the echoes take a year.
My towering height is something else
of which I’m very proud.
I scrape the sky when I pass by
and drink from every cloud.
A tailor who was measuring me
and swore he had the knack,
set off in haste to chalk my waist
and hasn’t yet come back.
My future husband, I insist,
must be more huge than me,
or with one bound I’ll swing him around
and hurl him out to sea.’
‘Grammar never was her strong point,’ said the whale, ‘but she sounds in excellent form today.’
Angus had listened in trepidation to the great voice and to the awesome catalogue of attributes it had listed. He had tried to give himself courage by allowing ten per cent off the list for the usual giant’s exaggeration. But even if she were only half of what she claimed, the Giantess must be a formidable woman indeed. Somehow it was difficult to imagine her darning socks. And apart from that there was the worrying discovery he had made in the sea just now. How much had he shrunk?
The whale glided into the shallow water of the creek. Angus released his hold, waded ashore and turned to face his friend. ‘How much have I lost?’ he inquired anxiously.
‘A lot,’ replied the whale, surveying him. ‘An awful lot. You’ve dwindled by about half.’
The voice Angus had heard on approaching the island rolled out again, sounding louder and nearer all the time. He found himself thinking with longing of his home territory and of the clear eyes of Goldentop and the fringed ones of Morag Matheson.
‘You know, I think perhaps I’ll come back some other time,’ he said to the whale. ‘I don’t feel in the right frame of mind for courting.’
‘It’s too late to back out now,’ the whale told him. ‘Here she comes!’ He nodded with his head in the direction of Angus’s right shoulder. ‘Good luck!’ he added and with a flick of his tail he was gone. Angus turned. The ‘tower’ he had seen above the tree-tops was advancing down the beach towards him. It was the Giantess!
‘Good afternoon,’ said Angus politely, the occasion obviously being one that called for politeness. The Giantess said nothing but she stooped suddenly and her huge hand shot out. Before he realized what she was about she had grasped him by the waist and swung him up to face level.
‘Angus Macaskill is my name,’ said Angus hurriedly. ‘I’m a giant. At least, I was this morning. I’m from the mainland. I have quite a good little territory over there. Lots of butter and eggs and vegetables and that sort of thing. More than enough for two. I’m looking for a wife, I think. Will you marry me?’
The Giantess listened to this recital in complete silence. When it was finished she spoke just one word. ‘Cheek!’ she said. The hand that grasped Angus drew back quickly and then shot forward. He found himself flying out over the sea in a huge tumbling curve that arched slowly down towards the waves.
Goodbye, world! he thought. Goodbye! And splash! He hit the water. But before he could sink, there beside him was the whale.
‘You landed just about where I thought you would,’ he said to Angus. ‘Hang on and I’ll have you back at the Blue Bay in no time.’
Angus spat out a mouthful of salt water. ‘If I shrink as much on the way back as I did when I came here,’ he said, ‘there’ll be nothing left of me.’
‘I’ll go extra specially fast,’ the whale promised. And so he did. He tore through the water at such a rate that Angus had to hold on with all his strength. Even so, he felt himself shrinking so much smaller that his clothes began to fall off. He had to clutch them desperately.
When they landed in the Blue Bay they went through the same routine as at the island. ‘How much have I lost this time?’ Angus asked, after he had waded ashore.
The whale looked him over carefully. ‘Well, not as much as last time,’ he answered. ‘But still quite a lot. You’re about ordinary-sized now. I shouldn’t try it again.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Angus told him. ‘It’s dry land for me from now on. Dry land and a bit more reverence for the wisdom of mothers. Thanks for rescuing me.’
‘At least you can say one thing,’ said the whale.
‘What’s that?’ asked Angus.
‘You’re not the first man to shrink from courtship,’ the whale answered. He dived under the water and vanished.
Angus made his way home as quickly as he could and the first person he went to see was Morag. He found her spinning and singing as before but more slowly and sadly than she used to.
‘It’s me!’ he shouted when he reached her. ‘I’m back!’
‘Angus?’ cried Morag. ‘I recognize your voice but where are you?’ She was so busy craning her neck skyward that she failed to notice him standing beside her.
