Scottish Traditional Tales

by A. J. Bruford

  THIS . . . SON OF MacDonald of the Isles, he was known as Domhnall Dubh Ballach and he had a powerful host of Highlanders as fine as a man could meet in a month’s travel. And who should decide to come . . . to come and attack him and bring him to battle but the Earl of Mar, and he came over from the Braes of Mar, between there and Perth. And where did they meet but at Inverlochy, where the factory has been built today . . . This was in 1431. And Domhnall Dubh Ballach won the battle, and he put the Earl of Mar to flight.

  The Earl of Mar fled, and he went up by Lianachan and up that way until he reached Glen Roy. And when he was nearly at a place they call Corriechoillie he went into an old woman’s house and asked her for food.

  ‘I haven’t any food ready, but if you’ll wait a moment,’ said she, ‘I’ll get you something.’

  ‘I haven’t time for that,’ said he, ‘they’re on my heels. But give me a little pinch of meal and I’ll make myself a meal somewhere.’

  She did what he asked. He got the meal, and at the first burn he got to, once he thought he was safe, he put the meal into the heel of his shoe with a splash of water and ate it with a twig. And he said:

  ‘Hunger is a good cook:

  Foul fall the man who scorns his food.

  Cold barley gruel from the heel of my shoe –

  The finest meal I have ever had.’

  And he went . . . Since night was falling then – between then and the morning he travelled up Glen Roy, and when dawn began to break, in case he should be seen he managed to get into a house belonging to a man they call O’Brien. And there wasn’t much food in the house and the stranger was hungry –

  ‘But I’ll tell you what I’ll do for you,’ said he. ‘I’ll kill our only cow and you can have it, to eat.’ And that was what was done.

  He stayed three days there, sleeping on a bed of heather, and the blanket or, as they said, the coverlet that was over him was the cow’s hide. And when he had rested and recovered, he left at nightfall, heading for home, his own place. And he told him: ‘If you think you are being blamed or anyone bears a grudge against you for saving my life, come to my place and I will make you welcome.’

  That was what happened. He [O’Brien] felt as he saw it that they were down on him for saving the man, and he went to his place . . . the Earl of Mar’s. And as he came up to the place there was a porter out there at a great gate, and nobody was to be let into that place unless he was given a sign from the house or a word from the doorway. This wretched little man came along, and he was most astonished to see the Earl inviting him to come on up to the house, and surprised at the shaking of hands there was up there and how welcome he was made.

  The Earl said to him: ‘Come into my house, and you shall have the best room in it and the best food I can give you, just as I got from you; and if you’re not wanting to go back to Glen Roy, you shall have lands on my estate, and you can stay there as long as you live.’

  That was what happened. The old man decided that he was as well to stay there and never to go back to Glen Roy, and they never heard of him again there: he lived on the Earl of Mar’s lands.

  95a Angus MacLellan

  PAUL OF THE THONG

  . . . IT WAS SAID THAT it was in Scolpaig Castle that Dòmhnall Hearach was murdered . . . He was of the Clan Donald. And this is how they killed him: they had a thong hanging from the rafters to see who could [leap up and] put his head through the noose that was on it. And he got his head through the noose and the man who was [holding it] below pulled on the rope and they strangled him like that. [And afterwards that man was known as Paul of the Thong.]

  And when his wife began to get uneasy about him not coming home, she went down – she knew where he was – she went down to look for him, and he was dead and they had burnt his eyes out with red-hot irons. And she said: ‘If you cooked him,’ said she, ‘why did you not eat him?’

  One of them gave her a kick in the backside and she went out and she said: ‘Who knows,’ said she, ‘but that there may be under my girdle what will avenge him yet.’

  And she was pregnant . . . and she fled then and went to Skye and she was delivered there and bore a baby boy.

  And the boy was always asking her what had become of his father and she would not tell him; but when he was about sixteen or seventeen years old she did tell him, and then he began to make arrows, a bow and arrows.

  Then he set out from Skye with some others, and he said he was going to avenge his father. And they came ashore at Eubhal and they came to the house of an old woman there, and they knocked at the window and she said: ‘Is this Aonghas Fionn,’ said she, ‘the son of Dòmhnall Hearach?’

