulate\u2014or perhaps, unwilling to\nmake the attempt, on finding himself the last male of his line. He may be\nsaid to have, prior to this, fairly recovered the use of speech, for he\nwas able to converse pretty distinctly; but he was so totally deaf, that\nall communications were made to him by signs or in writing. Yet he raised\na regiment at the beginning of the great European war; he was created a\nBritish peer in 1797, as Baron Seaforth of Kintail; in 1800 he went out\nto Barbadoes as Governor, and afterwards to Demerara and Berbice; and in\n1808 he was made a Lieutenant-General. These were singular incidents in\nthe life of a deaf and dumb man. He married a very amiable and excellent\nwoman, Mary Proby, the daughter of a dignitary of the Church, and niece\nof the first Lord Carysfort, by whom he had a fine family of four sons\nand six daughters. When he considered his own position\u2014deaf, and formerly\ndumb; when he saw his four sons, three of them rising to man\u2019s estate;\nand when he looked around him, and observed the peculiar marks set upon\nthe persons of the four contemporary great Highland lairds, all in strict\naccordance with Coinneach\u2019s prophecy\u2014he must have felt ill at ease,\nunless he was able, with the incredulous indifference of a man of the\nworld, to spurn the idea from him as an old wife\u2019s superstition.\n\nHowever, fatal conviction was forced upon him, and on all those who\nremembered the family tradition, by the lamentable events which filled\nhis house with mourning. One after another his three promising sons\n(the fourth died young) were cut off by death. The last, who was the\nmost distinguished of them all, for the finest qualities both of head\nand heart, was stricken by a sore and lingering disease, and had gone,\nwith a part of the family, for his health, to the south of England. Lord\nSeaforth remained in the north, at Brahan Castle. A daily bulletin was\nsent to him from the sick chamber of his beloved son. One morning, the\naccounts being rather more favourable, the household began to rejoice,\nand a friend in the neighbourhood, who was visiting the chief, came down\nafter breakfast full of the good news, and gladly imparted it to the old\nfamily piper, whom he met in front of the Castle. The aged retainer shook\nhis head and sighed\u2014\u201cNa, na,\u201d said he, \u201che\u2019ll never recover. It\u2019s decreed\nthat Seaforth must outlive all his four sons.\u201d This he said in allusion\nto the seer\u2019s prophecy; thus his words were understood by the family;\nand thus members of the family have again and again repeated the strange\ntale. The words of the old piper proved too true. A few more posts\nbrought to Seaforth the tidings of the death of the last of his four sons.\n\nAt length, on the 11th January, 1815, Lord Seaforth died, the last of his\nrace. His modern title became extinct. The chiefdom of the Mackenzies,\ndivested of its rank and honour, passed away to a very remote collateral,\nwho succeeded to no portion of the property, and the great Seaforth\nestates were inherited by a white-hooded lassie from the East. Lord\nSeaforth\u2019s eldest surviving daughter, the Honourable Mary Frederica\nElizabeth Mackenzie, had married, in 1804, Admiral Sir Samuel Hood,\nBart., K.B., who was Admiral of the West India station while Seaforth\nhimself was Governor in those islands. Sir Samuel afterwards had the\nchief command in the Indian seas, whither his lady accompanied him, and\nspent several years with him in different parts of the East Indies. He\ndied while holding that high command, very nearly at the same time as\nLord Seaforth, so that his youthful wife was a recent widow at the time,\nand returned home from India in her widow\u2019s weeds, to take possession\nof her paternal inheritance. She was thus literally a white-coifed or\nwhite-hooded lassie (that is, a young woman in widow\u2019s weeds, and a\nHood by name) from the East. After some years of widowhood, Lady Hood\nMackenzie married a second time, Mr. Stewart, a grandson of the sixth\nEarl of Galloway, who assumed the name of Mackenzie, and established\nhimself on his lady\u2019s extensive estates in the North. Thus, the\npossessions of Seaforth may be truly said to have passed from the male\nline of the ancient house of Mackenzie. And still more strikingly was\nthis fulfilled, as regarded a large portion of these estates, when Mr.\nand Mrs. Stewart Mackenzie sold the great Island of Lewis to Sir James\nMatheson.\n\nAfter many years of happiness and prosperity, a frightful accident threw\nthe family into mourning. Mrs. Stewart Mackenzie was one day driving her\nyounger sister, the Hon. Caroline Mackenzie, in a pony carriage, among\nthe woods in the vicinity of Brahan Castle. Suddenly, the ponies took\nfright, and started off at a furious pace. Mrs. Stewart Mackenzie was\nquite unable to check them, and both she and her sister were thrown out\nof the carriage much bruised and hurt. She happily soon recovered from\nthe accident, but the injury which her sister sustained proved fatal,\nand, after lingering for some time in a hopeless state, she died, to the\ninexpressible grief of all the members of her family. As Mrs. Stewart\nMackenzie was driving the carriage at the time of the accident, she may\nbe said to have been the innocent cause of her sister\u2019s death, and thus\nto have fulfilled the last portion of Coinneach\u2019s prophecy which has yet\nbeen accomplished.\n\nThus we have seen that the last chief of Seaforth was deaf and dumb;\nthat he had four sons; that he survived them all; that the four great\nHighland lairds who were his contemporaries were all distinguished by\nthe peculiar personal marks the seer predicted; that his estates were\ninherited by a white-coifed or white-hooded lassie from the East; that\nhis great possessions passed into the hands of other races; and that his\neldest daughter and heiress was so unfortunate as to be the innocent\ncause of her sister\u2019s death. In this vary remarkable instance of family\nfate, the prophecy was not found out after the events occurred; it had\nbeen current for generations in the Highlands, and its tardy fulfilment\nwas marked curiously and anxiously by an entire clan and a whole county.\nSeaforth was respected and beloved far and near, and strangers, as well\nas friends and clansmen, mourned along with him the sorrows of his later\nyears. The gradual development of the doom was watched with sympathy and\ngrief, and the fate of Seaforth has been, during the last half-century\nof his life, regarded as one of the most curious instances of that\nsecond-sight for which the inhabitants of the Highlands of Scotland have\nbeen so long celebrated. Mr. Stewart Mackenzie, the accomplished husband\nof the heiress of Seaforth, after being for many years a distinguished\nmember of the House of Commons and a Privy Councillor, held several high\nappointments in the Colonial Dominions of the British Crown. He was\nsuccessively Governor of Ceylon and Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian\nIslands, and died, universally beloved and lamented, in the year 1843.\n\nLockhart in his Life of Scott, in reference to the Seaforth prediction,\nsays:\u2014\u201cMr. Morrit can testify thus far\u2014that he heard the prophecy quoted\nin the Highlands at a time when Lord Seaforth had two sons alive, and in\ngood health, and that it certainly was not made after the event\u201d; and he\ngoes on to tell us that Scott and Sir Humphrey Davy were most certainly\nconvinced of its truth, as also many others who had watched the latter\ndays of Seaforth in the light of those wonderful predictions.\n\nThe late Duncan Davidson of Tulloch, Lord-Lieutenant of the County of\nRoss, on reading our Second edition, wrote to the author, under date of\nMay 21, 1878, as follows:\u2014\u201cMany of these prophecies I heard of _upwards\nof 70 years ago, and when many of them were not fulfilled_, such as the\nlate Lord Seaforth surviving his sons, and Mrs. Stewart-Mackenzie\u2019s\naccident, near Brahan, by which Miss Caroline Mackenzie was killed.\u201d\nTulloch was, he said, during the latter years of Lord Seaforth, a regular\nvisitor at Brahan Castle, and often heard the predictions referred to\namong members of the family. The letter is in our possession, and it\nwas published, during Tulloch\u2019s life, and by his special permission, in\nMackenzie\u2019s _History of the Mackenzies_, p. 267.\n\nAn attempt was recently made to sell the remaining possessions of\nthe family, but fortunately, for the present, this attempt has been\ndefeated by the interposition of the Marchioness of Tweeddale and Mrs.\nColonel Stanley, daughters of the present nominal possessor of the\nproperty. At the time a leading article appeared in the _Edinburgh Daily\nReview_ giving an outline of the family history of the Seaforths. After\ndescribing how the fifth Earl, with the fidelity characteristic of his\nhouse, \u201ctrue as the dial to the sun,\u201d embraced the losing side in \u201cthe\nFifteen\u201d; fought at the head of his clan at Sheriffmuir; how in 1719\nhe, along with the Marquis of Tullibardine, and the Earl Marischal,\nmade a final attempt to bring the \u201cauld Stewarts back again\u201d; how he\nwas dangerously wounded in an encounter with the Government forces at\nGlenshiel, and compelled to abandon the vain enterprise; how he was\ncarried on board a vessel by his clansmen, conveyed to the Western Isles,\nand ultimately to France; how he was attainted by Parliament, and his\nestates forfeited to the Crown; how all the efforts of the Government\nfailed to penetrate into Kintail, or to collect any rent from his\nfaithful Macraes, whom the Seaforths had so often led victorious from\nmany a bloody conflict, from the battle of Largs down to the Jacobite\nRebellions of 1715 and 1719; and how the rents of that part of the\nestates were regularly collected and remitted to their exiled chief in\nFrance, with a devotion and faithfulness only to be equalled by their own\ncountrymen when their beloved \u201cbonnie Prince Charlie\u201d was a wanderer,\nhelpless and forlorn, at the mercy of his enemies, and with a reward\nof \u00a330,000 at the disposal of many a poverty-stricken and starving\nHighlander, who would not betray his lawful Prince for all the gold in\nEngland; the article continues:\u2014But their (the Seaforth\u2019s) downfall\ncame at last, and the failure of the male line of this great historical\nfamily was attended with circumstances as singular as they were painful.\nFrancis, Lord Seaforth, the last Baron of Kintail, was, says Sir Walter\nScott, \u201ca nobleman of extraordinary talents, who must have made for\nhimself a lasting reputation, had not his political exertions been\nchecked by painful natural infirmity\u201d. Though deaf from his sixteenth\nyear, and inflicted also with a partial impediment of speech, he was\ndistinguished for his attainments as well as for his intellectual\nactivity. He took a lively interest in all questions of art and science,\nespecially in natural history, and displayed at once his liberality\nand his love of art by his munificence to Sir Thomas Lawrence, in the\nyouthful straits and struggles of that great artist, and by his patronage\nof other artists. Before his elevation to the peerage, Lord Seaforth\nrepresented Ross-shire in Parliament for a number of years, and was\nafterwards Lord-Lieutenant of the county. During the revolutionary war\nwith France, he raised a splendid regiment of Ross-shire Highlanders (the\n78th, the second which had been raised among his clan), of which he was\nappointed Lieutenant-Colonel Commandant, and he ultimately attained the\nrank of Lieutenant-General in the Army. He held for six years the office\nof Governor of Barbadoes, and, by his firmness and even-handed justice,\nhe succeeded in putting an end to the practice of slave-killing, which\nat that time was not unfrequent in the Island, and was deemed by the\nplanters a venial offence, to be punished only by a small fine.\n\nLord Seaforth was the happy father of three (four) sons and six\ndaughters, all of high promise; and it seemed as if he were destined to\nraise the illustrious house of which he was the head, to a height of\nhonour and power greater than it had ever yet attained. But the closing\nyears of this nobleman were darkened by calamities of the severest kind.\nThe mismanagement of his estates in the West Indies involved him in\ninextricable embarrassments, and compelled him to dispose of a part of\nhis Kintail estates\u2014\u201cthe gift-land\u201d of the family, as it was termed\u2014a\nstep which his tenantry and clansmen in vain endeavoured to avert, by\noffering to buy in the land for him, that it might not pass from the\nfamily. He had previously been bereaved of two of his sons, and about the\ntime that Kintail was sold, his only remaining son, a young man of talent\nand eloquence, the representative in parliament of his native county,\nsuddenly died. The broken-hearted father lingered on for a few months,\nhis fine intellect enfeebled by paralysis, and yet, as Sir Walter Scott\nsays, \u201cnot so entirely obscured but that he perceived his deprivation as\nin a glass, darkly.\u201d Sometimes he was anxious and fretful because he\ndid not see his son; sometimes he expostulated and complained that his\nboy had been allowed to die without his seeing him; and sometimes, in a\nless clouded state of intellect, he was sensible of his loss in its full\nextent. The last \u201cCabarfeidh\u201d followed his son to the grave in January,\n1815, and then\u2014\n\n    Of the line of Fitzgerald remained not a male,\n    To bear the proud name of the Chiefs of Kintail.\n\nThe most remarkable circumstance connected with this sorrowful tale, is\nthe undoubted fact that, centuries ago, a Seer of the Clan Mackenzie,\nknown as Kenneth Oag (Odhar), predicted that when there should be a deaf\nand dumb \u201cCabarfeidh\u201d (Staghead, the Celtic designation of the chief\nof the clan, taken from the family crest), the \u201cgift-land\u201d of their\nterritory (Kintail) would be sold, and the male line become extinct. This\nprophecy was well known in the north long before its fulfilment, and\nwas certainly not made after the event. \u201cIt connected,\u201d says Lockhart,\n\u201cthe fall of the house of Seaforth not only with the appearance of a\ndeaf \u2018Cabarfeidh,\u2019 but with the contemporaneous appearance of various\ndifferent physical misfortunes in several of the other great Highland\nchiefs, all of which are said to have actually occurred within the memory\nof the generation that has not yet passed away.\u201d\n\nOn the death of his lordship, his estates, with all their burdens and\nresponsibilities, devolved on his eldest daughter, Lady Hood, whose\nsecond husband was James Stewart Mackenzie, a member of the Galloway\nfamily, and whose son has just been prevented from selling all that\nremains of the Seaforth estates. \u201cOur friend, Lady Hood,\u201d wrote Sir\nWalter Scott to Mr. Morritt, \u201cwill now be \u2018Cabarfeidh\u2019 herself. She has\nthe spirit of a chieftainess in every drop of her blood, but there are\nfew situations in which the cleverest women are so apt to be imposed\nupon as in the management of landed property, more especially of a\nHighland estate. I do fear the accomplishment of the prophecy that, when\nthere should be a deaf \u2018Cabarfeidh,\u2019 the house was to fall.\u201d The writer\nconcludes thus:\u2014\u201cScott\u2019s apprehensions proved only too well founded.\nOne section after another of the estates had to be sold. The remaining\nportion of Kintail, the sunny braes of Ross, the church lands of\nChanonry, the barony of Pluscarden, and the Island of Lews\u2014a principality\nitself\u2014were disposed of one after the other, till now nothing remains\nof the vast estates of this illustrious house except Brahan Castle, and\na mere remnant of their ancient patrimony (and that in the hands of\ntrustees), which the non-resident, nominal owner has just been prevented\nfrom alienating. _Sic transit._\u201d\n\nLeaving these extraordinary prophecies with the reader, to believe,\ndisbelieve, or explain away on any principle or theory which may satisfy\nhis reason, his credulity, or scepticism, we conclude with the following\n\nLAMENT FOR \u201cTHE LAST OF THE SEAFORTHS\u201d.\n\nBY SIR WALTER SCOTT.\n\n    In vain the bright course of thy talents to wrong\n    Fate deaden\u2019d thine ear and imprison\u2019d thy tongue,\n    For brighter o\u2019er all her obstructions arose\n    The glow of the genius they could not oppose;\n    And who, in the land of the Saxon, or Gael,\n    Might match with Mackenzie, High Chief of Kintail?