CHAPTER XI.

IMPRECATIONS, SPELLS, AND THE BLACK ART.

IMPRECATION (_Guidhe_).

The imprecations, which form so important a part of the vocabulary of thoughtless and profane swearing, are in Gaelic corruptions of English expressions. Thus, one of the commonest—_diabhul Mac-eadhar_ is a corruption of ‘devil may care,’ and though no language has a monopoly of oaths and curses, and English is not always to blame, it is some satisfaction that needless profanity is not entirely of native growth.

Most Gaelic imprecations are mere exclamations, condemnatory not so much of the person himself as of what he is saying or doing. Of these the following are of common use:

A bad meeting to you! (_Droch còmh ’l ort!_). A bad growth to you! (_Droch fàs ort!_). Bad understanding to you! (_Droch ciall ort!_). Bad accident to you! (_Droch sgiorram ort!_). Bad —— ? to you! (_Gum bu droch drùileach!_ or _drùthalach dhuit!_).

Black water upon you! (_Bùrn du ort!_).[84] A down mouth be yours! (_Beul sìos ort!_).[85] A wry mouth be yours! (_Beul seachad ort!_). Go to your grandfather’s house! (_Tigh do sheamar dhuit!_). The mischief be in your side! (_An dunaigh ad chliathaich!_). The burning of your heart to you! (_Losgadh do chridhe ort!_). Little increase to you! (_Beagan piseach ort!_). Little prosperity to you! (_Beagan àidh ort!_). The spell of your death-stroke be yours! (_Sian do ghonaidh ort!_). Death without a priest to you! (_Bàs gun sagart ort!_). Wind without rising be yours! (_Gaoth gun dìreadh ort!_), _i.e._ a wind that will throw you on your beam-ends, and not allow you to right. Your black certain death-stroke to you! (_Sàr du do ghonaidh ort!_). The place of the dead be yours! (_Marasg, i.e. marbh-thasg, ort!_). The number of Friday be yours! “The curse of Friday be yours!” “The end of the seven Saturdays to you!” May you be late! (_Gu ma h-anamoch dhuit!_). The direction in which you turn the back of your head, may you never turn your face! (_An toabh bheir thusa cùl do chinn, gar an d’ thig an t-aon latha bheir thu t’ aghaidh!_), etc., etc.

When a curse proceeds from rage or malevolence, it is at the same time a confession of impotence. The party uttering it is unable at the moment to indulge his rancour in any other way. If he had the power he would bring all the woes he threatens or imprecates there and then on his enemy’s devoted head. Patience is no element of wrath and rarely enters the house of malevolence, and if the man who curses his enemy had the artillery of heaven at command, he would at that moment devote his enemy to unspeakable misery. This impotence of rage is the reason why curses are so frequently ascribed to angry old women.

Those who have seen old women, of the Madge Wildfire school, cursing and banning, say their manner is well calculated to inspire terror. Some fifteen or twenty years ago, a party of tinkers quarrelled and fought, first among themselves, and then with some Tiree villagers. In the excitement a tinker wife threw off her cap and allowed her hair to fall over her shoulders in wild disorder. She then bared her knees, and falling on them to the ground, in a praying attitude, poured forth a torrent of wishes that struck awe into all who heard her. She imprecated “Drowning by sea and conflagration by land; may you never see a son to follow your body to the graveyard, or a daughter to mourn your death. I have made my wish before this, and I will make it now, and there was not yet a day I did not see my wish fulfilled,” etc., etc. “Once,” says one who is now an old man, “when a boy I roused the anger of an old woman by calling her names. She went on her knees and cursed me, and I thought I was going to die suddenly every day for a week after.”

The curse causeless will not come, but a curse deserved is the foreshadowing of the ultimate issue of events. The curse of the oppressed, who have no man to deliver them, is at times but the presage of the retribution which the operation of the laws of the moral world will some day bring about. Hence we find such expressions as, “She cursed him and obtained her wish.” The curse came upon the oppressor, not because of the malediction, but because what was asked for was part of the natural sequence of events in the moral government of the world. For this reason, the curse of the poor is undesirable. There is something wrong in the relation between superior and inferior when it is uttered; authority has been misused, and wisdom and patience have been awanting, selfishness has overstepped its due limit, and the just influence of the superior has degenerated into wantonness of power. In the expatriations from the Highlands, there was much in this respect to be reprobated, and it is most creditable to Highlanders, and is greatly to be ascribed to the influence of religion over them, that in the songs made at the time of the Clearances, there are no curses against the oppressor.

