A STRING OF QUAINT BEADS FROM MANY LANDS.
“How gallantly, how merrily, we ride along the sea!
The morning is all sunshine, the wind is blowing free;
The billows are all sparkling, and bounding in the light,
Like creatures in whose sunny veins, the blood is running bright.”
· · · · ·
“Not down the breeze more blithely flew,
Skimming the wave, the light sea-mew,
Than the gay galley bore
Her course upon that favouring wind,
And Coolin’s crest has sunk behind
And Slapin’s caverned shore.”
To those who make their home in the Isles, the possession of a yacht,
or, at least, of a good sailing-boat, becomes almost a necessity. In the
first place, all beauty lies along the seaboard; and the visit to a
neighbour even on the same island, which may entail a wearisome land
journey through dreary country, is often a short and beautiful sail;
when, instead of noisily jolting and grinding along a hard road, you may
glide silently through air and water—perhaps the only way in which you
can ever revel at once in stillness and motion. Besides, to be
continually within sight of countless islands, and chains of blue hills,
without the means of exploring them, would be tantalizing indeed.
[Illustration: DUNTULM CASTLE. _To face p. 129._]
So it came to pass that the little fairy “Gannet” flapped her white
wings one sunny afternoon, and bade us sail with her over the merry
green waves to the opposite coast of Grieshernish, one of the few
sheltered nooks where the plantations have actually struggled up to
treehood. Here we found our chief amusement in a wonderful music-room,
wherein every conceivable variety of musical instrument had its
appointed place. Besides piano and harmonium, flute and guitar, there
was every variety of organ, from the finger-organ down to the most
elaborate grinder, with such an array of puppets as would have made the
fortune of an itinerant organist. Then there was every species of large
mechanical instrument, from a common musical-box up to a large
self-acting organ, which played all the favourite operas like a
first-rate brass band. Another, something similar, called a Euterpean,
gave us more solemn music. Others play reels and dance-music. Next come
harp, violin, violoncello, bagpipes, trumpet, cornet-à-piston,
reed-pipe—every musical instrument you can conceive down to a
Jew’s-harp. For aught I know, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, may have
been stowed away in some recess of that wonderful room. It was a quaint
fancy of one who had spent his best years on Indian plains, and who had
devised this method of shutting out sight and sound of the wild storms
and tempests that so often raved round his western home.
We returned to Uig in the evening so well pleased with the swift, lovely
little yacht, that we determined to start at once for a cruise round the
coast—a cruise so delightful, that I am utterly at a loss whether to
award the palm of real enjoyment to yachting in the Hebrides or camping
in the Himalayas.
Each day we sailed just so far as might seem pleasant, gliding silently
over the waters, rejoicing in the stillness of our noiseless progress;
no jarring sound of wheels; no straining engines, or whirring steam;
only the plash of wavelets when we anchored for the night in some quiet
natural harbour, under the lee of some bluff headland, whence we could
row close in shore among all the beautiful cliffs and caves, landing on
the small islands to the astonishment of every species of sea-fowl, and
of colonies of rabbits, which last proved a very welcome addition to our
larder. One favourite anchorage was just below Duntulm Castle; in a
clear, green bay, with a pleasant island on one side, where multitudes
of large white-winged gannets make their home, and gather wonderingly
round their namesake. They were sorely puzzled by our intrusion into
this, their sanctum; and often, as we sat on the brink of the cliff
where they had built their nests they would swoop past us again and
again, flapping their great wings within a foot of us, with wild angry
cries as if to drive us away again. If you ever anchor in this quiet
bay, you must land alone, in the early morning, on this little island;
and though the smooth grassy slope is drenched with heavy dew, clamber
up to the top, and you will find yourself overlooking a precipitous rock
face, down into the clearest green depths; only disturbed by the ripple
where the top of some broken basalt pillar rises above the surface.
The old castle stands facing you on a great stack of clustering pillars.