‘I’m down here,’ he told her. ‘The salt water shrank me. I’m just about your size now.’
‘So you are,’ she agreed. Her eyes dropped down from the clouds, rested on him briefly and kept on dropping till her gaze was fixed on the ground.
‘Will you marry me, Morag?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I will,’ she replied. So they got married and lived as happily as two people in love might reasonably expect to live. They had three ordinary-sized children, two girls and a boy, none of whom could ever be persuaded to go near the sea. Angus stopped being lonely.
THE MAN IN THE BOAT
Betsy Whyte
This story is aboot a laird awa in the Heilands… and he had the Black Art… but every year he used to gie a big ceilidh for aa the workers on his estate, an aa the fairm folk an aa the fairm hands, an he used tae had the ceilidh in a big barn. There wis a fire in this barn, and they’d put on a big pot of sowens. (Ye ken whit sowens are? No? Well, Scotland, it’s always been a very poor country, and no that very long ago, jist aboot a hundred years ago, they used to soak… the husks o the grain… until they were soor, and then they strained it, and boiled up the liquid an this made a sort of porridge, and a lot o them had to exist on that.) So this big pot o sowens wis boilin away anywey, and everybody wis doin their thing: ye hed tae
Tell a story,
Sing a sang,
Show yir bum
Or oot ye gang!
They hed other things as well as singin an tellin stories an that: they hed sort of games, they’d games of strength an guesses an that sort o thing, an one o the things wis to see who could tell the biggest lie. So everybody wis gaun their roond an gaun their
laird, landowner. awa, away.
sowens, a type of porridge. soor, sour.
roond, but every time it cam roond tae this cattleman he would aye say, ‘Ye ken fine A cannae dae nothing, ye shouldnae ask me! Ye ken A cannae dae it.’
So this laird says, ‘Look, ye can surely tell a lie.’
He says, ‘No, A cannae.’ Sandy wis a bit simple, ye ken, and he wisnae very good at nothin but lookin efter the coos.
So the laird says, ‘Sandy, look, try an tell a story, or tell us a lie o some kind.’
He says, ‘A cannae, A dinnae ken how tae.’
‘Well,’ the laird says, ‘if ye dinnae ken how tae ye’re no gaunnae be here. Awa ye go an mak yirsel useful some other place.’
He says, ‘What am A gaunnae dae?’
An the laird says, ‘A’ll tell ye what tae dae. Awa ye go doon tae the water an clean ma boat, because A’ll be usin it shortly. Awa ye go.’ So Sandy’s away, tramp, tramp, tramp, doon through the gutters tae this river, this big river. And he scraped aa the moss an dirt aff the boat, scrapin it oot, and there wis a baler lyin in the boat, an he wis balin oot the water, an balin oot the water, an he steps inside the boat so that he could finish balin it oot, ye see?
But didn’t this boat take off wi him, an there’s no wey he could stop it! An before he could get time to think, even, they’re away in the middle o the water, an he couldnae swim. So he says, ‘Ach, A’ll jist sit an let it go wherever it wants tae go
.’ So he jist sat like this lookin up at the birds an things.
But he glanced doon again, an there he saw the loveliest wee green satin slippers; pure silk stockins; taffeta dress. He says, ‘Whit’s this? Whit’s this?’ An he felt his sel ower – oh! pappies an everything! ‘Oh!’ he says. ‘Whit’s happenin?’ Curls an everything. An he looked… ower the side o the boat, an there wis the bonniest lassie that he ever saw lookin back at him. ‘What’s happened?’ he says. ‘What’s happened? (higher voice) What’s happened?’ His voice changed all of a sudden. Oh! So he says, ‘Oh, my God!’ – he was so stunned he jist sat there, an this boat, it got tae the other side, an he felt… it was the boat scrapin the
bottom that brought him back tae himsel, ye see – but he was a she now!
So she stands up in this lovely green claes, an she looked – she wondered how she was gonnae get oot o the boat withoot makin a mess o her shoes an everything. Now there was a young man walkin alang the bank o the river, and when he looked doon an sa this lassie in the boat, ’course he would run doon an help her oot. So he ran doon an cairried her oot o the boat till he got her on dry land, an he says, ‘Where are ye going?’