  ‘It is,’ said he.

  ‘Go out then,’ said she, ‘and get the wether that is out at the back of the house,’ said she, ‘and kill it, so that you can eat it,’ said she, ‘before you go.’

  And he did that and they cooked the meat and had a meal and went on their way.

  And he left the road at Bayhead – they all left the road at Bayhead – and cut across . . . the Druim Ard.

  And he [Paul] was on the top of a corn-stack in Paiblesgarry and he noticed them and he said: ‘Aonghas Fionn,’ said he, ‘is coming. It’s time for me to go,’ said he.

  He jumped down from the stack and made off and he cut across [the sands at] Tràigh a’ Locha . . . Aonghas Fionn went and cut across by Cachaileith a’ Ghàrraidh Bhig [Gap in the Little Dyke], as they called it, across by Balranald.

  And in these times, if anyone could get his finger in the keyhole of the church, nothing could be done to him. And he made for Rathad Mór a’ Rìgh (the King’s Highway) and Aonghas Fionn kept after him, and he was catching up with him fast. And when he was across the ford Aonghas just took an arrow and fired it at him, and the arrow pierced the sole of his foot – Paul’s foot.

  And there was a man in Goular whom they called Goll and Paul had put his eyes out. And when Aonghas Fionn brought Paul down at the church, his [Goll’s] daughter saw them and said: ‘There are men,’ said she, ‘over by the church.’

  ‘Oh,’ said he, ‘Black Paul,’ said he. ‘Take me over there by the hand,’ said he.

  And she led him over and he shouted to them to leave him [Paul] alive till he got at him. And they left him alive till he got there, and this was the death he gave him – he chewed his testicles. That was how they put him to death. [The place is still called Leathad Phòil, Paul’s Slope.]

  95b Donald Morrison

  MURCHADH GEÀRR’S BIRTH

  SOME SAY, ACCORDING to tradition, that it happened like this: his father, he was laird of Lochbuie, and he was getting on in years, and Duart captured him. And he put him in an island out there at the back of Staffa, which they call Cairnburg. And . . . he imprisoned him there and he left the ugliest woman in Mull with him, to prepare his food, and I suppose they had all the facilities they had in those days. That was going on fine, but events took another turn: the woman who was in Cairnburg with him grew – she wasn’t very well, and she was sent – taken away from there, and taken to Torloisk – down here, MacLeans again. And the Ollamh Muileach [the Mull Doctor], he was over by Loch Scridain there, Pennyghael, and he was MacLean of Duart’s doctor. And this man, he was asked to come and see to the woman when it was needed, and he said he would. And Duart said to him, ‘If it’s a son, strangle him, but if it’s a daughter, let her live.’ And it was a son, and apparently the Ollamh Muileach went back, and he said that it was a daughter. And he [the baby, Murchadh Geàrr] was kept in hiding until he grew up; he was up in a place up here they call Glencannel, with some of the MacGillivrays in hiding there, until he grew up to be a man, and then he came to the fore. And, yes, you know . . . if there hadn’t been anyone to succeed the man who was in prison, no family – in Cairnburg – you see, Duart would have had Lochbuie along with the rest! . . . That’s the story I heard handed down.

  95c Donald Morrison

  MURCHADH GEÀRR’S RETURN

  BUT THEY GOT STRONG, Lochbuie, you
see, and they ousted out the MacFadyens. And then it came to the point when Lochbuie and Duart were fighting one another and . . . the head of Lochbuie was Murchadh Geàrr or ‘Dumpy Murdoch’ they called him. And he lost the castle and he hooked it off to the Earl of Antrim for assistance.

  And the mother of the first Earl of Antrim was a daughter of MacDonald of the Isles, that’s Islay. And his mother was over there with him and she was always asking him to put Highlanders over there. And at last he gave her that but not in one year. The story says, the traditional story says that he filled the seven glens in Antrim with Highlanders from the Butt of Lewis to the island of Arran. And that went on for a long time.