On either side, and in the background, lie smooth green slopes, crowned
with another range of reddish basalt. The quiet mists are still sleeping
in the valley, and above them towers a dark solid mass, which is the
Quiraing. Then, as the first rosy flush touches the hill top, the dewy
vapours float upward to greet the dawn, and the closed flowers open
their cups, and all manner of happy winged insects awake to dance in the
quivering sunlight. Everything around you is quiet and still. The only
sound is that of
“... The murmuring surge,
That on th’ unnumbered idle pebbles chafes;”
for there is not a grain of sand within miles of you—only sharp shingly
beach; so if you want to bathe, and love to paddle about on the soft,
yellow sand, you must go to Kilmaloig Bay, or to Loch Staffin.
Now, if you turn and look out to sea, there lies the Long Island on the
one hand, and on the other Loch Seaforth, and the wild hills of
Torridon, in Rosshire. And much nearer you is the Island of
Fladdahuan—Fladda of the Ocean, one of those early Missionaries who here
built his cell and chapel. The island, as seen from here, is like some
great sea monster. For one large isle lies like a great solid head,
while a long line of smaller rocky knobs suggests the dorsal fin of some
huge creature swimming across the Minch.
The ruins of Fladda’s chapel were long extant. On the altar lay a round,
bluish stone, which was always moist. Should fishermen be detained here
by contrary winds, they first walked sunwise round the chapel, then
poured water on this stone Hindu-fashion, and shortly a favourable
breeze would certainly spring up. It likewise cured diseases, and the
people swore solemn oaths by it.
There was a similar stone in the Isle of Arran, of a green colour, and
the size of a goose’s egg. It was known as the stone of St Molingus, and
was kept in custody of the Clan Chattan; and the popular belief was, not
only that it cured diseases, but that, if it were thrown at an advancing
foe, they would be terror-stricken, and retreat. It was also a solemn
thing to swear by. I was strongly reminded of this Hebridean custom
when, wandering in the solemn shade of the great forests of Ceylon, in
the immediate neighbourhood of the ancient ruined city of Pollonarua, we
were shown, in the court of a village temple, a flat slab of stone,
esteemed so sacred, that the most hardened villain dares not perjure
himself when compelled to swear by it. He must lay thereon a firnam—a
coin less than a farthing in value—and then take the required oath.
In these our Western Isles there were many varieties of stones esteemed
sacred—more especially such as were perforated; also various crystals.
One such magic crystal, the size of a hen’s egg, is still preserved at
Ardvoirlich in Perthshire, and it is believed that water into which it
has been dipped cures cattle of distemper. Even now, graziers come long
distances to procure this precious medicine—sometimes more than forty
miles—and are greatly disgusted at finding that the far-famed “Clach
Dearg” has been deposited at the bank with other family treasures, and
can by no means be borrowed. _Whence_ and _when_ it came to Ardvoirlich
is unknown, no tradition existing on the subject; but its silver setting
is supposed to be of Oriental work. The person coming for this curative
water had to draw it himself, and carry it into the house, where the
crystal was dipped in it, and it was then carried off in bottles. But it
was necessary that it should enter no other house by the way; so should
the bearer visit his friends on his homeward route he most leave the
bottle outside.[26] A stone of the same sort is the hereditary property
of the Robertsons of Struan. It is called the Clach-na-Bratach; or,
Stone of the Standard, having been found sticking to the flag-staff of
the chief of Clan Donnachaidt on the morning of the Battle of
Bannockburn. Since then the clan has never gone forth to battle without
carrying this stone, whose varying colour boded good or evil. On the eve
of Sheriff-muir, a large flaw was detected in it, and all present knew
that evil would befall them on the morrow. No medical stores an needed
by those within hail of this precious charm, inasmuch as the water in
which it has been thrice dipped, will assuredly cure all manner of
diseases of men, of cattle, and of horses.