‘A don’t know,’ she says. ‘A don’t really know where A’m goin.’
He says, ‘Well, where did ye come from?’
‘Oh, A came from the other side o the water.’
‘Are ye goin tae anybody?’
‘A don’t know.’
He says, ‘Lassie, I think ye must have fell an bumped yir heid. I think ye’ve lost yir memory wi aa this “Don’t knows, don’t knows”.’
She says, ‘Well, mebbe something like that happened.’ She says, ‘A jist don’t know where A’m goin here. Ye see, A know where A’m goin when A’m at the other side o the water, but A don’t know where A’m goin here.’
‘Well,’ he says, ‘A think A’ll take ye home tae ma mother, an get her tae look after ye, see if ye get yir memory back.’ So he took her home tae his mother, and she helped his mother in the hoose, an did this an that. But in time he got aafae fond o her, in fact he fell in love wi her, and the two of them got married. And within a couple o year they had two o the bonniest wee bairns ye ever saw, a wee toddler an one in the pram.
So one day, when they were oot walkin wi the bairns, an he was pushin his pram, quite proud o this wee laddie he’s got, ye see… she says, ‘Ye know, I think we’ll go a walk down the river today.’ She says, ‘A haven’t been back down that way since the day A came here.’
He says, ‘Well, that’s a good idea. It might bring back yir memory,’ he says, ‘if nothing else has all this time.’
She says, ‘That’s right.’ So away they go down the riverside and, sure enough, the wee boat wis still sittin there. ‘Aw,’ she says, ‘Look at it! It’s aa covered wi moss an lichen an aa kinds o dirt: A must go down an clean it.’
So she ran doon the bank, and she says: ‘You keep the bairns here an A’ll run down the bank an clean it.’ Down she goes, an she’s scrapin away at it, an the baler wis still lyin in it, an she startit tae bale oot the water. And in the end she stepped intae the boat to bale oot the last water, an ye can guess whit happen’t! The boat’s away wi her again, an it kept goin and kept goin, an the fella – there wis no wey he could stop it, it went so fast, an he couldnae swim efter it, so he jist had tae stand there an let it go.
Now halfway across the water when she lookit doon, there wis the auld tackety boots, the auld moleskin troosers covered wi coo shairn, the whiskers an baird an… this auld sleeved waistcoat, an he looked ower intae the water an there wis this cattleman… wi his teeth all broon wi tobacco juice an everything. ‘Oh my God!’ He started to roar an greet, an howl an greet, ‘Oh, ma man an ma bairns! Ma man an ma bairns! Ma man an ma bairns…’ and he jist sat like this and the tears trippin him, until the boat scraped the other side: an the boat took him right back tae where it had started aff.
Then Sandy jumpit oot the boat, an he ran an ran greetin an sobbin an sobbin an greetin. An when he ran up tae the fairm, this ceilidh’s still gaun on, see? an the pot o sowens is still on the fire! An he cam in howlin an greetin an sobbin, an the laird says tae him, ‘Whit’s adae wi ye, Sandy?’
‘Oh, dinnae speak tae me, dinnae speak tae me,’ he says. ‘Wheesht, leave me alane – wid ye leave me alane? Ma man an ma bairns! Ma man an ma bairns!’
‘Man an bairns?’ the laird says. ‘Whit are ye speakin aboot?’
‘Oh, would you wheesht?’ he says.
‘Sandy, come in here. Come on an sit doon beside… me here an tell us aa aboot it!’ So Sandy came in, an he sat doon beside the laird, an between sobbin an greetin he tells them aa aboot his man an his bairns.
coo shairn, cow dung. Whit’s adae, What’s wrong.
An the laird says, ‘Well, Sandy, that’s the biggest lie we’ve heard the nicht, so you’ve won the golden guinea!’
That’s the end o that one. Ye see, the laird had pit a glamourie ower him, so that he thought aa this had happen’t tae him, but actually he’d only been awa aboot twenty minutes.