\n\n    Thy sons rose around thee in light and in love,\n    All a father could hope, all a friend could approve;\n    What \u2019vails it the tale of thy sorrows to tell?\n    In the spring time of youth and of promise they fell!\n    Of the line of MacKenneth remains not a male,\n    To bear the proud name of the Chief of Kintail.\n\n    And thou, gentle Dame, who must bear, to thy grief,\n    For thy clan and thy country the cares of a Chief,\n    Whom brief rolling moons in six changes have left,\n    Of thy husband and father and brethren bereft;\n    To thine ear of affection, how sad is the hail\n    That salutes thee\u2014the heir of the line of Kintail!\n\n_Na \u2019m biodh an t\u2019 earball na bu ruighne bhiodh mo sgialachd na b\u2019\nfhaide._\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nON HIGHLAND SUPERSTITION.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE REV. ALEXANDER MACGREGOR, M.A., ON HIGHLAND SUPERSTITION, DRUIDS,\nFAIRIES, WITCHCRAFT, SECOND-SIGHT, HALLOWE\u2019EN, SACRED WELLS, AND OTHER\nPECULIAR PRACTICES AND BELIEFS, WITH SEVERAL CURIOUS INSTANCES.\n\n\nIt is lamentable that mankind in all ages of the world have been prone\nto the most degrading superstitions. The enlightened ages of antiquity\nwere no more exempt from them than the most ignorant. We know from the\nBible how difficult it was to restrain the Jews from the most idolatrous\nand superstitious observances, and to confine them to the worship of the\nonly living and true God. This remarkable tendency of the Hebrew nation\nwas caused, in all likelihood, by their sojourning for the long period\nof 400 years among the Egyptians, whose system of religion was a mass of\nidolatrous observances. They had a number of ideal gods, to whom they\nerected temples of prodigious size and architectural splendour. Their\nprincipal deities, were Osiris and Isis, whom they considered typical of\nthe sun and moon. But they had a great variety of other deities, animals\nof all kinds\u2014(hence the golden calf of the Hebrews), the dog, the wolf,\nthe hawk, the stork, the cat, and several other creatures. They also\nadored their great river, the Nile, personifying it in the crocodile,\nto which they erected temples and appointed priests to serve at their\naltars. The Egyptians also believed in dreams, lucky and unlucky days,\ncharms, omens, and magic\u2014in short, they were grossly superstitious!\n\nThe absurdities of Egyptian superstition formed the basis of what\nfollowed in Greece and Rome. Fifteen hundred years before the birth of\nour blessed Saviour, Egypt was at the height of its civilisation, but\nthen, too, it was at the height of its superstition. The mythology and\nsuperstitious observances of the Greeks deserve to be noticed, both as a\nmatter of amusement and instruction, but we can, in the meantime, hint\nat but a few particulars. They had no idea of the only living and true\nGod. Their notions of Divinity were grovelling and contemptible. Their\ngods were, as they believed, at one time heroes and rulers on earth,\nbut still having their habitation somewhere within the boundaries of\nthe Grecian territories. We are made acquainted with the character of\nthese imaginary deities by the numerous allusions made to them in the\nworks of the Greek and Roman poets, as well as by the various sculptured\nfigures which have been brought to light in modern times. Jupiter, the\nson of Saturn, was the chief God. But even the great Jupiter himself did\nnot enjoy unmolested his supreme dignity, for the offspring of Titan,\na race of terrible giants, set Jupiter at defiance. They piled the\nmountains of Pelion and Ossa on the top of each other, and endeavoured\nto ascend into heaven, and to pull Jupiter down from his throne. The\ngods, in great alarm, fled from Mount Olympus into Egypt, where they\nconcealed their true character by assuming the form of various animals;\nbut Jupiter, assisted by Hercules, succeeded in destroying the giants,\nand in reasserting his sovereign sway. And hence he is always represented\non a throne, with a thunderbolt in his hand, and an eagle by his side.\nJupiter\u2019s brothers and children were the gods and goddesses of a great\nvariety of distinct things\u2014in fact, under the complicated mythology of\nGreece, every imaginable thing had its god or goddess. For example,\nJupiter\u2019s brother Neptune was god of the ocean, and is painted as a\nmajestic figure, with a crown on his head, and a trident in his hand,\nand drawn in a car over the sea by powerful water-horses. Neptune has\noften appeared in his stately chariot on the decks of ships when crossing\nthe Equator. Then all on board who had never crossed the line before\nwere brought into his presence, laid hold of, and plunged into a bath\nof water, where they received a smart shave, with tar for soap, and a\nrusty hoop for a razor. Only the ladies on board were exempted from this\nunpleasant treatment, not because they had no beards, but by the powerful\ntalismanic effect of slipping a few sovereigns into the hands of the\nseamen for grog.\n\nThe superstitions of the European Northmen, or Scandinavians (the early\ninhabitants of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Iceland), were of a kind\nremarkably accordant with the cold and stern character of the regions\nwhich they occupied. The dread names of their gods Odin, Thor, and\nother deities of the north are now only perpetuated in the names given\nto some of the days of the week. Thus, our term \u201cWednesday\u201d is derived\nfrom \u201cOden\u2019s\u201d or \u201cWoden\u2019s\u201d day\u2014the day of the week on which the northern\nJupiter was specially worshipped. Our Thursday is from Thor, the second\ndignity among the fabulous gods. As this day was called \u201cDies Jovis\u201d\nby the Romans, we have a confirmation that Thor, the thunderer, was\nequivalent to the thundering Jove of the Grecian mythology. Friday takes\nits name from Freya, the beautiful daughter of Niord, and corresponds\nwith the \u201cDies Venevis,\u201d or \u201cVenus-day\u201d of the Greeks and Romans.\nSaturday is derived in the same manner from the god \u201cSaeter\u201d of the\nScandinavians, or Saturn of the Greeks. Tuesday, or anciently \u201cTiesday\u201d\n(a pronunciation still preserved in many parts in Scotland), is from\n\u201cTisa,\u201d the wife of Thor; Sunday and Monday were named from the sun and\nmoon, both by the northern and southern nations of Europe, from a remote\nperiod.\n\n\nDRUIDISM.\u2014Interesting as are the ancient superstitions of Greece, Rome,\nand the northern regions of Europe, we feel a greater interest in the\nhistory of Druidism, the great superstition which flourished peculiarly\namong our own forefathers, the aboriginies of the British Islands.\nDruidism was the religion of the ancient Celts or Gauls, and prevailed\nin France, and everywhere, indeed, wherever that ancient race had formed\nsettlements. Several learned inquirers into the native Druidism have\ncavilled much about the etymology of the word. Some writers, as Pliny,\nderive \u201cDruidh\u201d from the Greek \u201cDrus\u201d an oak; but we think that the\nproper etymon is the ancient Celtic vocable, \u201cDr\u00f9\u201d an oak tree, from\nwhich no doubt \u201cDrus\u201d was taken. The Druids, we believe, had their name\nbefore the Greek language was in existence, and it is well known that\nthe Greek itself is partly at least of Celtic origin. As far as can\nbe gathered from the statements of C\u00e6sar, Diodorus Siculus, Strabo,\nand others, the Druids not only formed the priesthood of the Celts,\nbut appointed to themselves all the offices now usually discharged\nby the several learned professions. There appears to have been three\norders among their priests\u2014the Druids proper, the Vates, and the\nBards\u2014who severally performed different functions. The Bards sung,\nin heroic verse, the brave actions of eminent men; the Vates studied\nthe productions of nature and the laws; while the Druids directed the\neducation of youth, and officiated in the affairs of religion and\njustice. In their hands they commonly carried a long wand, and their\narms and necks were decorated with golden chains and bracelets. But\nthe most notable of their ornaments was an artificial egg set in gold,\nand of miraculous virtues. They asserted that every one of these eggs,\nwhich they sold at enormous prices, was formed by a number of serpents,\nmysteriously conjoining for its production. When made, it was raised\nup in the air by the hissing of these reptiles, and was to be caught\nin a clean white cloth when falling to the ground. The person who was\nfortunate enough to catch it had instantly to mount a swift horse, and\nescape from the angry serpents. Procured in this way, the egg possessed\nthe property of making the owner successful in all his undertakings. The\nopen sky was the canopy under which they worshipped. A wood or grove,\nfenced in by large stones, constituted the scenes where their rites were\nperformed. In the centre of the groves was an open area, encompassed\nby large, erect stones, closely set together. Here there were circles\nwithin circles, and in the centre of the inner one there was a stone\nof prodigious size, on which the victims were slain, and offered up to\nthe Supreme Being. The fruit of the oak, and especially the mistletoe\nbough, were thought to possess a divine virtue. The mistletoe is perhaps\none of the most remarkable parasitic plants in the world, hence it\nbecame an object of superstitious regard. It grows chiefly on the oak\nand chesnut. It is an evergreen, and appears strange in winter, with\nits brilliant green leaves on an otherwise leafless tree. It is thought\nthat it springs from a seed carried by birds from tree to tree, landed\nin a crevice of the bark, where it sprouts, and derives its nourishment\nfrom the living wood, like a graft in a fruit tree. The mistletoe bough\ngrows sometimes as large as a bushel basket\u2014sometimes four or five\nfeet in diameter\u2014of a roundish form, and covered with leaves of the\nbrightest green. Two white bulls were brought and fastened to a tree by\nthe horns, then the arch-Druid ascended the tree, cropped the mistletoe\nwith his golden knife, and received it in his robe, amid the shouts of\nthe people. Then the bulls were sacrificed on the large stone, and the\ndeity was invoked to bless the gift. The Druids had an idol of gigantic\nsize, formed of wicker-work in the rude likeness of a human being. They\nfilled it with human victims, men and women. Straw and wood were piled\naround it, and the unfortunate creatures within perished in the flames\nby a slow, horrible death. It is said by some historians that women were\nmore frequently the victims of these superstitious cruelties than the\nmen. Young, innocent, beautiful maidens were dragged to the altar, and\nsacrificed to the powers above.\n\nMany Druidical relics still exist. By far the most extraordinary of these\nremains are those at Stonehenge, on Salisbury plain, in Wiltshire. They\nare numerous on the Western Isles, and some are near Inverness, such as\nthe relics at Clava, on Nairnside, and the circles at Strathnairn and\nat Culduthel. Mona, or Anglesea, as it is now called, was their chief\nsettlement; but it is in North Britain that the Druidical monuments\nare most abundant. As a specimen of a Druidical cairn, we may mention\nthat on the Moor of Strathardle, in Perthshire\u2014a stoney mound, ninety\nyards in circumference, and twenty-five feet high. Such monuments are\nnumerous along the Grampian range. There are also curious stones, called\nrocking-stones, supposed to be of Druidical origin. In the parish of\nKells, in the Stewarty of Kirkcudbright, there is a rocking-stone\ncalled the \u201cLogan-stone,\u201d about ten tons in weight; and it is so nicely\nbalanced upon another stone that the pressure of a child\u2019s hand can set\nit in motion. A similar stone may be seen on the glebe of the parish of\nStrath, in Skye. The artifices of the Druids to deceive the ignorant were\nnumerous. For example, among the ancient Britons a meteor was supposed to\nbe a vehicle for carrying to paradise the soul of some departed Druid. So\nwell did they engraft their absurd ideas on the minds of the ignorant,\nthat, even at this distant day, the appearance of a ball of fire, meteor,\nor of what are called falling stars, creates, among the more credulous\nHighlanders, a belief that some illustrious spirit has taken its flight\nto eternity. From this circumstance we may infer, with Dr. Smith, that\n\u201cDreug,\u201d the Gaelic for a meteor, is a contraction for \u201cDruidh-eug\u201d\u2014a\nDruid\u2019s death. This ingenious antiquarian thinks that this Druidical\nfantasy had its origin in a tradition of Elijah\u2019s fiery chariot. While\nDruidical superstitions were at one time prevalent over the continent\nof Europe and the adjacent Isles, their extinction is enveloped in the\nmystery of the dark ages. Up to a late period, however, some traces of\nDruidical customs were perceivable among the Scottish Celts. Dr. Jamieson\nmentions that an old Highlander, so lately as the end of the eighteenth\ncentury, was in the habit of addressing the Deity by the title of\nArch-Druid.\n\nDr. Smith says that the British Druids owed their decline to the\nfollowing circumstances:\u2014Trathal, the grandfather of Fingal, being\nchosen generalissimo of the Caledonian army sent against the Romans, did\nnot feel disposed, on his return, to resign his authority, even at the\ncommand of the Druids; hence arose a civil war, in which the army of the\nchurch was defeated in several battles. These overthrows were fatal to\nthe Druids. They made several attempts to regain their dominions, but all\nwere ineffectual. They retired to the I-thonn (the isle of waves), that\nis Iona, where their order was not quite extinct on the arrival of St.\nColumba on that island, in the sixth century.\n\n\nFAIRIES.\u2014Among the various spiritual beings to whom the credulity of\nmankind has given an imaginary existence, the fairies occupy a prominent\nplace, and are specially worthy of notice. The fairy is distinguished\nby one peculiarity from every other being of a similar order. Other\nspirits, such as dwarfs, brownies, elves, and such like, are represented\nas deformed creatures, whereas the fairy is a beautiful miniature of\n\u201cthe human form divine\u201d. It is perfect in face, delightful in figure,\nand more of angelic than human appearance. These points of distinction,\nwith generally a dress of bright green, mark the personal individuality\nof the fairy. The origin of the fairy superstition is ascribed to the\nCeltic race; hence in Ireland, the Highlands and Islands of Scotland,\nand Wales, the fairies are even to this day believed by some to exist.\nThey were usually called \u201cgood neighbours,\u201d \u201cDaoine-sithe,\u201d men of peace,\nand yet, if offended, they became very inveterate in their spite. They\nreadily kidnapped unbaptised children, and even adult men and women,\nparticularly young married females, to become nurses to the fairy\nchildren. They lived under ground, or in little green hills, where the\nroyal fairies held their courts. In their places all was beauty and\nsplendour. Their pageants and processions were far more magnificent than\nany that Eastern sovereigns could get up or poets devise. They rode\nupon milk-white steeds. Their dresses were brilliant beyond conception,\nand when they mingled in the dance, their music was more sublime by far\nthan mortal lips or hands could ever produce. The fairy legends are\nnumerous and various. From an early period every fairy annalist concurred\nin giving to the king and queen of the fairies the name of Oberon and\nTitania. Titania, though not under this name, figures in the tale of\nThomas Lermont, commonly called Thomas the Rhymer, one of the earliest\ntraditions relative to the fairy tribe. Thomas was a distinguished poet\nand prophet, who lived near Melrose, and was proprietor of Ercildoune.\nThe year of his birth is uncertain, but he was an old man when Edward\nI. was carrying on war in Scotland. His predictions have long excited\ninterest in his native country. The following adventure, handed down in\nthe words of an ancient ballad, befell this individual on the Eildon\nhills, in Roxburghshire:\u2014\n\n    True Thomas lay on Huntly bank,\n      A ferlie spied he with his e\u2019e;\n    For there he saw a ladye bright\n      Come riding down by Eildon tree.\n\n    Her shirt was o\u2019 the grass-green silk,\n      Her mantle o\u2019 the velvet fyne;\n    At ilka telt o\u2019 her horse\u2019s mane\n      Hung fifty siller bells and nine.