  But at this time he [Murchadh Geàrr] lost his castle – Duart got a hold of Lochbuie and he fled to the Earl of Antrim for assistance. And he asked for assistance and Antrim said to him that he would give them thirteen big swordsmen and a boat, a currach, and they had to row. Now a currach is a boat made of skins, with a wooden frame. They were common in these old days. And they rowed her from Derry up to Craignure there, to Java, and they came ashore there. It was getting near to the night. And they dodged along by Craignure. And there was one of them that loitered behind. And some of the Mull men were dubious about them and they asked this man, ‘What’s your name?’

  He said, ‘Today I was a Morrison but now I am a Son of the Night’. – He didn’t know where he was going.

  But it passed like that and they went on to Lochbuie to the castle and Dumpy Murdoch got in touch with the dairymaid, she knew him. And her opinion was that – The cows were in one park on this side of the castle and the calves were in the other . . . They had shielings in these days, you know. And she told them, ‘Let the cows and the calves among one another and chase them, two or three of you, and make them roar till they make a big noise, and then the people in the castle will come out to see what’s wrong, and when they come out, you rush in.’ And it worked and they got a hold of the castle and they had it ever since until it was sold by – well, by the last chief of Lochbuie that I remember. And now it belongs to a Lewisman, it’s sold. Aye, that’s the way. And the castle’s there yet, the ruins of it. I was never in Lochbuie.

  96 Gilbert Clark

  THE BATTLE OF TRÀIGH GHRUINNEART

  MACLEAN OF DUART – Lachainn Mór of Duart – was married [sic] to the mother of MacDonald of Islay. MacDonald was just a child – a young lad, not a child but a young lad – when his father died, and at that time MacLean of Duart thought it would be a good chance to get Islay in his own name and under his own control. And they came to Islay – a place they call Mulindry where the MacDonalds had their great houses, their long house. And, as it turned out, they failed to come to terms because MacDonald’s advisers were stirring him up against his mother’s brother and the result was that they made the Mull men prisoners. But they got free: they came to terms and they got free.

  But after that the dispute got even worse. Lachainn Mór gathered the host and the ships of Mull to take Islay by force. The MacDonalds in Islay did as best they could. Word went out to Arran, to Kintyre and to all their kinsfolk round about to come and help them.

  And there was a witch – they called her the Doideag Mhuileach – the Doideag Mhuileach, whom MacLean of Duart kept as an adviser, and she told him there were three things he must not do, before he sailed against the Islay men. He must not. . . or rather he must go three times sunwise round a green knoll that was in front of Duart Castle, but instead of that, MacLean went clean against the old woman and went three times round this mound widdershins. The second thing: she told him if he got to Islay that he was not to put in to land at a place they called Nòstaig, a sandy bay on the north-west of Islay. And the third thing, not to take a drink of water from the Well of Niall Neònach.

  When he got to Islay he put into Nòstaig. He marched across to the side of Tràigh Ghruinneart: it was a hot day in autumn and they just came to the well and had a drink of water . . . well water. They didn’t know that this was the Well of Niall Neònach. But all three things were done contrary to the old woman’s advice. And there was a fourth. I don’t know if it was the old woman who told him this or who it was: not to raise his standard on Cnoc nan Àighean, and he did that too.

  Anyway, the MacDonalds on the other side were gathering every man they could. They had MacAoidh of the Rhinns, a man famous for his skill at arms; and the Ollamh Ìleach was a famous physician to the MacDonalds. And there was a man they called Mac a’ Phrìor: he was well-known as a soothsayer, like Coinneach Odhar [the ‘Brahan Seer’] and men of that sort. And he said to MacDonald – he told him he could tell him how the day would go for him, but that he would have to promise him a piece of land that they called Seann Fheòirlinn – Sunderland we call it today – and Coul, as a reward. MacDonald promised faithfully that if the day went well for him they [sic] could have that.

  Well, the battle was joined and it seemed as if the Islay men would have the worst of the day, because the Mull men were above them on the high ground. But as the battle went on more men arrived to help the Islay men.

  And there was a little man there – a wretched little man who had come across from Jura, and he offered his services to Lachainn Mór. And Lachainn Mór turned round and said that he could not bear to look at such a miserable creature among his men. This enraged this wretched little man so much that he went over to the MacDonalds and said to MacDonald, ‘Will you take me into your army?’