The Druids specially prided themselves on the miracles wrought by their
own magic crystal balls, or adder’s stones as they were called. Of these
the most precious were ring-shaped, and supposed to be the crystallized
saliva of serpents by them thrown into the air, and caught by watchful
wizards ere it reached the earth. We hear of precisely the same
superstition at the present day in the East. A recent traveller tells us
that in the ruins of Tadmor, he met an old hag who described to him how
she had just been watching two serpents thus form a magic crystal, which
she had found; she showed him a pearl, which she firmly believed to be
made of serpent’s slime.
These magic balls have been found in divers parts of Europe, generally
in sepulchral urns. Twenty such crystals were discovered in an alabaster
urn at Rome, and one at Tornay, in the tomb of Chilperic, King of
France, who died A.D. 480. In his tomb were also found the bones of the
horse on which he was supposed to appear in the presence of Odin. Two of
these rock crystals were recently found in a tumulus near Dundee. On
some of these precious Druidical stones were graven figures of serpents
coiled up. In later ages others were adorned with Christian symbols;
perhaps a silver rim bearing the names of Gabriel, Michael, Uriel,
Raphael; and a silver cross on the top. According as the crystal was
clear or clouded, the destiny of the future was explained. Spenser in
his “Fairie Queen” tells of such a stone. He says:—
“Such was the glassy globe that Merlin made,
And gave unto King Ryence for his gard,
That never foes his kingdom might invade;
But he, it knew at home, before he hard
Tydings thereof, and so them still debarred.”
It is said that the central gem in the brooch[27] which the Bruce was
compelled to leave a prey to Macdougall of Lorn, because he could not
extricate it from the grasp of his dead foe, is one of these magic
crystals, and that beneath it is a hollow space to contain some other
amulet. It certainly proved a trusty talisman, in that hour of direst
need, when its master was so sorely beset by overpowering odds, and we
may well believe that it was a hard necessity which forced him to
abandon it.
A list of many such magical stones was compiled two hundred years ago by
a Welshman curious in these matters—in which he mentions upwards of
fifty varieties in common use among his countrymen and the Highlanders;
some round, some oval, some hollow rings, some of crystal, some of
glass, but all alike were used medicinally, and more especially on
May-day at the feast of Beltane, they were dipped in water, with which
the cattle were sprinkled to save them from the power of witches and
elves.
A talisman of this sort belongs to the family of Græme of Inchbrakie—a
bead from the necklace of a luckless old wife who, about the year 1715,
was burnt at Crieff on a charge of witchcraft. The Laird of Mongie, her
foster son, was the only person who dared to plead for her life, and in
gratitude for his goodwill she bit this bead from off her necklace (her
hands being bound), and spat it towards him, promising that so long as
he and his descendants preserved that charm, the house of Inchbrakie
should never lack a direct heir, or lose their patrimony. In the same
breath she cursed the neighbouring house of Mongie, declaring that till
the nearest river ran dry, it should have no lineal descendant.
Moreover, she bitterly bewailed the loss of another magic stone, which
she believed would have effectually preserved her from all the malice of
her foes.
The Campbells of Glenlyon and the Bairds of Auchmeddan have similar
magical curing-stones; that of the latter is a silver-mounted black
flint, bearing date 1174, and is now the property of the Frasers of
Findrack. But the most remarkable of all these is one belonging to the
Lockharts of Lee, in Lanarkshire, known as the Lee penny, and
immortalized by Sir Walter Scott as “The Talisman.” It is a small red
pebble, heart-shaped, set in a coin of Edward IV. It was supposed to
have been an amulet brought from the Holy Land in the time of the
Crusades. Like the crystal balls, it was to be drawn round any vessel
containing water, and dipped thrice therein. That water, henceforward,
had power to cure all manner of diseases. Not only did the people bring
their cattle from all parts of the kingdom to drink of this medicine,
but, when a terrible plague ravaged Newcastle in the time of Charles I.,
the townsfolk were allowed to borrow the penny, on giving a bond of
6,000_l._ for its sure restoration. So precious did they find it, that
they desired to be allowed to forfeit the money, and keep the groat with
the charmed stone, a proposition to which the Laird of Lee would by no
means accede. Afterwards, when the Synod busied itself with the
suppression of all manner of superstitions, it found no fault in the Lee
penny, inasmuch as it undoubtedly possessed curative gifts, which were
wrought without the use of any unlawful charms or sorceries. So to this
day, cattle-owners come from afar to ask for bottles of water in which
the magic penny has been dipped; (a ceremony which, I believe, is
generally performed by some member of the family, to secure the safety
of the talisman) and these precious bottles are hung up, all ready for
emergencies in many a cow-byre in Lanarkshire.