\n\nThe saddle of this visionary beauty\u2019s steed was of ivory, inlaid with\ngold. She had a quiver of arrows at her back, with a bow in one hand, and\nthe other led three beautiful hounds in a leash.\n\n    True Thomas he pull\u2019d off his cap,\n      And louted low down to his knee;\n    \u201cAll hail! thou mighty queen of heaven,\n      For thy peer on earth I ne\u2019er did see!\u201d\n\n    \u201cO no! O no! Thomas,\u201d she said,\n      \u201cThat name does not belang to me;\n    I am but the queen of fair Elfland,\n      That am hither come to visit thee.\u201d\n\nBy some spell this fairy queen made Thomas her slave. She became changed\ninto a hideous hag, yet he was compelled to follow her. They entered a\ncavern, and after wading through pools of blood, in pitchy darkness for\nthree days, they reached a beautiful orchard, where the lady resumed her\nformer dignity and stateliness. She took him to a gorgeous castle, where\nhe joined with lords, and knights, and ladies in dancing to the most\nexquisite music. At the end of what he thought a short time, the queen\ntold him that he had been seven years in the castle, and that he might\nreturn home. On parting, she gifted him \u201cwith a tongue that could never\nlie\u201d. There are numberless such fairy legends, but one is enough for a\nspecimen. Some of the poor creatures arraigned in Scotland for witchcraft\nadmitted having had correspondence with the fairies. The trials of Bessie\nDunlop in 1576, and of Alison Pearson in 1588, illustrate this statement.\nBessie Dunlop avowed that the ghost of one Thomas Reid appeared to her\u2014a\nsoldier slain at Pinkie in 1547\u2014that he took her to fairyland, and\nintroduced her to the queen. Alison Pearson also admitted her familiarity\nwith the fairies, from whom she had received herbs for the cure of\ndiseases. It is remarkable that Patrick Adamson, an able scholar and\ndivine, who was created Archbishop of St. Andrews by James VI., actually\ntook the medicines prescribed by this poor woman, in the hope that they\nwould transfer an illness with which he was seized to the body of one of\nhis horses. These poor women were both convicted, and both were put to\ndeath at the stake. No doubt there are some in the Highlands and Islands\nwho still believe in the existence of the fairy race. The \u201csithiche,\u201d\nor fairy, is the most active sprite in Highland mythology. It is a\ndexterous child-stealer, and must be carefully guarded against. At birth\nmany covert and cunning ceremonies are still used to baffle the fairy\u2019s\npower, otherwise the new-born child would be taken off to fairyland, and\na withered, little, living skeleton of a child laid in its stead. If\noffended, they are wantonly mischievous, and hurt severely, and perhaps\nkill with their arrows, such as annoy them. These arrows are of stone,\nlike a yellow flint, and shaped like a barbed arrow-head. They are called\n\u201csaighdean sithe,\u201d or fairy arrows. These arrow-heads must have been\nextensively used in their warfare by the aboriginal people of the Isles\n(and not, of course, by the fairies), as they are still picked up here\nand there in the fields, and are all much of the same size and shape. In\nSkye, and in the Hebrides in general, the fairies dwelt in green knolls\nor hillocks, called \u201csitheanan,\u201d and there is hardly a parish or district\nwhich has not its \u201csithean,\u201d or fairy-hill. I knew an old man in Skye\nwho died about thirty years ago, at the age of about 100, whose name was\nFarquhar Beaton. He so firmly believed in fairies and other superstitions\nthat in his \u201cgrace before meat\u201d he prayed thus:\u2014\n\n    O Thi bheannuichte, cum ruinn, agus cuidich leinn, agus na\n    tuiteadh do ghras oirn mar an t-uisge air druim a\u2019 gheoidh.\n    An uair a bhios fear \u2019na eigin air gob rutha, cuidich fein\n    leis; agus bi mu\u2019n cuairt duinn air tir, agus maille ruinn.\n    Gleidh an t-aosda agus an t-oga, ar mnathan agus ar paisdean,\n    ar spreidh agus ar feudal, o chumhachd agus o cheannas nan\n    sithichean, agus o mhi-run gach droch-shula. Bitheadh slighe\n    reidh romhainn, agus crioch shona aig ar turas.\n\nWhich may be translated thus:\u2014\n\n    O Blessed One, provide for us and help us, and let not thy\n    grace fall on us like the rain-drops on the back of a goose.\n    When a man is in danger on the point of a promontory at sea,\n    do thou succour him; and be about us and with us on dry land.\n    Preserve the aged and the young, our wives and our children,\n    our sheep and our cattle, from the power and dominion of the\n    fairies, and from the malicious effects of every evil eye. Let\n    a straight path be before us, and a happy end to our journey.\n\nMany throughout the Highlands and Islands entertained the same firm\nbelief in the existence of fairies as poor old Farquhar Beaton did. They\nwere generally deemed harmless sprites\u2014\u201cDaoine-sithe,\u201d\u2014beings that loved\nkindness and peace, yet they had their differences and quarrels; and\ndesperate were their disputes when they took place. Old Farquhar spoke\nof many occasions when the fairy fights became fast and furious. The\nMacleods of Dunvegan, and the Macdonalds (commonly called the Lords of\nthe Isles) at Duntulm, had their particular pipers, and their pipe-music\ncolleges. The Macleods had the distinguished race of MacCrimmons for\ncenturies, as family pipers, and they had their college at Boreraig,\na tenement near Dunvegan, which they held free. In the same way, the\nMacdonalds had the famed MacArthurs as pipers, with the free possession\nof Peingowen for their college. A continued rivalry existed between the\nMacCrimmons and MacArthurs for supremacy in the musical art, and both\nhad their particular fairy friends, who were said to supply them with\nreeds, and even, at times, with sets of bagpipes. As the famed Muses\nof Parnassus inspired their favourite bards with poetic powers, so the\nfairies conferred the requisite power on these family pipers to progress\nin the proficiency of their art. But at times, so keen were these gay\ncoadjutors for the success of their particular musical proteg\u00e9s, that\nthey disputed, and actually fought for the victory, thereby causing their\n\u201csian\u201d dwellings to ring with the din of the conflict. Old Farquhar,\nwhen questioned as to his belief in these things, would raise his hands,\nand say, \u201cMo dha shuil fein a chunnaic iad; mo dha chluas fein a chual\niad.\u201d (My own two eyes beheld them; my two ears heard them.) Farquhar\nwas a thin, spare, hard-featured, little man, who prided himself on his\nancestry, as a race distinguished for their knowledge of medicinal herbs.\nHe could trace his genealogy from son to sire, back to ten or twelve\ngenerations, as many others in Skye could do in regard to themselves.\nPoor Farquhar had a superstitious dislike to bacon or pork. For many\nyears before his death he had dinner at the Manse every Sabbath by the\nminister\u2019s special request, when he invariably said the above grace\nbefore commencing his meal. It frequently happened that the servants\u2019\ndinner consisted of pork or bacon, the look of which Farquhar could not\nbear, and yet he often dined on it. The servants, knowing his prejudices,\nhad beforehand prepared a quantity of the lean parts of the meat for the\nold man, which they passed off as mutton, and which he never suspected.\nWhile partaking of it, however, he frequently said, to the no small\namusement and tittering of the domestics\u2014\u201cBu tu fein an fheoil mhaith,\ncheart, agus cha b\u2019i a\u2019 mhuc ghrannda, shalach\u201d; (Thou art the good,\nright meat, and not the filthy, unclean pig).\n\nThe fairies were said to be very fierce and vindictive when altercations\nand differences took place among themselves, and particularly so, when\nenemies injured or assailed those with whom they were on friendly terms.\nThe Jameses, who were jolly monarchs, were in general most auspicious\npartisans of these fantastic tribes; at least they considered those\nroyal personages as such. Perthshire was of old a noted district for the\nintrigues of the fairies. The Clan Donnachaidh, or Robertson of Struan,\nwere not generally favourites with them. During the minority of James V.,\nthis powerful clan committed bloody outrages over the district of Athole,\nat which the fairies were so enraged, that they contrived means whereby\nthe enemy waylaid the laird of Struan, while visiting his uncle, and\nbasely assassinated him in the presence of his relative.[8]\n\nIn ancient times, the residence of the Athole family was a lofty,\nturreted mansion, possessing an air of grandeur characteristic of\nfeudal times. It is said that it was within this lordly mansion that\nthe cruel assassin of our first James meditated his bloody purpose. If\ncredit can be given to Lindsay, the historian, it was here also, about\na century afterwards, that an Earl of Athole entertained, in the most\nsumptuous manner, King James V. On that occasion, his Majesty entered\nthe district of Athole with a numerous retinue, to hunt the deer of the\nGrampian hills. A banquet of extraordinary magnificence and splendour\nwas furnished for the Scottish Monarch. A separate banquetting-hall was\nprepared, at a vast expense, for the entertainment of his Majesty and\nhis retainers. Lindsay says, \u201cThat there was no want of meates, drinkes,\nand delicacies, that were to be gotten at that time in Scotland, either\nin brugh or land. So that he (the King) wanted none of his orders mare\nthan he had been at home in his own palace. The King remained in this\nwilderness (i.e., Athole) at the hunting the space of three days and\nthree nights, as I have shewn. I heard men say it cost the Earl of Athole\nevery day in expenses a thousand pounds.\u201d No sooner had the royal visitor\ntaken his departure than Athole, instigated, as was said, by the fairies,\ncaused his Highlandmen to set fire to the temporary palace and huts which\nhad been reared for the occasion, \u201cthat the King and the ambassadors\nmight see them on fire\u201d. Then the ambassador said to the King, \u201cI marvel,\nSir, that you should thole your fair palace to be burnt, that your grace\nhas been so well lodged in.\u201d Then the King answered,\u2014\u201cIt is the use\nof our Highlandmen, though they be never so well lodged, to burn the\nlodgings when they depart.\u201d\n\n\u201cIt would seem,\u201d says Lindsay, \u201cthe next visit the King paid to his\nHighlandmen, was not marked with so much merriment and banquetting as the\nformer, for when the King passed into the isles, and there held justice\ncourts, and punished both thief and traitor, according to their demerits,\nsyne brought many of the great men of the isles captive with him; such\nas Mudyart, Maconnel, Macloyd, Mackay, Macloyd of the Lewis, MacNeil,\nMaclane, Macintosh, John Mudyard, Mackenzie, with many others that I\ncannot rehearse at this time. Some of them he put in ward, and some bade\nin court, and some he took pledges for good rule in time coming. So he\nbrought the isles, both north and south, in good rule and peace.\u201d\n\nIt was believed by the natives in these times, that the King had acquired\npower over these chieftains through the influence of the fairies, or some\nother evil spirits that had not been on friendly terms with the natives\nof the Isles, on account of some injuries received at their hands.\nSuperstition in those days was at no loss to find a cause for every\nrevolution and change.\n\nSpeaking of the fairies in olden times, they seem to have exercised their\nvarious pranks in different localities, still pointed out in the shires\nof Fife and Forfar, as well as in the counties around. The old Castle of\nGlammis, a venerable and majestic pile of building, has several fairy\nlegends connected with it. In an underground part of this old edifice,\nthere was a secret room, which was only known to two, or at most three\nindividuals, at the same time, and these were bound not to reveal it, but\nto their successors in the secret. It is said to have been haunted, and\nat times taken possession of by ghosts and fairies. It has frequently\nbeen the object of search with the inquisitive, but the search has been\nin vain. Tradition gives one account, that Malcolm II. was murdered in\nthis room in 1034, and that the murderers lost their way in the darkness\nof the night, and by the breaking of the ice were drowned in the loch of\nForfar. Fordun gives a different account, and states that the King was\nmortally wounded in a skirmish near the Castle, and that an obelisk or\nlarge stone of rude design was erected to commemorate the murder, and not\nto represent the King\u2019s gravestone, as he was buried at Iona.\n\nNear the summit of Carmylie hill is a large burrow or tumulus, which\nwas believed at one time by the natives to be a favourite haunt of the\nfairies, where, with much splendour, they held their nightly revels. It\nstill bears the name of \u201cFairy-folk hillock\u201d.\n\nIn the parish of Lunan, in Forfarshire, there is an immense variety of\n\u201cknaps\u201d or round hillocks, in different places. Very probably the knaps\nhad been used as beacons in ancient times, to give notice of alarm on\nthe approach of an enemy, by means of fires lighted upon them. It is,\nhowever, the case, that various fairy superstitions were connected with\nthese \u201csians\u201d or tumuli, of which mention is made to this day. One\nancient practice existed, that the relatives of the dead, the day after\nthe funeral, carried the chaff and bed-straw on which the body had lain\nto the knap nearest to the house, and there consumed them by fire. This\nsuperstition was prevalent in several parts of Scotland.\n\n\nWITCHCRAFT.\u2014This superstition took its rise in the East, and at an\nearly period of the world\u2019s history. It was regarded as the power of\nmagical incantation through the agency of evil spirits. From an early\nera, it was pursued as a trade by crafty wretches, who played upon the\nweakness of their fellow-creatures. Laws were passed against it. Many\nwretches were tortured in order to confess to it; and, to avoid these\npreliminary horrors, hundreds confessed all that they were accused of,\nand were forthwith led to execution. It has been calculated that, from\nthe date of Pope Innocent\u2019s bull in 1484 to the final extinction of\nthese persecutions, no fewer than 100,000 were put to death in Germany\nalone. Witchcraft was first denounced in England in 1541, in the reign\nof Henry VIII. Previous to that time, however, many witch trials had\ntaken place, and severe punishments were inflicted. We are all familiar\nwith the fearful account of the witches near Forres, in the tragedy of\nMacbeth. Queen Elizabeth, in 1562, directed a statute exclusively against\nwitchcraft. Many sad incidents are on record of the effects of this\nstatute.[9]\n\nThe mind of King James VI. was deeply impressed with the flagrant nature\nof the crime of witchcraft. Soon after his arrival from Denmark in\n1590, to conduct his bride home, the Princess Anne, a tremendous witch\nconspiracy was formed against his Majesty\u2019s prosperity. One Mrs. Agnes\nSampson, commonly called \u201cthe wise wife of Keith\u201d (a village of East\nLothian), was the principal agent in this horrible work. She was summoned\nbefore the King, and in the words of her trial it is recorded:\u2014\u201cThe said\nAgnes Sampson was after brought again before the King\u2019s Majestie and\nhis Council, and being examined of the meetings and detestable dealings\nof these witches, she confessed that upon the night of All Hallowe\u2019en\nshe was accompanied with a great many other witches, to the number of\ntwo hundred, and that all they together went to the sea, each one in a\nriddle or sieve, and went in the same, very substantially, with flaggons\nof wine, making merry and drinking by the way in the same riddles, or\nsieves, to the Kirk of North Berwick, in Lothian, and that after they had\nlanded, took hands on the land, and danced this reil, or short dance,\nsinging all with one voice\u2014\n\n    Cummer, goe ye before, Cummer goe ye;\n    Giff ye will not go before, Cummer, let me.\n\nOne Geillis Duncan did go before them, playing this reil upon a small\ntrump until they entered the Kirk of North Berwick. These made the King\nin a wonderful admiration, and he sent for the said Geillis Duncan, who\nupon the like trump did play the said reill before the King\u2019s Majestie.