ASSIPATTLE AND THE MESTER STOORWORM
Elizabeth Grierson
In far bygone days, on the Mainland of Orkney, there lived a well-to-do farmer, who had seven sons and one daughter. And the youngest of these seven sons bore a very curious name; for he was called Assipattle, which means, ‘He who grovels among the ashes’.
Perhaps Assipattle deserved his name, for he was rather a lazy boy, who never did any work on the farm as his brothers did, but ran about outdoors with ragged clothes and unkempt hair, and whose mind was ever filled with wondrous stories of trolls and giants, elves and goblins.
When the sun was hot in the long summer afternoons, when the bees droned drowsily and even the tiny insects seemed almost asleep, the boy was content to throw himself down on the ash-heap amongst the ashes, and lie there, lazily letting them run through his fingers, as one might play with sand on the sea-shore, basking in the sunshine and telling stories to himself.
And his brothers, working hard in the fields, would point to him with mocking fingers, and laugh, and say to each other how well the name suited him, and how little use he was in the world.
And when they came home from their work, they would push him about and tease him, and even his mother would make him sweep the floor, and draw water from the well, and fetch peats from the peat-stack, and do all the little odd jobs that nobody else would do.
So poor Assipattle had rather a hard life of it, and he would often have been very miserable had it not been for his sister, who loved him dearly, and who would listen quite patiently to all the stories that he had to tell; who never laughed at him or told him that he was telling lies, as his brothers did.
But one day a very sad thing happened – at least, it was a sad thing for poor Assipattle.
For it chanced that the King of these parts had one only daughter, the Princess Gemdelovely, whom he loved dearly, and to whom he denied nothing. And Princess Gemdelovely was in want of a waiting-maid, and as she had seen Assipattle’s sister standing by the garden gate as she was riding by one day, and had taken a fancy to her, she asked her father if she might ask her to come and live at the castle and serve her.
Her father agreed at once, as he always did agree to any of her wishes; and sent a messenger in haste to the farmer’s house to ask if his daughter would come to the castle to be the Princess’s waiting-maid.
And, of course, the farmer was very pleased at the piece of good fortune which had befallen the girl, and so was her mother, and so were her six brothers, all except poor Assipattle, who looked with wistful eyes after his sister as she rode away, proud of her new clothes and of the slippers which her father had made her out of cowhide, which she was to wear in the Palace when she waited on the Princess, for at home she always ran barefoot.
Time passed, and one day a rider rode in hot haste through the country bearing the most terrible tidings. For the evening before, some fishermen, out in thei
r boats, had caught sight of the Mester Stoorworm, which, as everyone in Orkney knows, was the largest, and the first, and the greatest of all sea serpents. It was that beast which, in the Good Book, is called the Leviathan, and if it had been measured in our day, its tail would have touched Iceland, while its snout rested at John-o’-Groat’s Head.
And the fishermen had noticed that this fearsome monster had its head turned towards the mainland, and that it opened its mouth and yawned horribly, as if to show that it was hungry, and that, if it were not fed, it would kill every living thing upon the land, both man and beast, bird and creeping thing.
For it was well known that its breath was so poisonous that it consumed as with a burning fire everything that it lighted on. So that, if it pleased the awful creature to lift its head and put forth its breath, like noxious vapour, over the country, in a few weeks the fair farmland would be turned into a region of desolation.
As you may imagine, everyone was almost paralysed with terror at this awful calamity which threatened them; and the King called a solemn meeting of all his counsellors, and asked them if they could devise any way of warding off the danger.
And for three whole days they sat in Council, these grave, bearded men, and many were the suggestions which were made, and many the words of wisdom which were spoken; but, alas! no one was wise enough to think of a way by which the Mester Stoorworm might be driven back.
At last, at the end of the third day, when everyone had given up hope of finding a remedy, the door of the Council Chamber opened and the Queen appeared.
Now the Queen was the King’s second wife, and she was not a favourite in the Kingdom, for she was a proud, insolent woman, who did not behave kindly to her stepdaughter, the Princess Gemdelovely. She spent much more of her time in the company of a great Sorcerer, whom everyone feared and dreaded, than she did in that of the King, her husband.
Scottish Folk and Fairy Tales from Burns to Buchan (Penguin Classics) Page 10