Amongst the magical stones which to this day command the reverence of
the people, I may mention a crystal ball in the family of Willox,
hereditary cattle-curers at Nairn. Whatever mischief befalls the cattle
in the neighbourhood, the remedy is sure. Willox is summoned, and
presently arrives, bringing some curious old harness, which is said to
be a witch-bridle; also this round crystal, which is placed in a bucket
of water, and is certain to reflect the face of whatever bad neighbour
has bewitched the cattle by his evil eye. A few years ago, this crystal
was produced in Court in Inverness, its owner having got into trouble,
during a year of grievous murrain, when people of all sorts, even highly
educated, were shown to have come from all parts of the country to
consult its owner. Amongst others who had applied to him for the good of
their cattle, was a highly respected English lady, well known in the
neighbourhood for her general acuteness and common sense. The crystal
having been duly inspected was restored to its master who will doubtless
exhibit it to all curious in such matters. In many of the Isles an old
flint arrow-head is still thought most valuable for the same purpose.
The people call them elf-shot and believe them to have been hurled at
the cattle by evil fairies!
St. Fladda’s blue stone has led us into a long digression. To return to
our post on the rock. The sleepers in the yacht are now all astir, and
as you look down on the picturesque sailors in their blue jerseys and
long scarlet knitted caps, all so busy unfurling the white sails, you
know that there is a chance of a move before long. So you hail the wee
boat, that has been fetching the morning supply of milk, and practice
your rowing, till a tune on the pipes announces that breakfast is ready.
Then you will sail slowly along the coast, starting early while the sun
is still in the east, lighting up the cliffs, and you must keep as near
the shore as you dare, or you will lose all beauty. And the slower the
better, for every fresh turn shows you new, strange caves, or masses of
tall basaltic columns, sometimes cut across, as if by some giant knife,
showing a slanting section of all the pillars, but more frequently
overlaid with rich soil and green pasture, and above it all the
ever-changing masses of the Quiraing tower like grim fortifications.
From this side you can hardly believe that they are not great masses of
grey masonry; so utterly different are they from the red or yellow
basalt which composes the greater part of the sea-coast for the next few
miles. A very wonderful formation it is, with those regular hexagonal
columns, that look as though carefully chiselled according to
geometrical laws. Learned men tell us that it was once a red-hot fluid,
which, in cooling, crystallised in this manner, and experiments are
shown with chemical mud, which being allowed to cool, gradually assumes
the same forms, and give us miniatures of Staffa, and all this coast.
Very beautiful are these caves and rock masses, where, on the slightest
provocation, the green waves rush in with such sudden swell, and dash
right over them in wild white spray. This it is which makes the danger
of lingering too long in the pleasant nooks and caves, sheltered from
the open sea. You may chance to find, as you row confidingly out of your
little haven, that a sudden breeze has sprung up, fretting the white
sea-horses, and making them chafe and toss so angrily that your tiny
boat may find it hard work enough to return to the mother-craft.