A common expression in the imprecations used by old women was, “May no benefit be in your cheese, and no cheese in your milk.”[86]

There is said to be a curse on an estate in Argyllshire, that a lineal descendant will never succeed to it, and on one of the principal castles in Perthshire, that no legitimate heir (_oighre dligheach_) will own it till the third generation (_gus an treasa linn_). This latter curse was paused by the haughtiness of an old woman, a former mistress of the castle, who lived entirely on marrow.

All evil wishes can be counteracted by the bystander saying, after each curse, “The fruit of your wish be on your own body” (_Toradh do ghuidhe far_, etc.). On the occasion above referred to, of the banning by the tinker wife, her frightful tirade became ludicrous from the earnestness with which this was done by one of the native women who was listening.

SPELLS (_Geasan no Geasaibh_).

A person under spells is believed to become powerless over his own volition, is alive and awake, but moves and acts as if asleep. He is like St. John’s father, not able or not allowed to speak. He is compelled to go to certain places at certain hours or seasons, is sent wandering or is driven from his kindred and changed to other shapes.

In nursery and winter evening tales (_sgialachdun ’us ur-sgeulun_) the machinery of spells is largely made use of. In the former class of tales they are usually imposed on king’s children by an old woman dwelling near the palace, called “Trouble-the-house” (_Eachrais ùrlair_, lit. confusion of the floor). Her house is the favourite place for the king’s children to meet their lovers. She has a divining rod (_slacan druidheachd_), by a blow from which she can convert people into rocks, seals, swans, wolves, etc., and this shape they must keep till they are freed by the same rod. Nothing else can deliver them from the spell.

The story usually runs that the king is married a second time. His daughter by the first marriage is very handsome, and has a smooth comb (_cìr mhìn_) which makes her hair, when combed by it, shed gold and precious gems. The daughters by the second marriage are ugly and ill-natured. When they comb their hair there is a shower of fleas and frogs. Their mother bribes Trouble-the-house to lay spells on the daughter of the first marriage. Unless the princess enters the house the old woman is powerless to do this. One day the beautiful princess passes near the house, and is kindly and civilly asked to enter. “Come you in,” says the designing hag, “often did I lick the platters and pick the bones in your father’s house.”[87] Misled by this artful talk, the princess enters, is struck with the magic rod, and converted into a swan.

It is a popular saying that seals and swans are “king’s children under enchantments” (_clann sigh fo gheasaibh_). On lonely mountain meres, where the presence of man is seldom seen, swans have been observed putting off their coverings (_cochull_) and assuming their proper shape of beautiful princesses in their endeavours to free themselves from the spells. This, however, is impossible till the magician, who imposed them, takes them away, and the princesses are obliged to resume their coverings again.

The expressive countenance and great intelligence of the seal, the readiness with which it can be domesticated, and the attachment which, as a pet, it shows to man, have not unnaturally led to stories of its being a form assumed by, or assigned to, some higher intelligence from choice or by compulsion. In Caithness, seals are deemed to be the fallen angels, and the Celtic belief that they are “king’s children under spells” is paralleled in the Shetland tales of the Norway Finns. These are persons, a native of these northern islands writes (in a private letter), who come across from Norway to Shetland in the shape of large seals. A Shetlander on his way to the fishing, early in the morning, came across a large seal lying asleep on a rock. Creeping quietly up he managed to stab it with his knife. The animal was only slightly wounded and floundered into the water, taking the knife along with it. Sometime afterwards the fisherman went, with others, to Norway to buy wood. In the first house he entered he saw his own big knife stuck up under a beam. He gave himself up for lost, but the Norwegian took down the knife and gave it back to him, telling him never again to disturb a poor sea-animal taking its rest.

There is a sept in North Uist known as “the MacCodrums of the seals” (_Clann ’ic Codrum nan ròm_), from being said to be descendants of these enchanted seals. The progenitor of the family, being down about the shore, saw the seals putting off their coverings and washing themselves. He fled home with one of the skins and hid it above the lintel of the door, ‘_arabocan_’ as it is called in that part of the country. The owner of the covering followed him. He clad her with human garments, married her, and had a family by her. She managed ultimately to regain possession of her lost covering and disappeared.