\nAgnes Sampson declared that one great object with Satan and his agents\nwas to destroy the King by raising a storm at sea when James came across\nfrom Denmark,\u201d and that \u201cthe witches demanded of the Divell, why he beare\nsic hatred to the King? who answered, by reason the King is the greatest\nenemie hee hath in the world.\u201d Such an eulogy, from such a quarter, could\nnot but pamper the conceit of the easily flattered Scottish monarch!\n\nBut we had some cases in the north, which showed that witchcraft was\nnot confined to the lower classes. Catherine Ross, or Lady Fowlis, was\nindicted by the King\u2019s advocate for the practice of witchcraft. She was\nanxious to make young Lady Fowlis possessor of the property of Fowlis,\nand to have her married to the Laird of Balnagown. Before this could be\neffected, she had to cut off her sons in-law, Robert and Hector Munro,\nand the young wife of Balnagown. She proceeded to her deadly work by\nconsulting with witches, making effigies of her intended victims in clay,\nand shooting at them with arrows, shod with elf-arrowheads.\n\nThe nature of these effigies of clay may be explained. Such as were\nintended to be doomed, or destroyed, were formed of clay into hideous\nfigures, or rude statues larger than life-size. These were called\n\u201ccuirp-creadha,\u201d or bodies of clay. Once formed, incantations and\nspells were uttered over them. Pins, nails, and feathers were pierced\ninto them, and fairy arrows darted against them, with fearful oaths and\nimprecations. Such things Lady Fowlis resorted to for destroying her\nrelatives; but when all failed, this abandoned woman had recourse to the\npoisoning of ales and certain dishes, by which she put several persons\nto death, though not the intended victims. By the confession of some of\nthe assistant hags, the purposes of Lady Fowlis were disclosed; she was\nbrought to trial, but was acquitted by a local jury.\n\nThese disgraceful proceedings were not without parallel in other\ndistinguished families of the day. Euphemia Macalzean, daughter of an\neminent judge, Lord Cliftonhall, was burned at the stake for witchcraft\nin 1591. This abandoned woman was found guilty by a jury for murdering\nher own godfather, as also her husband\u2019s nephew, and others, for which\nshe was \u201cburnt in assis, quick to the death\u201d.\n\nIn the beginning of the reign of Charles II., Morayshire became the\nscene of a violent fit of the great moral frenzy, and some of the most\nremarkable trials in the course of Scottish witchcraft took place there.\nThe last justiciary trial for witchcraft in Scotland was that of Elspeth\nRule, who was convicted in 1708, and banished. The last regular execution\nfor this crime took place in Dornoch in 1722, when an old woman was\ncondemned to death by David Ross, Sheriff of Caithness. It is difficult\nto compute the number of the victims of witchcraft in Scotland, but\nattentive inquirers make out that the black list would include upwards\nof four thousand persons! And by what a fate did they perish? Cruelly\ntortured while living, and dismissed from life by a living death amidst\nthe flames! And for what? For an impossible crime. And who were the\nvictims, and who were the executioners! The victims in most cases, were\nthe aged, the weak, the deformed, the lame, and the blind\u2014those, indeed,\nwhom years and infirmities had doomed to poverty and wretchedness; yes,\nexactly that class of miserable beings for whom Acts of Parliament have\nnow made comfortable provision\u2014those unfortunate creatures for whose\nbenefit our more enlightened rulers now provide houses of refuge, erect\npoorhouses like palaces, build large asylums, and endow charitable\ninstitutions of every kind. But who were the executioners? The wisest,\nthe greatest, and the most learned of their time\u2014men distinguished above\ntheir fellows for knowledge and intelligence\u2014ministers of religion and of\nthe law, kings, princes, and nobles.\n\nIt is rather remarkable that, as late as January, 1871, a trial in regard\nto witchcraft took place in Newtonwards Quarter Sessions, in County Down.\nHugh Kennedy sued his brother John for payment of a sum alleged to be\ndue to him for wages and other services. He stated that his brother\u2019s\nhouse and land were frequented by witches, and that he had been employed\nto banish them. The witches did not belong to the \u201cgood people,\u201d and\nwere maliciously inclined towards his brother\u2014his land got into a bad\ncondition, and his cows into a state of settled melancholy. There was\na certain charm of great repute in the neighbourhood for putting to\nflight these unwelcome visitors; but it was only useful when properly\napplied and performed, and no other person but plaintiff could be got to\nundertake the task. The method pursued was thus:\u2014The plaintiff locked\nhimself in the house alone; he stopped up the keyholes, closed up the\nwindows, stuffed up the chimney, and, in fact, left no mode of egress to\nthe unfortunate witches whom he was to summons into his presence. He then\nlit a fire and put a pot of milk on it, and into the pot he put three\nrows of pins and needles, which had never been sullied or contaminated\nby use. These he boiled together for half-an-hour, during which time the\nwitches were supposed to be suffering the most excruciating tortures,\nand had at last to take to flight. They had never been seen or heard of\nsince. The cows resumed their former healthy condition, and the land its\nwonted fertility. The case being of a rather \u201ccomplicated\u201d nature, it was\nleft to arbitration. Subsequently, it was announced in court, that the\nsum of 10s had been awarded to the plaintiff.\n\n\nSECOND-SIGHT.\u2014This is the faculty of seeing otherwise invisible objects.\nIt is neither voluntary nor constant, and is considered rather annoying\nthan agreeable to the possessors of it, who are chiefly found among the\nHighlands and Islands of Scotland, the Isle of Man and Ireland. The\ngift was possessed by individuals of both sexes, and its fits came on\nwithin doors and without, sitting and standing, at night and by day,\nand at whatever employment the votary might chance to be engaged. The\nvisions were usually about funerals, shrouds, the appearance of friends\nwho were at the time in distant countries, the arrival of strangers,\nfalls from horses, the upsetting of vehicles, bridal ceremonies, funeral\nprocessions, corpses, swamping of boats, drowning at sea, dropping\nsuddenly dead, and numberless other subjects. Very astonishing cases\nmight be mentioned wherein it would appear impossible that either fraud\nor deception could exist. Martin, in his book on the Western Isles,\nalludes to many who were undoubtedly, in his belief, \u201cTaibhsears,\u201d\nor Seers; and even to this day this faculty is believed by many to\nexist. Dr. Beattie ascribes it to the influence of physical causes on\nsuperstitious and unenlightened minds, such as the effects which wild\nscenery, interspersed with valleys, mountains, and lakes, have upon\nthe imagination of the natives. Others maintain that it arose from\noptical illusions, and others from ignorance, the great mother of all\nsuperstitions. It is remarkable when Dr. Samuel Johnson visited Skye in\n1773, and had heard much about the second-sight, that he gave credit to\nit, and expressed his surprise that it was disbelieved by the clergy,\nwhile many others were of a different opinion. If space permitted, many\nwonderful cases of second-sight might be given, but a few must suffice.\nIt is traditionally stated that the execution of the unfortunate Queen\nMary had been foreseen by many Highland seers, and had been previously\ndescribed by them by extraordinary minuteness. King James alludes to\nit in his \u201cDemonology\u201d; and it was brought as a charge against various\nShetland witches in that monarch\u2019s reign. Mackenzie of Tarbat, afterwards\nEarl of Cromartie, a talented statesman in the reign of Charles II.,\nwrote some account of this strange faculty for the use of the celebrated\nBoyle. He gives one instance, as follows:\u2014One day as he was riding in\na field among his tenants, who were manuring barley, a stranger came\nup to the party and observed that they need not be so busy about their\ncrop, as he saw the Englishmen\u2019s horses tethered among them already.\nThe event proved as the man had foretold, for the horses of Cromwell\u2019s\narmy in 1650 ate up the whole field. A few years after this incident,\nbefore Argyll went on his fatal journey to congratulate King Charles on\nhis restoration, he was playing at bowls with some gentlemen near his\ncastle at Inverary, when one of them grew pale and fainted as the Marquis\nstooped for his bowl. On recovering, he cried, \u201cBless me, what do I see?\nmy lord with his head off, and all his shoulders full of blood\u201d. The\nlate General Stewart of Garth, in his \u201cSketches of the Highlanders,\u201d\nrelates a very remarkable instance of second-sight which happened in\nhis own family:\u2014\u201cLate on an autumnal evening in the year 1773, the\nson of a neighbouring gentleman came to my father\u2019s house. He and my\nmother were from home, but several friends were in the house. The young\ngentleman spoke little, and seemed absorbed in deep thought. Soon after\nhe arrived, he inquired for a boy of the family, then three years of\nage. When shown into the nursery, the nurse was trying on a pair of new\nshoes, and complained that they did not fit the child. \u2018They will fit\nhim before he will have occasion for them,\u2019 said the young gentleman.\nThis called forth the chidings of the nurse for predicting evil to the\nchild, who was stout and healthy. When he returned to the party he\nhad left in the sitting-room, who had heard of his observation on the\nshoes, they cautioned him to take care that the nurse did not derange\nhis new talent of the second sight, with some ironical congratulations\non his pretended acquirement. This brought on an explanation, when he\ntold them that as he had approached the end of a wooden bridge near the\nhouse, he was astonished to see a crowd of people passing the bridge.\nComing nearer, he observed a person carrying a small coffin, followed by\nabout twenty gentlemen, all of his acquaintance, his own father and mine\nbeing of the number, with a concourse of the country people. He did not\nattempt to join, but saw them turn off to the right, in the direction of\nthe churchyard, which they entered. He then proceeded on his intended\nvisit, much impressed with what he had seen, with a feeling of awe, and\nbelieving it to have been a representation of the death and funeral of a\nchild of the family. The whole received perfect confirmation in his mind,\nby the sudden death of the boy the following night, and the consequent\nfuneral, which was exactly as he had seen. This gentleman was not a\nprofessed seer. This was his first and his last vision, and, as he told\nme,\u201d says General Stewart, \u201cit was sufficient.\u201d\n\nA very remarkable instance of supernatural vision happened a few years\nago, in a landed proprietor\u2019s house in Skye. On a certain evening,\nprobably that of New Year\u2019s Day, a large party of neighbouring ladies\nand gentlemen, with the youngsters of their families, had been invited\nto enjoy certain harmless festivities at this proprietor\u2019s house, the\nlady of which had been absent at the time in the south, but her sons\nand daughters were at home to entertain the happy guests. After dinner\nthe junior members of the party retired to the drawing-room to amuse\nthemselves. A quadrille was set agoing, but before it had commenced, the\nfigure of a lady glided along the side wall of the room, from end to end,\nand was seen by several of those opposite to it. \u201cMy mother! my mother!\u201d\nscreamed one of the young ladies of the family, and fainted. The vision\nput a sudden termination to the hilarities of the evening; but the most\nsurprising fact was, that at the very time the vision appeared, the lady\nof the house had died in a city in the south.\n\nBesides the many instances of second-sight given by Martin, Theophilus\nInsulanus, and several others, a great additional variety might be\nstated of rather remarkable cases. In the village of Earlish, parish of\nSnizort, in Skye, about fifty years ago, a cottar\u2019s wife was delivered of\na nice baby. Soon after the birth, the happy mother was visited by the\nwives of her neighbours, who came, according to the custom of the place\non such occasions, each with a gift of fowls, eggs, and such like. The\nbaby was admired as a nice infant, and the usual hopes were expressed\nthat it might be long spared to the parents. One female in a corner of\nthe apartment whispered in her neighbour\u2019s ear, that she was afraid\nthe infant would not be long spared, and that it would some day be the\ncause of excessive grief to the poor mother. On being questioned for the\nreason of such a statement, she said that she had a vision of the child\nall mangled, torn up, and bleeding. Her neighbour upbraided her for\nexpressing a thing so ridiculous in itself, and so very improbable. In\nthe course of a month or two, when the infant had progressed in health\nand strength to the desire of his parent\u2019s heart, he was laid to sleep\nin the cradle, and the mother, being alone at the time, embraced the\nopportunity of going to the well for a pitcher of water. After having\ntalked for a few minutes with a neighbour who had met her at the well,\nshe returned to her house, when, to her unspeakable horror, she found her\nbaby on the floor dead, mangled, torn to pieces, with the arms and face\neaten away. During the distracted mother\u2019s absence, a large brute of a\npig had been roaming about. It entered the deserted apartment, seized\nupon the innocent sleeping babe, and partially devoured it.\n\nAbout sixty years ago, one of the annual fairs was to be held at Portree,\nthe Capital of Skye, to which the natives were in the habit of resorting\nin hundreds from all quarters of the Island. In the East-side district\nof Kilmuir, about eighteen miles north of Portree, there lived at that\ntime a female advanced in years, who was reported to be possessed of\nthe faculty of second-sight. Some time previous to the date of the\nmarket, this woman was day after day sitting, sighing, and lamenting the\ncatastrophe, which she said was sure to take place, as she had seen a\nboat sinking in a storm, and so many people drowned. Few, however, paid\nany attention to the cause of her grief at the time, but there was reason\nafterwards to do so. A large boat left Portree on the market-day evening\nfor the East-side, which was literally crammed with people of all ages,\nanxious to get home. A storm got up, and all were consigned to a watery\ngrave.\n\nHere is another remarkable instance. A worthy parish minister in Skye,\nabout seventy years ago, went to visit a brother of his, a Captain\nMacleod, who had been ailing, and lived near Portree. Captain Macleod had\na numerous family of sons and daughters. In the evening, the minister\nmounted his horse to return home, a distance of about nine miles. The\nweather became so boisterous and stormy, that the good old gentleman\ndeemed it prudent to pass the night at Scorribreck, where Widow Nicolson\nand her family resided. She was a sister of the late Adjutant-General\nSir John Macdonald. Mrs. Nicolson welcomed her reverend guest, and was\ndelighted at his unexpected appearance. At that remote period most of the\nlarge farmers\u2019 dwellings in Skye, were comfortable thatched houses, with\ntrap-stairs to the upper flats, where they deposited all kinds of lumber.\nIn a certain corner up-stairs in this domicile, the parish mort-cloth\nwas kept for safety, as the burying-place was near by. Mrs. Nicolson\nascended the stairs on some business in the dark, and left the reverend\ngentleman with her family for a few minutes in the parlour. Immediately\nthereafter a scream was heard, instantly followed by the noise of a fall\non the upper floor. Two or three rushed up with a light, and found Mrs.\nNicolson in a fainting fit, quite insensible. On her recovering, and at a\nsubsequent hour of the evening, she reluctantly told her reverend friend\nthat she beheld a very brilliant light on the mort-cloth, which was\nspread on a table, and in the middle of the light she saw the distinct\nimage of his niece\u2019s face, a daughter of the said Captain Macleod. The\ncircumstance, no doubt, created some concern in the minds of the family\ncircle, but ere bed-time, the conversation turned on something else.\nShortly thereafter, however, the young lady alluded to, took ill, and\ndied, and her bier was the first to require the use of the mort-cloth in\nquestion after that eventful evening.