CHAPTER IX.

PREMONITIONS AND DIVINATION.

PREMONITIONS.

These are bodily sensations by which future events may be foreknown. An itching in the nose foretells that a letter is coming, and this in olden times was a matter of no small consequence. There is an itching of the mouth that indicates a kiss, and another indicating a dram. A singing or tingling in the ears denotes death, a friend at the moment of its occurrence has expired and news of his death will be heard before long; an itching of the cheek or eyes, weeping; itching of the left hand, money; of the right, that one is soon to meet a stranger with whom he will shake hands; of the elbow, that he will soon change beds or sleep with a stranger; of the brow, that some person will make you angry before long.

Hot ears denote that some person is speaking about your character. If the heat be in the right ear, he is supporting or praising you; if in the left, he is speaking ill of you (_Chluas dheas gam thoirt a nuas; ’s a chluas chli gam shìor-chàineadh_). In the latter case persons of a vindictive nature repeated the following words:

“He who speaks of me, If it be not to my advantage, May he be tossed On sharp grey knives, May he sleep in an ant-hill, And may it be no healthy sleep to him, But a furious woman between him and the door, And I between him and his property and sleep.”[70]

The evil wish went on, that “an iron harrow might scrape his guts,” and something about “a dead old woman” that my informant could not remember.

_Trial (Deuchainn)._—The _deuchainn_ al. _diachuinn_, sometimes called _frìdh_, omen, was a ‘cast’ or trial made by lots or other appeal to chance to find out the issue of undertakings—whether an absent friend was on his way home or would arrive safe; whether a sick man will recover; whether good or bad fortune awaits one during the year; what the future husband or wife is to be; the road stolen goods have taken, etc. This cast may be either for oneself or for another, “for him and for his luck” (_air a shon ’s air a shealbhaich_). On New-Year day people are more disposed to wonder and speculate as to their fortunes during the year upon which they have entered than to reflect upon the occurrences of the past. Hence these ‘casts’ were most frequently made on that day. Another favourite time was Hallowmas night. Most of them might be made at any time of the year, and the difficulty was not in making them but in interpreting them.

In making a ‘cast’ for one’s future partner, the approved plan is for him to go at night to the top of a cairn or other eminence where no four-footed beast can go, and whatever animal is thence seen or met on the way home is an omen of the future husband or wife. It requires great shrewdness to read the omen aright.

Another way is to shut the eyes, make one’s way to the end of the house, and then, and not till then, open the eyes and look around. Whatever is then seen is an indication of fortune during the year. It is unlucky to see a woman, particularly an old woman bent with age and hobbling past. A man is lucky, particularly a young man riding gaily on a mettlesome horse. A man delving or turning up the earth forebodes death; he is making your grave, and you may as well prepare. A duck or a hen with its head below its wing is just as bad, and the more that are seen in that attitude the speedier or more certain the death. A man who had the second sight once made a ‘trial’ for a sick person at the request of an anxious friend. He went out next morning to the end of the house in the approved manner. He saw six ducks with their heads under their wings, and the sick man was dead in less than two days.

Other seers, who made ‘trials’ for reward, made the person who consulted them burn straw in front of a sieve and then look through to see ‘what they should see.’ From the objects seen the seer foretold what was to befall.

When a trial was made to ascertain whether an absent friend would return, if on going out to the end of the house a man is seen coming, or a duck running towards the seer, his safe arrival will soon be; but if the object be moving away, the indication is unfavourable. By this trial it may also be known whether the absent one will return empty-handed or not.

Another mode of _deuchainn_, for the same purpose, is to take a chance stick and measure it in thumb-breadths, beginning at its thick or lower end, and saying, when the thumb is laid on the stick, no or yes as the opinion of the person consulting the oracle may incline, and repeating yes, no, alternately till the other end is reached. According to the position of the last thumb will the answer be affirmative or negative or doubtful.

When a young woman wants to ascertain whether a young man in whom she feels an interest loves her, let her look between her fingers at him and say the following charm. If his first motion is to raise his right arm she is secure of his affections.

“I have a trial upon you, I have a looking at you, Between the five ribs of Christ’s body; If it be fated or permitted you To make use of me, Lift your right hand, And let it not quickly down.”[71]

In the detection of theft the diviner’s utmost skill could only determine the direction the stolen goods had taken.

DIVINATION.

_Divination (Fiosachd)._—The same causes which in other countries led to oracles, astrology, necromancy, card-reading, and other forms of divination, in the Scottish Highlands led to the reading of shoulder-blades and tea-cups, palmistry, and the artless spinning of tee-totums (_dòduman_). In a simple state of society mummeries and ceremonies, dark caves, darkened rooms, and other aids to mystification are not required to bring custom to the soothsayer. The desire of mankind, particularly the young, to have pleasant anticipations of the future, supply all deficiencies in his artifices. One or two shrewd guesses establish a reputation, and ordinarily there is no scepticism or inquiry as to the sources of information. It is noticeable that the chief articles from which the Highland soothsayer drew his predictions, supplied him with a luxury.