West of Uist there is a rock called _Connsmun_, to which the neighbouring islanders are in the habit of going yearly to kill seals. On one of these expeditions a young man, named Egan, son of Egan, killed a large seal in the usual manner by a knock on the head, and put a withe through its paw to secure it, while he himself went to attend to other matters. When he came back, however, the seal was gone. Sometime after he was driven away in a storm, and landed in a district he did not recognize. He made his way to one of the houses, and was very hospitably entertained. His host, who had been surveying him intently, when the meal was over asked his name. He told, and his host said, “Egan, son of Egan, though I have given you meat, and cheese, and eggs, upon your two hands be it, Egan, son of Egan, you put the withe through my fist.”[88]

THE BLACK ART.

Nothing was known in the Highlands of the dark science beyond what is conveyed in the name given to it, ‘Satan’s black school’ (_Sgoil du Shatain_), and a few anecdotes of its more illustrious students. All accounts agree that Michael Scott was an advanced scholar. He, by his skill in it, made a brazen man, whom he compelled to do all his work for him. By means of him he brought the Flanders Moss (_Mhòinteach Fhlansrach_), in the Carse of Stirling, across from the continent on bearers (_lunnun_). The moss is twenty-three miles long, and lies north of Stirling, where, unfortunately, the bearers broke. The Mull doctor (_an t-ollamh Muileach_)[89] and the Islay doctor (_an t-ollamh Ileach_) also attended the school, and adventures are assigned to them as to the other scholars.

Cameron of Locheil (_Mac Dhò’uill dui_, the son of Black Donald, is the Highland patronymic of the chiefs of this house), Macdonald of Keppoch (_Mac-ic-Rao’uill_), and Mackenzie of Brahan were at the school together, and when their education was finished the devil was to get as his fee whoever of them was hindmost. The three young men made a plan to chase each other round and round in a circle so that none of them should be hindmost. At last the devil was for clutching some one, but the young man pointed to his shadow which was behind. The devil in his hurry caught at it, and the young man never had a shadow from that day.

Locheil hired a servant maid to attend to a set of valuable china dishes of which he was the possessor. Her post was onerous, and she had another waiting-maid under her. Her life was to be the forfeit of any of the dishes being broken. One night when ascending the stairs with the dishes on a tray, the under-servant leading the way with a light, she noticed that the sugar bowl was in two and began to weep. A gentleman, whom she had not till then observed, was walking backwards and forwards on the stair-head. He asked her why she wept, and she told. He asked what she would give to have the bowl made whole as it was before? Would she give herself? She thoughtlessly said she would give anything. The bargain was struck, and on drying her tears and looking up the maid found the bowl whole. She told all this to her master, and when the devil came that same night to claim her, Locheil gave his former teacher a hospitable reception. When it waxed late, the devil, afraid of the cock-crowing, was preparing to go away. Cameron coaxed him to remain till the inch still remaining of the candle on the table should burn down. Whenever he gave his consent Cameron blew out the candle and gave it to the servant, telling her her life depended on its safe custody. In this manner the devil was cheated by his own scholar.

A drover bought a flock of goats from Macdonald of Keppoch, who himself accompanied the drove to Locheil-side. Here, in crossing a ford, the goats were taken away by the stream, and went past the drover as red stalks of fern (_nan cuiseagun ruadha rainich_), all except one dun hornless goat (_gobhar mhaol odhar_). The drover returned in search of Macdonald and found him lying on the heather, seemingly asleep. He pulled his hand to awaken him, but the hand came away with him. In the end, however, the hand was put right, and the goats were restored to the astonished drover.

Another time Keppoch and his dairy-maid had a trial of skill in sorcery. While she was milking a cow in the cattle-fold, Macdonald, who was looking on, by his charms prevented the cow from yielding her milk. The dairy-maid removed to the other side of the cow and defeated his conjurations. He then removed the hoop on the milk-pail. This also she counteracted.

Macdonald is said to have put a stop in his own country to the women winding black thread at night, but how or why does not appear.

The mighty magician, Michael Scott, had a narrow escape from becoming the prey of the arch-fiend. On his death-bed he told his friends to place his body on a hillock. Three ravens and three doves would be seen flying towards it; if the ravens were first the body was to be burned, but if the doves were first it was to receive Christian burial. The ravens were foremost, but in their hurry flew beyond their mark. So the devil, who had long been preparing a bed for Michael, was disappointed.