  ‘I certainly will, even if there were a thousand like you.’

  ‘Well,’ Dubh-Sìdh said . . . that was what they called this little man, Dubh-Sìdh – . . . a Shaw from Jura, and Dubh-Sìdh said to MacDonald: ‘If you take care of all the rest of the Mull men, I’ll look after Lachainn Mór myself.’

  And I’ll tell you later how this happened.

  The battle began. As I’ve said . . . the Mull men were up on the high ground and the Islay men were down below. Anyway the Arran men arrived to help them, and this is what they did because they were late: they came to land at Portnahaven . . . and they marched up by the side of the loch and up by a place they called Boirechill, this side of Traigh Ghruinneart: and what should they come upon but a party of the Mull men down below them, away from the battlefield. I don’t know what the Mull men were doing there, about two miles away from the battlefield. But the Arran men came upon them unawares and killed every single one of them. And to this day they call that place Torr na Muileach [the Mull Men’s Mound], at the back of Lyrabus.

  Well, when Lachainn Mór and his men saw this band approaching, they thought there was a great host there and their courage began to fail them and they moved down to a place they call Sliabh a’ Chath [the Battle Brae] and the Islay men got a better chance to get a footing up on firm ground.

  And there were trees, patches of woodland there at the time, and this Dubh-Sìdh climbed up into one of the trees – and the day was hot. MacLean of Duart took off the steel armour that was protecting . . . his breast, and he bent down over the well to have a drink of water. And as he tood up Dubh-Sìdh planted an arrow in his breast and killed him.

  And the army, his army, panicked now and they fled, and they came to a church with the Islay men in pursuit – they came to the old church of Kilnave, a few miles down beyond Sliabh a’ Chath. They went in there thinking they would be in sanctuary but the Islay men had gone berserk so that they set fire to the church, and every man who was in there was burnt to death except for one who managed to escape. And the Islay men were after him, but he must have been pretty fast: he managed to keep ahead of them. He swam out to sea near Nave Island – and there’s an islet there – with an arrow in his thigh. He swam out till he reached this islet they call Badaig and he stayed there, at the back of the islet, till the Islay men had gone away. And he came ashore then and he stayed on in Islay ever after, and we still have people whom they call to this day Clann Mhuirich na Badaig . . . the Curries of Badaig.

  But I’ve got ahead of my story. I should have told y
ou about . . . how the Arran men got on.

  When Lachainn Mór fell and the battle was over, one of the Arran men came along, Angus MacDonald, a near kinsman to MacDonald of Islay. He saw a fine ring on Lachainn Mór’s finger. He bent down to pull this ring off but the ring was so tight that he couldn’t get it off. He cut off the finger. And one of the Mull men was lying near him. This man was still alive and this infuriated him so much that it gave him a burst of strength, the Mull man, and he reared up and planted an arrow in Angus MacDonald and killed him. They carried off the body of Angus MacDonald . . .

  Well, in those days it was the custom among the Gaels – the Highland clans – that their closest female relatives were by them on the battlefield. And so it was with Lachainn Mór: he had his foster-mother and her son with him when he came . . . The day after the battle, when things had settled down, his foster-mother and her son Duncan brought a slype and a horse to take Lachainn to Kilchoman and bury him in the High Church of Kilchoman. Now the man was so big and massive that his feet were sticking out at the front of the slype and his head was jolting from side to side at the other end. Duncan began to make sport of it – laughing. His mother asked him what he was on about.

  He said: ‘What a come-down for Lachainn Mór – lying there on his back nodding to and fro like that!’

  This made his mother so furious that she drew a knife and killed her own son. That’s the place they call Carn Dhonnchaidh [Duncan’s Cairn] to this day, a little settlement where there were a lot of crofters after that time.

  Anyway his foster-mother went on with the few men she had with her and Lachainn Mór was buried at the west end of the High Church of Kilchoman. But tradition says that at that time the church was different and that it was inside the church that Lachainn was buried, though today, the building being different, he lies outside the church. And to this day they speak of the tombstone of Lachainn Mór of the Two Hearts. There’s a great stone slab there. I’m sure that it’s an hour-glass that’s on it, though the people believed that it was two hearts that were carved on this slab.