_Shoulder-blade Reading (Slinneineachd)._—This mode of divination was practised, like the augury of the ancients, as a profession or trade. It consisted in foretelling important events in the life of the owner of a slaughtered animal from the marks on the shoulder-blade, speal or blade-bone. Professors of this difficult art deemed the right speal-bone of a black sheep or a black pig the best for this purpose. This was to be boiled thoroughly, so that the flesh might be stripped clean from it, untouched by nail or knife or tooth. The slightest scratch destroyed its value. The bone being duly prepared was divided into upper and lower parts, corresponding to the natural features of the district in which the divination was made. Certain marks indicated a crowd of people, met, according to the skill of the diviner, at a funeral, fight, sale, etc. The largest hole or indentation was the grave of the beast’s owner (_úaigh an t-sealbhaduir_), and from its position his living or dying that year was prognosticated. When to the side of the bone, it presaged death; when in its centre, much worldly prosperity (_gum biodh an saoghal aige_).

_Mac-a-Chreachaire_, a native of Barra, was a celebrated shoulder-blade reader in his day. According to popular tradition he was present at the festivities held on the occasion of the castle at _Bàgh Chiòsamul_ (the seat of the MacNeills, then chiefs of the island) being finished. A shoulder-blade was handed to him, and he was pressed again and again to divine from it the fate of the castle. He was very reluctant, but at last, on being promised that no harm would be done him, he said the castle would become a cairn for thrushes (_càrn dhruideachun_), and this would happen when the Rattle stone (_Clach-a-Ghlagain_) was found, when people worked at sea-weed in _Baile na Creige_ (Rock-town, a village far from the sea), and when deer swam across from Uist, and were to be found on every dung-hill in Barra. All this has happened, and the castle is now in ruins. Others say the omens were the arrival of a ship with blue wool, a blind man coming ashore unaided, and that when a ground officer with big fingers (_maor na miar mòra_) came, Barra would be measured with an iron string. A ship laden with blue cloth was wrecked on the island, and a blind man miraculously escaped; every finger of the ground officer proved to be as big as a bottle (!), and Barra was surveyed and sold.

When Murdoch the Short (_Murchadh Gearr_), heir to the Lordship of Lochbuy in the Island of Mull, circ. A.D. 1400, was sent in his childhood for protection from the ambitious designs of his uncle, the Laird of Dowart, to Ireland, he remained there till eighteen years of age. In the meantime his sister (or half-sister) became widowed, and, dependant on the charity and hospitality of others, wandered about the Ross of Mull from house to house with her family. It was always “in the prophecy” (_san tairgneachd_) that Murdoch would return. One evening, in a house to which his sister came, a wedder sheep was killed. After the meal was over, her oldest boy asked the farmer for the shoulder-blade. He examined it intently for some time in silence, and then, exclaiming that Murdoch was on the soil of Mull (_air grunnd Mhuile_), rushed out of the house and made for Lochbuy, to find his uncle in possession of his rightful inheritance.

On the night of the massacre of Glencoe, a party of the ill-fated clansmen were poring over the shoulder-blade of an animal slain for the hospitable entertainment of the soldiers. One of them said, “There is a shedding of blood in the glen” (_tha dòrtadh fuil sa ghleann_). Another said there was only the stream at the end of the house between them and it. The whole party rushed to the door, and were among the few that escaped the butchery of that dreadful night.

It is a common story that a shoulder-blade seer once saved the lives of a company, of whom he himself was one, who had ‘lifted’ a cattle spoil (_creach_), by divining that there was only the stream at the end of the house between them and their pursuers.

A shoulder-blade sage in Tiree sat dawn to a substantial feast, to which he had been specially invited, that he might divine whether a certain friend was on his way home or not. He examined the shoulder-bone of the wedder killed on the occasion critically, unable to make up his mind. “Perhaps,” he said, “he will come, perhaps he will not.” A boy, who had hid himself on the top of a bed in the room, that he might see the fun, could not help exclaiming, “They cannot find you untrue.” The bed broke, and the diviner and his companions, thinking the voice came from the skies, fled. When the boy recovered he got the dinner all to himself.

_Palmistry (Dearnadaireachd)._—Of this mode of divination, as practised in the Highlands, nothing seems now to be known beyond the name. Probably from the first the knowledge of it was confined to gipsies and such like stray characters.

_Divination by Tea, or Cup-reading (Leughadh chu-paichean)._—When tea was a luxury, dear and difficult to get, the ‘spaeing’ of fortunes from tea-cups was in great repute. Even yet young women resort in numbers to fortune-tellers of the class, who for the reward of the tea spell out to them most excellent matches.

After drinking the tea, the person for whom the cup is to be read, turning the cup _deiseal_, or with the right-hand turn, is to make a small drop, left in it, wash its sides all round, and then pour it out. The fortune is then read from the arrangement of the sediments or tea-leaves left in the cup. A large quantity of black tea grounds (_smùrach du_) denotes substance and worldly gear. The person consulting the oracle is a stray leaf standing to the one side of it. If the face of the leaf is towards the grounds, that person is to come to a great fortune; if very positively its back, then farewell even to the hope “that keeps alive despair.” A small speck by itself is a letter, and other specks are envious people struggling to get to the top, followers, etc. Good diviners can even tell to their youthful and confiding friends when the letter is likely to arrive, what trade their admirer follows, the colour of his hair, etc.