\n\nAnother instance equally marvellous took place in the northern district\nof Skye, at a considerably later date than that of the event just\nrecorded. The parish clergyman on his rounds, visited the miller\u2019s house,\nand met the miller\u2019s wife evidently in a very excited state, standing\non the kitchen floor. In that part of the Island great quantities of\ntimber were frequently found on the sea-shore, drifted thither from\nwrecked vessels. On this occasion, the miller\u2019s kitchen was benched all\nround with batons and planks of timber, in order to be seasoned by the\nheat of the fire, which is placed in these dwellings in the middle of the\nfloor. The clergyman had scarcely time to speak, when the good-wife, a\nvery respectable woman, told him that she was always glad to see him, but\nparticularly so on this occasion. She explained that Christy Macleod, a\nfemale of known repute as a seer, had just been sitting on that plank,\nwarming herself by the fire, when she suddenly fainted and fell on the\nfloor. She further stated that she carried Christy ben the house, and\nlaid her on a bed until she would recover. \u201cBut,\u201d said the matron to\nthe minister, \u201cyou must go to see Christy, and insist upon her telling\nwhat she saw, as I am in terror that she had an unlucky sight of some\nof my own children.\u201d The minister very reluctantly complied, and, on\nentering the apartment, found Christy so far recovered as to bear being\nquestioned. He asked the cause of her ailment, and, in short, put the\nquery whether she had seen anything? She refused to reply, except by\nthe uttering of some evasive answers. He then told her to tell at once\nwhat she had seen, as otherwise he would not leave her until she did.\nEventually she expressed herself in timid, tremulous terms, and said,\nthat while seated on the wooden bench by the fire, she happened to cast\nher eyes upon a plank on the opposite side, and beheld stretched on it\nthe mangled, bleeding body of a lad, Macdonald, then alive and well.\nHaving told this, she solicited the minister not to divulge it. On his\nleaving the seer, he was instantly pounced upon by the landlady, and\nasked, in breathless anxiety, \u201cWhat did she see? What or whom did she\nsee?\u201d His reverence had no alternative but to tell the good matron, for\nthe comfort of herself and her domestic circle, what the dreaded woman\nhad revealed. All parties were then contented, and the affair looked on\nas a mere revery. Six weeks or so thereafter, there was a marriage in\nthe upper district of the parish, to which the young man, Macdonald, was\ninvited, and went. On returning home alone about midnight by a hilly\npathway, in the extreme darkness, he lost his way, fell over a precipice\nabout a thousand feet high, and was dashed to pieces in the clefts of\nthe debris below. He was eventually missed at home. Messengers were sent\nin quest of him, hither and thither, and when no tidings could be found\nconcerning him, the population of the district went forth in hundreds\non the search. After a day or two\u2019s minute ransacking of every hill and\ndale, lake and river, the mangled corpse was discovered by a boy, jammed\nhard and fast in a crevice at the base of the huge precipice already\nnamed. The crowd assembled around the shattered remains, and a cry was\nuttered as to what was best to be done? The torn body could hardly be\nhandled, and a proposal was immediately agreed to, that four men should\nrun to the miller\u2019s house for a door or plank, to convey the remains to\nthe father\u2019s home. This was done\u2014the men rushed forward to the miller\u2019s,\nand snatched away the identical plank on which the woman, Macleod, had\nseen the vision already related.\n\nMany similar instances of second-sight in the Western Isles are alleged\nto have existed, which as yet have not been recorded.\n\nIt is stated in the Statistical Account of Iona, that St. Columba was\nthe first on record who had the faculty of second-sight. He is said to\nhave told the victory of Aidan over the Picts and Saxons, on the very\ninstant it happened. The same authority states, that when St. Columba\nfirst attempted to build on Iona, the walls, by the operation of some\nevil spirit, fell down as fast as they were erected. Columba received\nsome supernatural information that they would never stand unless a human\nvictim was buried alive. According to one account, the lot fell on Oran,\nthe companion of the Saint, as the victim that was demanded for the\nsuccess of the undertaking. Others pretend that Oran voluntarily devoted\nhimself, and was interred accordingly. At the end of three days, Columba\nhad the curiosity to take a farewell look at his old friend, and caused\nthe earth to be removed accordingly. Oran raised his swimming eyes, and\nsaid, \u201cThere is no wonder in death, and hell is not as it is reported\u201d.\nThe Saint was so shocked at this monstrous impiety, that he instantly\nordered the earth to be flung in again, uttering the words, \u201cUir! Uir!\nair beul Orain! mu\u2019n labhair e tuilleadh comhraidh!\u201d\u2014that is, Earth!\nEarth! on the mouth of Oran, that he may blab no more! This passed into\na proverb, and is in use in the Highlands at the present day. It is not\nimprobable that the story was invented by some of Columba\u2019s Druidical\nenemies to expose him and his Christian doctrines to ridicule.\n\n\nSMALLER SUPERSTITIONS.\u2014Somewhat resembling this alleged faculty, yet\ndifferent from it, are certain prognostications of death, which are said\nto be seen in the shape of blue, quivering lights, resembling the feeble\nflame of a taper. These have been observed moving along in the course\nwhich some funeral procession would soon take, or perhaps twinkling in or\nabout the bed on which some individual was soon to die. Many intelligent\npeople firmly believe in the existence of these lights.\n\nSome years ago, if not even still, many in the Western Isles believed\nin the existence of the \u201cGruagach,\u201d a female spectre of the class of\nBrownies to which the Highland dairymaids made frequent libations\nof milk. The Gruagach is said to have been an innocent, supernatural\nvisitor, who frisked and gambolled about the cattle-pens and folds. She\nwas armed only with a pliable reed, with which she switched all who\nannoyed her by uttering obscene language, or would neglect to leave for\nher a share of the dairy produce. Even so late as 1770, the dairymaids\nwho attended a herd of cattle in the Island of Trodda, at the north end\nof Skye, were in the habit of pouring daily a quantity of milk on a\nhollow stone for the Gruagach. Should they neglect to do so, they made\nsure of feeling the effects of her wand next day. The Rev. Dr. Macqueen,\nthen minister of Kilmuir, of whom Dr. Johnson spoke so highly, and who\nis buried within a few yards of Flora Macdonald\u2019s grave, went purposely\nto Trodda to check this gross superstition. He might then have succeeded\nfor a time, but it is known that many believed in the existence of the\nGruagach long after that worthy clergyman had been gathered to his\nfathers. Besides the votaries of this ridiculous superstition, there are\nothers who confidently believe in the existence of an evil eye, by which\ncattle and all kinds of property are said to suffer injury. The glance of\nan evil eye is, therefore, very much dreaded. It deprives cows of their\nmilk, and milk of its nutritive qualities, and renders it unfit for the\nvarious preparations made from it. This superstition can certainly lay\nclaim to great antiquity. Virgil, Ossian, and other writers, seem to have\ndreaded the effects of it, at least they allude to its existence. Virgil\nsays (Eclog. III., 103)\u2014\n\n    Nescio quis teneros oculus mihi fascinat agnos.\n    (I know not what malignant eye bewitches my tender lambs).\n\nBut equally superstitious are the means resorted to for the cure of these\nsad afflictions, such as the use of certain charms, the repetition of\nstrange rhymes, putting living trout in a portion of the injured milk,\nand many other such ridiculous appliances.\n\nThere is an endless variety of superstitions in regard to things which\nare unlucky or unfortunate to be done. It is unfortunate if a stranger\ncounts the number of your sheep, cattle, or children. It is quite common\nif one asks, \u201cHow many children have you?\u201d to add the words, \u201cBless them\u201d\nto the question. It is unlucky for an odd number to sit at a table,\nsuch as 7, 9, 11; and 13 in particular is so unfortunate that unless\nrectified, one of the party is sure to die that year. It is unlucky if\na stranger walks across a parcel of fishing-rods on the sea beach, over\nropes, oars, or sailing gear, when a boat is about to go to sea. Means\nare used for getting the stranger to retrace his steps. It is unlucky\nto drink the health of a company, or to serve them round a table except\nfrom left to right, as the sun goes in the firmament, or the hands on\nthe dial-plate of a watch. It is unlucky, in setting off, to row in a\nboat, or to commence a procession at a marriage or funeral, but to the\nright. It is unlucky to hear the cuckoo, or see a foal or snail before\nbreakfast. As to this there is a Gaelic rhyme as follows, viz.:\u2014\n\n    Chunnaic mi an searrachan \u2019sa chulaobh rium,\n    Chunnaic mi an t-seilcheag air an lic luim;\n    Chual mi\u2019 a\u2019 chuag gun ghreim \u2019nam bhroinn,\n    Is dh\u2019 aithnich mi fein nach rachadh a\u2019 bhliadhn\u2019 so leam.\n\nThese lines may be translated\u2014\n\n    With its back to me turn\u2019d I beheld the young foal,\n    And the snail on the bare flag in motion so slow;\n    Without tasting of food, lo! the cuckoo I heard,\n    Then judged that the year would not prosperously go.\n\nIt is unlucky to stand between an epileptic man and fire or water. In\nShetland there was once an idea that it was unlucky to save drowning\nmen. It is unlucky to throw out water after sunset, and before sunrise.\nIt is unlucky to have a grave open upon Sunday, as another will be dug\nduring the week for some of the family. If a corpse does not stiffen\nafter death, there will be another death in the family before the end\nof that year. Fires and candles afford presages of death. Long hollow\ncoals spirted from the fire are coffins. Winding-sheets are indicated\nwhen the tallow of the candle curls away from the flame. The howling of\na dog at night, and the resting of a crow or magpie on the house-top,\nare warnings of death. It is unlucky to weigh infants; they are sure to\ndie. Cats sleeping near infants suck their breath and kill them. When\nchildren begin to walk they must go up-stairs before they go down-stairs,\notherwise they will not thrive in the world, and if there is no stair\nthey should climb a chair. A mother after the birth of a child must not\ngo outside beyond her house door until she goes to be kirked. If you rock\nan empty cradle you will soon rock a new baby in it. It is quite curious\nto see the face of alarm with which a poor woman, with her tenth baby in\nher arms, will dash across the room to prevent \u201cthe baby but one\u201d from\nthe dangerous amusement of rocking the empty cradle. It is unlucky that\na stray swarm of bees should settle on your premises unclaimed by their\nowner. It is customary in many parts of England when a death takes place\nto go and tell the bees of it, to ask them to the funeral, and to fix a\npiece of crape upon their hives! It is unlucky to catch a sight of the\nnew moon through a window. It is a token of fine weather to see the old\nmoon in the arms of the new; and so is the turning up of the horns of the\nnew moon, as they retain the water which would fall to the earth if the\nhorns were turned down. It is unlucky to enter a house, which you are\nto occupy, by the back door. If, when fishing you count what you have\ntaken, you will catch no more. If, you break your bones by accident, it\nis unlucky and useless to employ a physician or surgeon to bind them, as\nit is believed that, however skilful these may be in curing all other\nmaladies, they know nothing whatever about the setting of broken bones.\n\nMany other remarkable cures are resorted to, such as healing sore eyes\nby putting gold rings in the ears, by rubbing them with jewels of pure\ngold, and by repeating certain rhymes. Warts are removed by washing them\nin rain-water or swine\u2019s blood. Serpents\u2019 heads are preserved for years\nto heal their own sting wounds. If a man, cow, or any animal be stung\nby a serpent, let the dried serpent\u2019s head be cast into water, let the\nwound be washed in it, and it soon heals. Fried mice are a specific for\nsmall-pox. Whooping-cough is cured by whatever is recommended by a person\nriding a piebald horse. A spider put into a goose-quill, well sealed, and\nput round a child\u2019s neck, will cure it of the thrush. In the Island of\nSoa, near Skye, it was customary when the head of the family died to have\na large lock of hair cut off his head and nailed fast to the door-lintel\nto keep off the fairies. Sailors are sometimes very superstitious. They\ngreatly dread the stormy petrel, or Mother Carey\u2019s chickens, as they\nflutter at night around their masts and yards. These birds are regarded\nas objects of superstitious fear, believing that they are possessed of\nsupernatural agency in creating danger for the poor, hard-toiled mariner.\nAt one time, a horse-shoe nailed to the mast of the vessel was great\nsecurity against all evil agencies, such as witches, petrels, fairies,\nand evil eyes. To recapitulate all such superstitious frets would be\nan endless task. There are many similar fanciful notions in regard to\nbirths, baptisms, marriages, and deaths, but it is impossible to enlarge\nmuch upon them. It was once prevalent when a child was baptised, that the\ninfant was neither washed nor bathed that night, for fear of washing off\nthe baptismal water before it had slept under it. Frequently too, the\nwater used in baptism was bottled up as an effectual recipe for various\ndisorders. Parents took all possible care lest their female infants\nshould be baptised with the same water used for male children, for if\nthey should, the females would grow up with beards! A few years ago, I\nwas baptising two or three children at the same time, in a village near\nby, when the first presented was a boy, and the next a girl. After the\nwater had been sprinkled on the face of the boy, and when I was about to\ndo the same to the girl, an old worthy granny present hastily snatched\naway the bowl containing the water, poured it out, and filled it afresh,\nmuttering aloud, \u201cNa leigeadh Ni Math gum biodh feusag air mo chaileig\u201d\n(Goodness forbid that my lassie should have a beard).\n\nIt is reckoned very unlucky in some parts of the country to have a child\nleft unbaptised beyond the year in which it was born. For example, should\na child come into the world on the 30th December, 1877, the parents would\nfeel very uncomfortable, and consider it a neglect of duty, if they did\nnot get the infant baptised either on that or next day.\n\nEven in England peculiar frets are still observed in regard to\ninfants. In a late number of an English paper, the following paragraph\nappeared:\u2014\u201cA certain act of barbarity and superstition is practised\nin many parts of the country. Children who are sickly are taken to a\nwoman for the purpose of being cut for a supposed disease, called the\nSpinnage. The infants are, on a Monday morning, taken to this woman,\nwho, for threepence, with a pair of scissors, cuts through the lobe of\nthe right ear, then makes a cross with the blood upon the forehead and\nbreast of the child. On the following Monday the same barbarous ceremony\nis performed upon the left ear, and on the succeeding Monday the right\near is again doomed to undergo the same ceremony. In some cases, it is\ndeemed necessary to perform this ridiculous operation nine times. It is\nnot the lower classes alone who are chargeable with this and similar\nfollies. Some of the higher classes likewise observe them. It is quite\ncommon to make the children partake of a roasted mouse as a cure for\nwhooping-cough.\u201d\n\nThe cold-bath was so much esteemed by the Highlanders in ancient times\nthat, as soon as an infant was born, he was plunged into a running\nstream, and then carefully wrapped in a warm blanket. Immediately\nthereafter, the little creature was forced to swallow a large quantity\nof fresh butter. It was made into a ball of no ordinary size, and was\npressed down its little throat, in a manner sufficient to create a fear\nof the poor child being suffocated. Another fret was observed, that\nimmediately after a child was baptised, he behoved to be secured from the\npower of the fairies, and of all evil spirits. For this purpose a basket\nwas taken, which was half filled with bread and cheese, wrapped up in a\nclean linen cloth. Over this parcel the child was laid as if in a cradle.