_Source._--_Notes and Queries_ for December 21, 1861; to which it was
communicated by "Cuthbert Bede," the author of _Verdant Green_, who
collected it in Cantyre.
_Parallels_.--Miss Dempster gives the same story in her Sutherland
Collection, No. vii. (referred to by Campbell in his Gaelic list, at
end of vol. iv.); Mrs. John Faed, I am informed by a friend, knows the
Gaelic version, as told by her nurse in her youth. Chambers' "Strange
Visitor," _Pop. Rhymes of Scotland_, 64, of which I gave an Anglicised
version in my _English Fairy Tales_, No. xxxii., is clearly a variant.
_Remarks_.--The Macdonald of Saddell Castle was a very great man
indeed. Once, when dining with the Lord-Lieutenant, an apology was made
to him for placing him so far away from the head of the table. "Where
the Macdonald sits," was the proud response, "there is the head of the
table."