\nThe basket was then taken up by the oldest female in the family circle\nat the time, carried three times round the fire, and then suspended for\na few seconds from the crook that hung over the fire. The child was then\nremoved from its temporary berth, while the bread and cheese were divided\namong the company present, as nourishment to guarantee their health for\nanother year. There was still another superstition, that soon after the\nbirth of a child, when all the duties necessary on such occasions had\nbeen performed, it was customary to make a dish of \u201ccrowdie\u201d by mixing\noaten meal and water together, of which each of the company required\nto take three horn-spoonfuls, for the protection of the infant. This\nsuperstition was, until of late, very prevalent in the Highlands of\nPerthshire. It was likewise the custom that the mother of the infant dare\nnot perform any work, or engage herself in any of her domestic affairs,\nuntil she had been kirked. After she had performed this religious\nrite, and had dealt out a portion of bread and cheese to every one she\nmet on her way home from the place of worship, she was invested with\nfree liberty to attend to her ordinary household concerns. Until then,\nhowever, everything she did, and every object she handled, was reckoned\nunclean, and would not be meddled with by any in the family circle.\n\nIt was also alleged by carpenters that, while in bed at night, they heard\ntheir saws, hammers, and planes at work before being employed next day\nin making a coffin. Highlanders in particular speak confidently of the\nexpected nature of the weather, from the figure, appearance, colour,\ncoming, and stages of the moon. They avoid slaughtering sheep, pigs, and\ncattle in the wane of the moon, as the meat would shrink in cooking.\nIn the same way they study to shear corn, to mow grass, to fell trees,\nand to cut peats and turf in the wane of the moon, as the best time for\ndrying and seasoning these commodities.\n\nThere was a superstition in Ross-shire whereby it was believed that the\nsoul did not finally and completely leave the body until the corpse had\nbeen laid in the grave. There was a similar superstition in Perthshire,\nwhereby it was believed that at the moment of dissolution, whether by\nnatural death or by accident the soul or spirit was visibly seen leaving\nthe body in the shape of a little creature like a bee. Witches frequently\nput themselves into the appearance of animals, such as a hare, but when\narrows were pointed at them, barbed with silver, or muskets loaded with\nsilver coins for shot, the semblance of the hare disappeared at once, and\nsome shrivelled, decrepit hag of a witch wife stood before the shooter in\nfull size!\n\nThe natives of Easter Ross, particularly the fishermen on the sea-coast\nfrom Tain to Cromarty Bay, are influenced to this day by remarkable\nsuperstitious frets which they observe on marriage occasions. It is the\npractice among them that couples, once the marriage festivities are past,\nmust go to be kirked on the Sunday. This devout duty is easily performed\nwhen there is but one marriage in the place. But should there be two\nor three, as frequently occurs, in the same week, the kirking affair\nis entirely altered, and becomes a matter of no small difficulty and\nconcern. Sabbath comes, and each marriage party, bridegroom and bride,\nwith their attendants, prepare themselves for the parish church; duly\narrive there in good time; and perhaps desert their usual seats, through\na desire to occupy those that happen to be nearest to the door. The\nsermon is impatiently listened to, when, without waiting perhaps for the\nbenediction, the parties rush out, like so many bees from a hive, and run\nhomewards as fast as their feet can carry them. Thus, one marriage party\nstrives with another, in running the lucky race. Frequently, in their\nhaste, the bridegroom outruns the bride and others of the party. All this\narises from an old superstition, that the marriage party which first\narrives at home from the kirking are sure to be prosperous and happy\nin after life, whereas those left behind, should it only be a distance\nof a few yards, run the risk of becoming the victims of misfortune and\nadversity.\n\nThe Highlanders, as well as many other ancient tribes, looked upon\ncertain days as lucky or unlucky in themselves. The 14th of May was\nconsidered an untoward day; so much so, that the day of the week on\nwhich the 14th day of May fell, was deemed unlucky during the whole of\nthat year, and nothing of consequence was undertaken on that day. May\nand January were considered unfortunate months to marry in, as also the\nFriday of any week.\n\nOn the death of a Highlander, many silly superstitions were practised. In\nsome districts it was believed that when death ensued, the spirit still\nkept close to the body, as if it were to guard it until after the burial,\nwhen dust was consigned to dust, and ashes to ashes. The relatives,\nfriends, and neighbours of the deceased, deemed it their duty likewise to\nwatch the corpse of the dead, both by night and by day. This was called\nthe \u201clate wake,\u201d at which the most absurd fooleries were practised,\nsuch as music, called the \u201ccoronach,\u201d dancing, leaping, riddles, games,\nsinging of songs, and the most boisterous revelry. These manners and\ncustoms are now, however, almost extinct. There are many superstitious\nobservances at certain seasons of the year, of which we must treat\nbriefly.\n\nI. \u201cLa Calluinn\u201d and \u201cOidhche Challuinn\u201d (New-Year\u2019s Day and New-Year\u2019s\nNight). Besides the \u201cfirst-footing,\u201d which is a common practice still,\nthe Highlanders observed many in-door and out-door ceremonies. On\nNew-Year\u2019s Eve, they surrounded each other\u2019s houses, carrying dried\ncow-hides, and beating them with sticks, thrashing the walls with clubs,\nall the time crying, shouting, and repeating rhymes. This is supposed to\noperate as a charm against fairies, demons, and spirits of every order.\nThey provide themselves with the flap, or hanging part of the hide on the\ncow\u2019s neck, which they called \u201ccaisean-uchd,\u201d and which they singed in\nthe fire and presented to the inmates of the family, one after another,\nto smell, as a charm against all injuries from fairies and spirits. A\nspecimen of the rhymes repeated, with loud chorus, is as follows:\u2014\n\n    Mor-phiseach air an tigh,\n    Piseach air an teaghlach,\n    Piseach air gach cabar,\n    Is air gach ni saoghalt\u2019 ann.\n\n    Piseach air eich a\u2019s crodh,\n    Piseach air na caoraich,\n    Piseach air na h-uile ni,\n    \u2019S piseach air ar maoin uil\u2019.\n\n    Piseach air beann an tighe,\n    Piseach air na paistean,\n    Piseach air gach caraide,\n    Mor-phiseach agus slaint dhuibh.\n\n    Great good luck to the house,\n    Good luck to the family,\n    Good luck to every rafter of it,\n    And to every worldly thing in it.\n\n    Good luck to horses and cattle,\n    Good luck to the sheep,\n    Good luck to every thing,\n    And good luck to all your means.\n\n    Luck to the good-wife,\n    Good luck to the children,\n    Good luck to every friend,\n    Great fortune and health to all.\n\nII. \u201cDi-domhnuich-caisg\u201d (Easter Sunday). This period is observed in the\nHighlands by preparing and eating certain kinds of pan-cakes made of\neggs, milk, meal, or flour. Together with this the young people provide\nthemselves with large quantities of hard-boiled dyed eggs, which they\nroll about, and finally eat. The English hot cross buns at Easter are\nonly the cakes which the Saxons ate in honour of their goddess \u201cEastre,\u201d\nand from which the Christian clergy, who were unable to prevent people\nfrom eating them, sought to expel the Paganism by marking them with the\ncross. Hence the hot cross buns.\n\nIII. \u201cLa Bealtuinn\u201d (May-day, Whitsuntide). The demonstrations of this\nday are now all but extinct. The first of May was held as a great\nDruidical festival in honour of the mighty Asiatic god, Belus. Fires\nwere kindled on the mountain-tops, through which all the cattle of the\ncountry were driven to preserve them till the next May-day. On this day\nall the hearth-fires were extinguished, in order to be kindled from this\npurifying flame. Hence the word Bealtuinn is \u201cBeil-teine,\u201d the fire of\nBelus. So that \u201cLa Bealtuinn\u201d (Whitsunday) is \u201cthe day of Belus\u2019 fire\u201d.\nOf old in the Highlands the young people went to the moors on this day,\nmade a circular table on the grass, cut a trench around it, kindled\na huge fire, baked a large cake, which they cut into as many similar\npieces as there were persons present. They daubed one of the pieces with\ncharcoal, and made it perfectly black. Then they put all the bits of cake\ninto a bonnet, from which all of them, blindfolded, drew a bit.\n\nWhoever drew the black bit was the person who was doomed to be sacrificed\nto Baal; and in order to avoid the execution of this doom, he was\ncompelled to leap six times over the flames. Even in Ayrshire, Baal\u2019s\nfire was kindled till about the year 1790.\n\n\nHALLOWE\u2019EN.\u2014The only other season noted for superstitious observances\nis that of Hallowe\u2019en. Hallowe\u2019en in Gaelic means \u201cSamhuinn,\u201d that is\n\u201cSamhtheine,\u201d the fire of peace. It is a Druidical festival, at which\nthe fire of peace was regularly kindled. There is no night in the year\nwhich the popular imagination has stamped with a more peculiar character\nthan Hallowe\u2019en. It was the night, above all others, when supernatural\ninfluences prevailed. It was the night for the universal walking abroad\nof all sorts of spirits, fairies, and ghosts, all of whom had liberty on\nthat night. It was customary in many parts of Scotland to have hundreds\nof torches prepared in each district for weeks before Hallowe\u2019en, so\nthat, after sunset on that evening, every youth able to carry a blazing\ntorch, or \u201csamhnag,\u201d ran forth to surround the boundaries of their farms\nwith these burning lights, and thereby protect all their possessions from\nthe fairies. Having thus secured themselves by these fires of peace,\nall the households congregated to practice the various ceremonies and\nsuperstitious rites of that eventful evening. As these are pretty fully\nalluded to in Burns\u2019 poem of \u201cHallowe\u2019en,\u201d it is unnecessary to enlarge\nhere. There is still a remarkable uniformity in these fireside customs\nall over the kingdom. Nuts and apples are everywhere in requisition.\nThese the old matron of the house has generally in store beforehand for\nthe youngsters\u2019 good luck on that night, or as the Ayrshire Bard has so\nnaturally expressed it\u2014\n\n    The auld guidwife\u2019s weel hoordit nits\n      Are round and round divided,\n    And mony lads\u2019 and lasses\u2019 fate\n      Are there that night decided.\n    Some kindle couthie, side by side,\n      And burn thegither trimly;\n    Some start awa\u2019 wi\u2019 saucy pride,\n      And jump out-owre the chimley,\n              Fu\u2019 high that night.\n\nThe ceremonies of the evening were numerous\u2014such as, ducking for apples\nin a tub of water, the pulling of kail stocks, the three dishes or\n\u201cluggies,\u201d the wetting of the shirt sleeve, the sowing of hemp seed,\npulling the stalks of corn, throwing the clue of blue yarn into the\npit of the kiln, the white of eggs put into a glass of water, reading\nof fortunes in tea-cups; these and many more were the superstitious\nceremonies of Hallowe\u2019en.\n\nPerhaps there is no part of the Highlands of Scotland where the practice\nof using the flaming torches of Hallowe\u2019en is so much observed, even\nstill, as in the braes of Aberdeenshire. Not later than last year,\nour Gracious Majesty, no doubt in order to preserve those relics of\nancient times, caused these blazing torches to be kindled by the youth\nof the place, around Balmoral Castle. The torches are considered by the\nnatives to be the means of protecting, not only their farms and other\npossessions from the ravages of the fairies, but likewise mothers and\nnewly-born infants. While the landed possessions were duly surrounded\nthat evening by the torch-bearers, the dwellings where children had born\nwere encompassed with still greater care, for the safety of the mothers\nand their young offspring, which the fairies were on the watch to snatch\naway. The torch-bearers used great care in carrying their fire in the\nright-hand, and therewith running around their premises from right to\nleft, thus observing the \u201cDeas-iuil,\u201d or the right hand direction. The\n\u201cTuath-iuil,\u201d being the left-hand, or wrong direction, would render\ntheir precautions entirely abortive. In this manner they protected\ntheir properties, and prevented the fairy thieves from snatching away\nthe unbaptised infants from their mothers\u2019 bed, placing in their room\ntheir own ugly and deformed children. Martin, in his _History of the\nWestern Isles_, informs us, \u201cThat this was considered an effectual means\nto preserve both the mother and infant from the power of evil spirits,\nwho are ready at such times to do mischief, and sometimes carry away\nthe infants, and return poor, meagre skeletons; and these infants have\nvoracious appetites. In this case it was usual for those who believed\nthat their children were thus taken away, to dig a grave in the fields\non quarter-day, and there to lay the fairy-skeleton till next morning,\nat which time the parents went to the place, where they doubted not to\nfind their own child instead of the skeleton.\u201d They had also, in other\nlocalties, recourse to the barbarous charm of burning, with a live coal,\nthe toes of the suffering infant, the supposed changeling. The Fairies\nwere not contented with abstracting handsome children\u2014beautiful maidens\nand wives sometimes disappeared.\n\n\u201cThe Miller of Menstrie,\u201d in Clackmannan, who possessed a charming\nspouse, had given offence to the fairy court, and was, in consequence,\ndeprived of his fair helpmate. His distress was aggravated by hearing his\nwife singing in the air\u2014\n\n    Oh! Alva woods are bonnie,\n      Tillicoultry hills are fair;\n    But when I think o\u2019 the bonnie braes o\u2019 Menstrie,\n      It mak\u2019s my heart aye sair.\n\nAfter many attempts to procure her restoration, the miller chanced\none day, in riddling some stuff at the mill-door, to use a posture of\nenchantment, when the spell was dissolved, and the matron fell into his\narms. The wife of the Blacksmith of Tullibody was carried up the chimney,\nthe fairies, as they bore her off, singing\u2014\n\n    Deidle linkum doddie;\n    We\u2019ve gotten drucken Davie\u2019s wife,\n    The smith o\u2019 Tullibody.\n\n\u201cThose snatched to Fairyland,\u201d says Dr. Buchan,[10] \u201cmight be recovered\nwithin a year and a day, but the spell for the recovery was only potent\nwhen the fairies made, on Hallowe\u2019en, their annual procession.\u201d Sir\nWalter Scott relates the following:\u2014\u201cThe wife of a Lothian farmer had\nbeen watched by the fairies. During the year of probation, she had\nrepeatedly appeared on Sundays in the midst of her children, combing\ntheir hair. On one of these occasions she was accosted by her husband,\nwhen she instructed him how to rescue her at the next Hallowe\u2019en\nprocession. The farmer conned his lesson carefully, and, on the appointed\nday, proceeded to a plot of furze to await the arrival of the procession.\nIt came, but the ringing of the fairy bridles so confused him, that\nthe train passed ere he could sufficiently recover himself to use the\nintended spell. The unearthly laugh of the abductors, and the passionate\nlamentations of his wife informed him that she was lost to him for ever.\u201d\n\n\u201cA woman,\u201d says Dr. Buchan, \u201cwho had been conveyed to fairyland, was\nwarned by one she had formerly known as a mortal, to avoid eating and\ndrinking with her new friends for a certain period. She obeyed, and when\nthe time expired, she found herself on earth restored to the society of\nmankind.\u201d\n\nA matron on another occasion was carried to fairyland to nurse her\nnew-born child, which had been previously abducted. She had not been\nlong in her enchanted dwelling when she furtively anointed an eye with\nthe contents of a boiling cauldron. She now discovered that what had\npreviously seemed a gorgeous palace, was, in reality, a gloomy cavern.\nShe was dismissed, but one of the wicked wights, when she demanded her\nchild, spat in her eye, and extinguished its light for ever.\n\nAbout the middle of last century, a clergyman at Kirkmichael, Perthshire,\nwhose faith was more regulated by the scepticism of philosophy, than\nthe credulity of superstition, would not be prevailed upon to yield his\nassent to the opinion of the times. At length, however, he felt from\nexperience that he doubted what he ought to have believed. One night, as\nhe was returning home at a late hour, from a meeting of Presbytery, and\nthe customary dinner which followed, he was seized by the fairies, and\ncarried aloft into the air. Through fields of ether and fleecy cloud he\njourneyed many a mile, descrying the earth far distant below him, and no\nbigger than a nut-shell. Being thus sufficiently convinced of the reality\nof their existence, they let him down at the door of his own house, where\nhe afterwards often recited to the wondering circle, the marvellous tale\nof his adventure. Some people will believe that \u201cspirits\u201d of a different\nsort had a little to do with the worthy minister\u2019s conviction, and that\nhis \u201cain gude grey mare\u201d had more to do with bringing him to his own\ndoor than the fairies.\n\nIt is difficult to describe a Hallowe\u2019en as enjoyed by a family circle\nin olden times. An eye-witness has given the following account of\nit:\u2014\u201cWhen I entered the house, the tide of enjoyment was rolling on in\nfull career. I listened and thought I heard an unusual noise in the\napartment immediately above. The noise, however, was by no means of an\nalarming kind. It appeared to be the obstreperous romping of a parcel of\nyoungsters. I found that the ladies of the house had brought together a\nnumber of young friends to burn nuts and duck for apples. I ascertained\nthat previous to my appearance, they had already gone through the greater\npart of the ceremonies of the evening. They had pulled stocks, burnt\nnuts, and were now collected with earnest and somewhat awe-stricken\nfaces, round a table on which stood two or three wine-glasses full\nof pure water. They were, in fact, about to commence the ceremony of\ndropping the egg\u2014a ceremony which is performed by puncturing a fresh egg\nwith a pin, when the person whose destiny is to be read holds it over a\nglass of pure water, into which he allows a few drops from the egg to\nfall. The glass is then held up to the candle, and some important event\nin the future life of the inquirer is found exhibited hieroglyphically\nin the glass,\u2014the egg droppings assuming an endless variety of shapes,\nin which the skilful in these matters discover a resemblance to things,\nwhich, by association, clearly point out coming circumstances and\nevents. All this was done by an old, weird sybil, who had been invited\nfor the special purpose of reading to the young folks the various signs\nand indications of this privileged right. We all tried our fortunes\nafter the most approved manner of egg-dropping, by the direction of the\nwithered sybil already alluded to, and who, indeed, looked the very\n\u2018beau ideal\u2019 of a witch, or fortune-teller of coming events. She was\nold, shrivelled, and haggard\u2014had a shrill, sharp voice, and was withal\nmarvellously loquacious. She seemed to be deeply in earnest, and to be\nstrongly impressed with the solemnities which were going forward, and was\nmore than once highly displeased with what she considered our irreverence\nfor these matters, and the unbecoming and ill-timed levity with which\nwe heard each other\u2019s fortunes foretold. We had all now tried our luck,\nwith various results, but there was one young gentleman, who, I thought,\nseemed rather disinclined to go through the ceremony\u2014and indeed, he\nfinally endeavoured to back out altogether by a forced joke. We all urged\nhim on, however, and at length fairly drove him to the experiment. \u2018Come\nawa, come awa, my bonny man,\u2014excuse me for speaking that way, but ye ken\nI\u2019ve kent ye sin ye was a bairn, and hae dandled ye mony a time on my\nknee. Come awa, and lat\u2019s see what luck is to be yours. I\u2019m sure it\u2019ll be\ngowd in goppins, and true love to brook it\u2014a bonnie lady wi\u2019 a bonnier\ntocher.\u2019 Whilst the old woman was speaking, the youth, having advanced\nclose to the table, was in the act of dropping, with rather an unsteady\nhand, the egg into the glass. This done: \u2018Here Janet,\u2019 he said, with an\naffected laugh, and at the same time handing the glass to her across the\ntable\u2014\u2018Now, give me all the good things of this life, let not one be\nawanting on your peril.\u2019 Well, all awaited in silence the announcement of\nour friend\u2019s future fortune, as we felt a degree of interest, nay of awe,\nstealing in upon us, which gradually allayed the light spirit with which\nwe had entered the apartment. The old woman had now gently raised the\nglass between her eye and the candle, and having peered through it for a\nsecond\u2014\u2018Eh! gude guide us, Sirs,\u2019 she exclaimed, \u2018Gude guide us, what\u2019s\nthis we hae here; but it canna be, it canna be, let me see,\u2019 and she\nlooked with an increased intensity at the fatal signs. \u2018Ay! ay!\u2019 she said\nagain, \u2018it\u2019s but owre true, my bairn, my bairn,\u2019 she added, and laying\ndown the glass on the table. \u2018Are ye sure it was your glass ye gae me?\u2019\n\u2018Sure enough, Janet, sure enough, what\u2019s all this fuss about?\u2019 \u2018What is\nit, Janet, what is\u2019t, what is\u2019t?\u2019 now burst from both old and young, all\nbeing wound up to a pitch of the most intense interest to know what was\nthat fate which Janet\u2019s expressions so particularly and fearfully hinted\nat. \u2018I insist on knowing,\u2019 said the young gentleman, striking his hand\non the table with a sort of good-natured energy, for he affected to be\nlaughing at the time. \u2018I insist upon it,\u2019 he said, \u2018for the edification\nof all present. Come then, Janet, any thing you like short of premature\ndeath and ruin, and crossed love.\u2019 \u2018But it\u2019s short o\u2019 neither, my bairn!\nAlas! it\u2019s short o\u2019 neither,\u2019 said the old woman gravely and seriously.\n\u2018It\u2019s indeed short o\u2019 neither\u2014there\u2019s a winding sheet there wi\u2019 a fearful\nrent in it, and that ye ken, betokens a violent death; there\u2019s a\u2019\u2014here,\nperceiving that things were getting rather serious, I suddenly burst in\nwith an affected shout of hilarity, overturned the glass, talked loudly\nand obstreperously, and insisted upon our adjourning to the apartment we\nhad left. So, with a wild, but assumed glee, we hurriedly descended to\nthe room below.\n\n\u201cWe endeavoured to enjoy ourselves, but still a weight seemed to have\nbeen laid upon the spirits of us all, which nothing could remove. We all\nfelt the absurdity of permitting such a frivolous circumstance as the\negg-dropping to depress us, but we could not hide from ourselves the fact\nthat it had depressed us, and more particularly so, as our excellent\nhost\u2014a kind-hearted youth of twenty-three\u2014had evidently taken the sybil\u2019s\nvaticinations too severely to heart. Under this feeling, and after our\nkind host had made such ineffectual attempts to restore the gaiety of the\nevening, the party broke up, each went his own way, and I retired to bed.\n\u2018Confound that old hag,\u2019 said my friend, just as I was about to part with\nhim for the night; \u2018confound her, she has spoiled our evening\u2019s enjoyment\nwith her nonsense. Wasn\u2019t it evident,\u2019 he said, \u2018that our friends were\ndamped by the fooleries up-stairs?\u2019 I said, avoiding a direct answer,\n\u2018that we had spent a very pleasant night, and if there was any feeling\nof the kind he alluded to, a night\u2019s sleep would entirely remove it.\u2019\nI met my friend and his aunts next morning at breakfast, where he more\nthan once alluded to the circumstance during our meal; and indeed\nfairly allowed that, in despite of the contempt with which he viewed\nsuch things, he could not help the idea of the rent winding-sheet still\nretaining its hold on his imagination.\n\n\u201cIt will serve no purpose to relate the history of this unfortunate\nyouth. The impression of the old hag\u2019s prediction never left him, but\nincreased in intensity as some years passed on. He became addicted to\nintemperate habits, and utterly heedless of his worldly affairs. He\nsquandered his patrimonial estate, and ruined his aged aunts, who lived\nwith him. Ultimately, he wandered in beggary to a neighbouring city, and\nfrequented the lowest haunts of dissipation, where he was found by a\nfriend, who had gone in search of him, but found exactly an hour after\nhe had swallowed a vial of laudanum. He opened his eyes, and knew his\nfriend, who had just procured a surgeon; but all in vain. His last words\nwere\u2014\u2018Oh! the winding sheet; the rent winding-sheet!\u2019 and in less than\ntwo hours, he gently expired.\u201d\n\nThere are instances of the minds of some having been unhinged through the\ninfluence of undue credulity in certain practices of this nature. It has\nfrequently happened besides, that personal injury has been inflicted,\nunintentionally no doubt, by the frolics and fooleries of that evening.\nThe throwing of cabbage runts and large round turnips down the \u201clums,\u201d\nor chimneys of the cottars\u2019 dwellings, have often struck violently\nupon the family group around the cosy ingle, and inflicted serious\ninjuries. The ceremony of throwing the clue of blue yarn into the pit\nof the kiln is one that has been attended with unhappy results. Kilns\nfor drying corn are generally erected in lonely places, apart from the\nother dwellings, owing to their liability to catch fire. On the other\nhand, the kiln-logies or pits, are dreary, dark, deep receptacles, of\ncircular form, narrow below and wide above, like hollow cones inverted.\nDuring the romping frivolities of the domestic circle in performing as\nmany of the games as they can, lots are cast as to the maiden who must\nresort to the kiln at the dark hour of midnight, with her clue of blue\nthread in her hand, to meet with her sweetheart, or to hear his name. The\nselected \u201class\u201d must go, and go alone, however dark and stormy the night.\nIt requires no small fortitude to enter the damp, dark kiln, to climb\nto the upper ridge of the kiln-logie, and to sit in that weird position\nin utter darkness. By this time, however, a number of the young men,\nunknown to the girl, had resorted to the kiln, and concealed themselves\nin and around the place. The girl, with palpitating heart cast her clue\nin to the kiln-logie, retaining the end of the thread in her hand, and\nexclaiming, with tremulous voice, \u201cCo e sud th\u2019air ceann mo r\u00f2pain?\u201d (Who\nis there at the end of my rope or thread?) Some of the youths, hidden in\nthe kiln, would enter the aperture or fire-place below, lay hold of the\nclue in the pit, and cry with a feigned-unnatural voice, \u201cI am here, what\nwant ye with me?\u201d \u201cWho art thou, and what thy name, bold swain?\u201d The\nreplies to this query were various. Some said that they were the girl\u2019s\nsweetheart, others, that they were wizards or beings of the supernatural\norder. Some even wickedly feigned to be the prince of darkness, when the\npreconcerted shrieking and howling of the hidden fellows so terrified the\ntrembling young female above, as to render her a helpless maniac for life.\n\n\nSACRED WELLS AND LOCHS.\u2014The veneration that has been paid for ages to\n\u201cSacred Wells,\u201d and the confidence placed in their charms all over the\nkingdom for the curing of diseases, both mental and bodily, falls next to\nbe noticed. It appears of old that if a well had a peculiar situation,\nif its waters were bright and clear, it was dedicated to some tutelary\nsaint, by honouring it with his name. Thus we have St. Fillan\u2019s, St.\nConel\u2019s, St. Catherine\u2019s, St. Bernard\u2019s, St. Cuthbert\u2019s wells, and a host\nof others in Scotland. We have hundreds of holy wells in England, such as\nSt. Chad\u2019s, St. John\u2019s, St. Mary\u2019s, St. Madern\u2019s wells, all remarkable\nfor something. We have St. Winifred\u2019s holy well in Flintshire, the\nmost famous in the three kingdoms, at whose shrine Geraldus Cambrensis\noffered his devotions in the twelfth century. The vast majority of holy\nwells were frequented for any disease, while some wells were visited\nfor special ailments, for the cure of which they had been celebrated.\nSt. Tegla\u2019s well was patronised by sufferers from the falling sickness;\nSt. John\u2019s, Balmanno, Kincardineshire, by rickety children, and sore\neyes. The waters of Trinity Gask, Perthshire, will render all baptised\ntherein proof against every plague. In the Island of St. Kilda there\nare two wells\u2014\u201cTobar nam buadh\u201d (the spring of virtues), celebrated for\ndeafness, and \u201cTobar a\u2019 chleirich\u201d (the clerk\u2019s well)\u2014which, though\ncovered twice a day by the sea, never becomes brackish. At Kirkden, in\nAngus, there is a well said to cure all sores, by mere washing, after the\napplications of skilled physicians had proved ineffectual. But by far\nthe most interesting wells in this country are those formerly resorted\nto for the cure of insanity. Of these may be mentioned St Fillan\u2019s well,\nnear Tyndrum, Perthshire, as well as St. Nun\u2019s celebrated fountain in\nCornwall. The curing process at St. Fillan\u2019s may be described as a\nspecimen. The lunatics were first plunged into the water, wherein they\nwere tumbled and tossed about rather roughly. They were then carried\ninto the adjacent Chapel of St. Fillan\u2019s and there secured with ropes,\ntied in a special way. A celebrated bell, which has a history of its\nown, was then placed with great solemnity on the patient\u2019s head. There\nthe poor creature was left all night alone in the dreary chapel, and,\nif in the morning he was found unloosed, hopes were entertained that he\nwould recover his reason, but the case was hopeless if found still in\nhis bonds. Very frequently the patients were released from the bonds and\ntormentors by death, caused by the cold, and all the cruelties inflicted\nupon them. St. Catherine\u2019s well, near Edinburgh, was regarded in olden\ntimes with great awe, because there appeared a black substance on its\nsurface which could be set on fire. This dark-looking, greasy substance\nor oil, was supposed to proceed from the strata of coal underneath, and\nit was believed to cure all sorts of cutaneous diseases. In the north\nend of Skye, and a little beneath the towering cliffs of the far-famed\nQuiraing, there is a conflux of pure, fresh-water springs, which form\na small elliptical pond of considerable depth. It is a beautiful spot,\npleasantly hemmed in with shrubs and bushes. It is called \u201cLoch Sianta,\u201d\nor the Holy Lake. Owing to the natural beauty of this little Hebridean\nSiloam, the natives conceived it to be favoured with its divinity, to\nwhom, in the days of darkness and superstition, they were extremely\npunctual in making offerings of various kinds. Invalids resorted thither,\ndrank of its waters, washed themselves therein, and received cures\nthereby for their mental and bodily ailments. These superstitions have,\nhowever, long ceased, and Loch Sianta, though beautiful as ever, has lost\nits ancient charms in this more enlightened age. On the first Sunday\nof May (old style) the well at \u201cCreagag\u201d or Craigie, in Munlochy Bay,\nwas believed to possess powerful charms against diseases, witchcraft,\nfairies and such like. For weeks before the time, old and young prepared\nfor their pilgrimage to this well. All behoved to bring their offerings.\nColoured threads and rags of cloth were brought in thousands, and hung\nupon the rocks and brushwood, as propitiatory gifts to the saint of the\nhealing waters. Even in St. Kilda the divinities of \u201cTobar nam buadh\u201d and\n\u201cTobar a\u2019 chleirich\u201d had to be propitiated by offerings, in the shape of\nshells, pins, needles, pebbles, coins, or rags, otherwise their tutelary\nsaint would be inexorable. So common, indeed, was this habit, that at\nthe Rugwell, near Newcastle, the shrubs and bushes near the spring were\ndensely covered with rags. And many of my readers are old enough to have\nseen crowds of the good citizens of the Highland Capital flocking on a\nMay morn eastward to the well at Culloden to taste of its waters, and to\ncover with their offerings of rags the branches of the surrounding trees.\nThere is a place beyond Kessock Ferry, near the point of Kilmuir, called\n\u201cCraigie-How,\u201d where there is a cave close to the sea-beach. In this cave\na little water falls down from the roof in drops on the stones below.\nThese drops are to this day considered a complete cure for deafness, if\nproperly applied. The patient lies down, and lays his head on the flags,\nand lets the water fall first into the one ear and then into the other.\nAfter some formalities are gone through, the patient rises, and the\ndeafness is believed to be gone!\n\nLoch Maree also has its Sacred well. The scenery of this part of\nGairloch, in Ross-shire, is unsurpassed, and perhaps rarely, if at all\nequalled, by that of any other quarter of the kingdom. The mountains\nwhich surround Loch Maree are of great height, and of beautifully\ncharacterised outline. Their lofty, jagged, serrated peaks, like\nMacbeth\u2019s witches, \u201cso withered and so wild in their attire,\u201d present the\nfinest specimens of the grand and picturesque to be met with anywhere.\nThe gigantic Slioch (Sliabhach) towering to a height of more than 4000\nfeet, is seen from afar, even from the remotest of the Northern Hebrides.\nWithin the bosom of these mountains lies enshrined the far-famed Loch\nMaree, with its many wooded islets, so varied in size and so different in\nappearance. About twenty-seven of these lie in a cluster near the middle\nof the lake (opposite the Loch Maree Hotel), which is eighteen miles in\nlength, and two in average breadth.\n\nDr. M\u2019Culloch writes\u2014\u201cIt was with some difficulty that we explored our\nway through the labyrinth of Islands in the centre of this lake; as they\nare little raised above the water, and covered with scattered firs,\nand thickets of birch, alder, and holly, while they are separated by\nnarrow and tortuous channels.\u201d The scene indeed, is so grand, wild, and\nfantastic, that words are at fault to describe it. Some years ago it was\nvisited by tourists, whose admiration of it cannot be better expressed\nthan in their own words. \u201cWhen this majestic scene first burst upon our\nview, the effect was as surprising and enchanting, as it was unexpected.\nThe lake sparkled bright in the evening sun. The lofty mountains were,\nat their summits, tinged with his golden rays, while in the hollows,\nand nearer their base, they were wreathed in mist and light clouds.\nThe effect of this was to increase to a prodigious degree, the apparent\nheight of the mountains, to make every hollow on their rugged sides, seem\na deep and inaccessible glen, and to enlarge to an almost immeasurable\nextent the lake, and the hills which rose at its extreme distance. It was\naltogether a scene of enchantment never to be forgotten. The white piqued\nsummits of the File-Mountain sparkled like the spires and turrets of an\nemerald palace, the work of some eastern magician, or of the genii of\nArabian romance, and forming a splendid contrast to the dark and rugged\nSlioch, which rises from the opposite side of the lake!\u201d\n\nIt is by no means surprising that Superstition, in her fantastic freaks,\nshould have, in ages long byegone, selected this weird locality for the\nmanifestation of not a few of her favourite proteg\u00e9s.\n\nThis superb sheet of water, from its almost unfathomable depth and other\ndimensions, furnished a befitting receptacle for brownies, water-horses,\nuruisgean, kelpies, and such like, while one of the islets of this\nbeautiful lake became the arena of various superstitious practices,\nand of curing therewith some of the most inveterate diseases. The\nlargest of these Islands are Eilean Suthain (St. Swithan\u2019s Isle),\nEilean Ruairidh Mhoir, and Eilean Ruairidh Bhig. Eilean Maree is the\nmost celebrated, and was, as some think, dedicated to the Virgin Mary;\nothers assert that it is named after St. Malrube; but more probably it\nis called after a Prince, or petty King who occupied the Island\u2014is,\nin short, \u201cLoch-ma-Righ,\u201d or Loch of my King. It has a burying-ground\nwith tombstones bearing inscriptions and hieroglyphical figures, which\ncannot now be deciphered. There is in the Island also a Sacred Well, in\nwhich, as in the pool of St Fillan\u2019s, lunatics were plunged and healed,\nand, in short, all manner of diseases cured. Around this sacred spot\nthe usual oblations were made to the tutelary saint, and coins of every\ndescriptions stuck into a tree that grew out of the bank. The sacred\nwater of this well was deemed so effectual in curing the insane, that\nthey were brought to it from the remotest quarters of the north. The\ntreatment they received was no doubt somewhat severe. Before they drank\nof its waters, it was reckoned indispensable to the permanency of their\ncure, that they should be dragged at the stern of a boat twice round the\nIsland, pulled by a rope made of horse-hair, fastened under their arms\nand around their shoulders. They were then dipped in the well, and drank\nof its water.\n\nHer Gracious Majesty, Queen Victoria, recently paid a visit to this\nromantic district, and held a religious service on the Island. In\ncommemoration of this welcome visit she has been pleased to sanction a\nmemorial inscription, by the proprietor of Gairloch, on a large stone\nopposite the Loch Maree Hotel, in which she took up her abode. In this\nmanner our beloved sovereign, whose eye is always keen to observe,\nwhose taste is exquisite to admire, and whose sensibility is great to\nappreciate all that is grand and beautiful in Nature\u2019s workmanship,\nhas conferred a lasting honour on the true-hearted Highland Chief, Sir\nKenneth S. Mackenzie, Baronet; on his loyal and delighted tenantry; as\nwell as on his romantic property in Gairloch.\n\nIt may be remarked that there is hardly a lake, or perennial fountain in\nScotland of any magnitude, but has certain traditional stories connected\nwith it, bearing reference to something wild or supernatural. The\ncelebrated Hugh Miller relates the following regarding the \u201cFiddler\u2019s\nWell,\u201d near Cromarty:\u2014\u201cThere is a little path which, in the eastern part\nof the parish, goes winding over rock and stone along the edge of a\nrange of low-browed precipices, till it reaches a fine spring of limpid\nwater, that comes gushing out of the side of a bank, covered with moss\nand daisies. This beautiful spring has been known to the people of the\ntown, for a century and more, by the name of Fiddler\u2019s Well. Its waters\nare said to be medicinal; and there is a tradition still preserved,\nof the circumstance through which its virtues were first discovered,\nand to which it owes its name. Two young men of the place, who were\nmuch attached to each other, were seized at nearly the same time by\nconsumption. In one the progress of the disease was rapid; he died two\nshort months after he was attacked by it; while the other, though wasted\nalmost to a shadow, had yet strength enough left to follow the corpse of\nhis companion to the grave. The surname of the survivor was Fiddler, a\nname still common among the seafaring men of the town. On the evening of\nthe interment, he felt oppressed and unhappy, his imagination was haunted\nby a thousand feverish shapes of open graves, with bones smouldering\nround their edges, and of coffins with the lids displaced; and after he\nhad fallen asleep, the images, which were still the same, became more\ngrisly and horrible. Towards morning, however, they had all vanished;\nand he dreamed that he was walking alone by the sea-shore in a clear\nbeautiful day in summer. Suddenly, as he thought, some person stepped\nup behind, and whispered into his ear, in the voice of his deceased\ncompanion, \u2018Go on, Willie, I shall meet you at Stormy\u2019. There is a rock\nin the neighbourhood of Fiddler\u2019s Well, so called from the violence with\nwhich the sea beats against it, when the wind blows strongly from the\neast. On hearing the voice, he turned round, and seeing no one, he went\non as he thought, to the place named, in the hope of meeting with his\nfriend, and sat down on a bank to wait for his coming; but he waited\nlong, lonely and dejected; and then remembering that he for whom he\nwaited was dead, he burst into tears. At this moment, a large field-bee\ncame humming from the west, and began to fly round his head. He raised\nhis hand to brush it away; it widened its circle, and then came humming\nin to his ear as before. He raised his hand a second time, but the bee\ncould not be scared off; it hummed ceaselessly round and round him, until\nat length its murmurings seemed to be fashioned into words, articulated\nin the voice of his deceased companion. \u2018Dig, Willie, and drink,\u2019 it\nsaid, \u2018Dig, Willie, and drink.\u2019 He, accordingly, set himself to dig, and\nno sooner had he torn a sod out of the bank, than a spring of clear water\ngushed from the hollow; and the bee, taking a wider circle, and humming\nin a voice of triumph that seemed to emulate the sound of a trumpet,\nflew away. He looked after it, but as he looked, the images of his dream\nbegan to mingle with those of the waking world; the scenery of the hill\nseemed obscured by a dark cloud, in the centre of which there glimmered a\nfaint light; the rocks, the sea, the long declivity faded into the cloud;\nand turning round, he saw only a dark apartment, and the first beams of\nmorning shining in at the window. He rose, and after digging the well,\ndrank of the water, and recovered. And its virtues are still celebrated;\nfor though the water be only simple water, it must be drunk in the\nmorning, and as it gushes out of the bank; and with pure air, exercise,\nand early rising for its auxiliaries, it continues to work cures.\u201d[11]\n\nIt has been remarked, that almost all our lakes, fountains, pools,\nwaterfalls, rocky crevices, and caves, have been tenanted, by\nsuperstition, with water-horses, kelpies, uruisgean, and brownies. Of\nthis there are many instances in the Highland districts of Perthshire,\nwhich are now made classic ground by the magic pen of the author\nof Waverley. Beinn Venue is a lofty mountain which rises from the\nsouth-east shore of Loch Katrine. The celebrated \u201cCoir-nan-Uruisgean,\u201d\nor Goblin\u2019s Cave, is situated at its base. It is guarded by precipitous\nrocks, which lie strewed in immense fragments on every side, and this\nwell-defended corrie or cave, affords a safe asylum for foxes, badgers,\nand wild-cats; as also one equally safe, if the natives be credited, for\nthe goblins, kelpies, and uruisgean. The uruisgean are, in short, no\nstrangers in various quarters of Perthshire, as well as in most parts\nof the Highlands. Dr. Graham says that they are \u201ca sort of lubberly\nsupernaturals, who could be gained over by kind attention, to perform the\ndrudgery of the farm; and it was believed that many Highland families had\nsome of the order so tamed, as to become attached to them\u201d. Sir Walter\nScott states that \u201ctradition has ascribed to the uruisgean, a figure\nbetween a goat and a man; in short, however much the classical reader may\nbe startled, precisely that of a Grecian Satyr.\u201d\n\nIt is related of an honest farmer\u2019s wife in Glenlyon, that one wet\nmorning, as the decent matron was in the act of making the porridge for\nthe family breakfast, she had an unexpected visit from an \u201curuisg,\u201d who\ncame in unceremoniously, cold, dripping with rain, and squatted herself\nclose by the cheering fire. There the huge, slippery-skinned, uncouth\nmonster lay, enjoying the genial warmth, but awkwardly impeding the\nworthy good-wife from cooking the family meal. Sadly annoyed at the\nmonster\u2019s impertinence, the good old lady lifted a ladleful of the\nboiling beverage from the pot on the fire, and poured it on the sides and\nthighs of her unwelcome guest, on which, the creature arose suddenly,\ndarted off in a moment, upsetting tables and chairs, and exclaiming in\npure Gaelic:\u2014\n\n    Ochan! loisg thu mi, chr\u00e0idh thu mi,\n    Led\u2019 bhrochan teth, tana, gu\u2019n st\u00e0;\n    Ach fhad\u2019s bhios uisg\u2019 ann an Liobhain,\n    Cha chriochnaich do pheanas gu br\u00e0th.\n          A\u2019 Chaillich gu\u2019n mhodh, is gu\u2019n nair\n          \u2019S tu chiurr mi gu goirt, is gu searbh,\n          Ach thig mi le armachd gu\u2019n d\u00e0il,\n          Is cuiream gu b\u00e0s thu gu dearbh!\n\nWe ought to learn one lesson from this subject\u2014gratitude to the Great\nRuler, because we live in more favourable circumstances, and under\nthe light and liberty of a preached Gospel. The press and the pulpit\nhave now opened the eyes of men; the schoolmaster is abroad; and many\nsuperstitions by which past ages have been deluded have greatly vanished\nbefore the pure light of evangelic truth. In many quarters of the world\nthey have disappeared before the lustre of that revelation which has\nbrought the truth of immortality to light, and which impresses the\nimagination of man with truer notions and simpler imagery. We cannot\nbut admire the dauntless courage of Paul when he boldly faced the\nEpicurean and stoic philosophers\u2014when \u201che stood in the midst of Mars\u2019\nHill, and said, Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are\ntoo superstitious\u201d. There he met a people, the most distinguished for\nthe wisdom of their political constitution, for the brilliancy of their\nachievements, for the extent and variety of their learning, and for the\nrefinement of their manners; yet a people who, amid all their glory and\nrenown, were ignorant of the true God, and lived the blind and deluded\nvictims of the grossest idolatry and superstition.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES\n\n\n[1] In corroboration of the main facts here stated, we quote\nthe following from \u201cWalford\u2019s County Families of the United\nKingdom\u201d:\u2014\u201cFLETCHER, JAMES, Esq. of Rosehaugh, Ross-shire, son of the\nlate Wm. Jack, Esq., by Isabel, dau. of the late Charles Fletcher, Esq.,\nand brother of J. C. Fletcher, Esq.; _b._ 18\u2014; _m._ 1852, Frederica Mary,\ndau. of John Stephen, Esq., niece of Sir Alfred Stephen, C.B., Chief\nJustice of New South Wales, and widow of Alexander Hay, Esq., of the 58th\nRegt.\u2026 He assumed the name of Fletcher in lieu of his patronymic on the\ndeath of his mother in 1856.\u201d\n\n[2] A place of that name near Beauly.\n\n[3] Since the above was in type, we came across the following in\nAnderson\u2019s History of the Family of Fraser, p. 114:\u2014\u201cHugh, son of the\n10th Lord Lovat, was born on the 28th September, 1666. From a large\nblack spot on his upper lip he was familiarly called, Mac Shimidh\nBall-dubh, _i.e._, black-spotted Simpson or Lovat. Three chieftains\nwere distinguished at this time by similar deformities\u2014(1) Mac Coinnich\nGl\u00f9n-dubh, _i.e._, black-kneed Mackenzie; (2) Macintoshich Claon, _i.e._,\nsquint-eyed MacKintosh; (3) Sisealach C\u00e0m, crooked or one-eyed Chisholm.\u201d\n\n[4] See Nos. XXVI. and XXVII. of the _Celtic Magazine_, Vol. III., in\nwhich this question is discussed at length.\n\n[5] For full details of this act, which afterwards proved the cause\nof such strife and bloodshed, see Mackenzie\u2019s \u201cHistory of the Clan\nMackenzie\u201d.\n\n[6] Highlands and Isles of Scotland, p. 111.\n\n[7] The late Colonel John Constantine Stanley, son of Lord Stanley of\nAlderley, who married Susan Mary, eldest daughter of the late Keith\nWilliam Stewart Mackenzie of Seaforth.\n\n[8] Vide Buch. Lib. xiii.\n\n[9] For several of these in England and the South of Scotland, see\n_Celtic Magazine_, Vol. III., pp. 52-53.\n\n[10] Dr. Buchan, Secretary of the Lancashire Insurance Company at\nInverness, a gentleman rarely surpassed in his knowledge of Celtic\nLegendary Traditions and Folklore, and to whom the writer is much\nindebted for these remarks on Hallowe\u2019en.\n\n[11] Since this was first published, the late Alexander Fraser,\nRegistrar, Inverness, a well-known Northern Antiquarian, wrote four full\nand most interesting papers, entitled, _Northern Folk-lore on Wells and\nWater; with an Account of some interesting Wells in the neighbourhood of\nInverness and the North_, which appeared in the _Celtic Magazine_, Vol.\nIII., pp. 348, 370, 419, and 456.\n\n\nTHE END.\n\nA. KING AND CO., ABERDEEN.","title":"The Prophecies of the Brahan Seer (Coinneach Odhar Fiosaiche)","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":46478}