Such risk as this I encountered at an exquisite spot in Kilmaluoc Bay,
so called in memory of St. Moluoc, whose lowly cell once stood on the
green shores of this quiet little harbour. As we rowed close in shore we
discovered a place where the rock face was riven, and showed light
within. There was just space for the little boat to float in, passing
under a low archway in the rock, when suddenly we emerged into an open
space so lovely that any scenepainter who could produce such a
transformation-scene for next Christmas would assuredly make his
fortune. We had floated into a circular basin, whose rocky sides opened
into several long deep caves, beneath whose shadow the water grew dark
and mysterious, of the deepest emerald tint, while beneath us lay a
clear, transparent aquamarine, through whose depths we could plainly see
our own shadow rest on the yellow sand far below. Tiny jelly-fish, edged
with lilac spots and long white fringe, floated beside the delicate pink
sea-weeds in the clear green water; and as we looked upward to the deep
blue sky, we saw that the rock was crowned with heather and ferns and
tall grasses, changing from golden cream to silvery, as the light wind
rippled over them, though no breath of air stirred near us. And from
every cleft in the rock grew tall spikes of crimson foxgloves (the
folk’s glove of olden days), and clusters of blue bells, and all manner
of flowers, blue and white and yellow.
There was not a sound to be heard save the swish-swish of the dancing
wavelets just outside. So perfectly did the rocks round us deaden all
noise, that when the yacht fired her little gun as a signal for the
immediate return of the boat, I still sat quietly painting, utterly
unconscious of any change, and it was not till we had floated clear of
the arch by which we had entered, and caught sight of the open sea, that
we realized anything being amiss. A heavy ground swell had set in, and
the yacht, not daring to lie where she was, was running before the wind,
seeking a safer harbour, and leaving us either to go ashore, or pull
after her, as might seem best to Norman Campbell, the trusty yachtsman,
who was rowing me. He being a strong muscular young fellow, and a
thorough seaman, chose the latter, and a stiff two miles he had before
we came up with the yacht, which had found a place where she could
venture to lie to and wait for us.
[Illustration: SCHLOCH MADDIE CAVE, SKYE. _To face p. 136._]
I fear Martin the skipper expended some forcible Gaelic on my escort,
but these Skye lads are used to gales of all sorts, and are not easily
ruffled; and when we anchored for the night in beautiful Loch Staffin
Bay, the most harmonious peace reigned among the crew, and the hours
were enlivened as usual by wild Gaelic songs and choruses, or by stories
of smuggling, in which the fathers and kinsfolk of the narrators
generally took a prominent part. For to have been a professional
smuggler is considered just as respectable as any other method of
earning a livelihood. Then we were told many wild legends of the coast,
and can bear witness how marvellously these gain in interest when the
narrator can point out the very spot where the weird spirit appeared, or
the miserable victim perished. And if divers caves _will_ claim the same
history, well, you must try and believe it to be true of each in turn.
Take such a wild, wailing pibroch as McCrimmon’s Lament, which whether
played on the pipes in the early morning at a Highland funeral, with an
accompaniment of wild cries from the sea-birds, or else sung by a chorus
of plaintive voices, while the little waves splash against the ship, and
the wind moans in fitful gusts, is about the most wildly mournful of all
Gaelic Laments. It becomes positively thrilling when the singers pause,
and pointing to a dark yawning cavern, extending far under the land,
tell you that there, into that very cave, the bold piper marched,
followed by his faithful dog; that he ventured bravely on, resolved to
explore the dark passage, and that about a mile inland, where a deep
hole is supposed to open into the subterranean passage, his watchful
friends still heard his heart-stirring music, when suddenly it ceased,
and soon an awful struggle was heard, and McCrimmon’s cry of anguish
arose, telling of some awful creature that was grappling with him in the
darkness. Then the cries ceased. Soon afterwards the miserable dog,
which had been flayed alive, and had lost even the power of howling,
crept to the mouth of the cave to die. And since that day no rash
adventurer has been so foolhardy as to tempt the like fate. I must
confess to having been painfully _désillusionnée_ on hearing the same
story told of the cave at Keill, in the Mull of Cantyre, and of half a
dozen different spots on the west coast. Nevertheless you sometimes hear
deliciously “creepy” stories, such legends as may well inspire the
fishers with an ill-defined, mysterious dread of certain spots. Such is
the tale that tells how on the shore of one of those dim isles (either
Barra or Tyree, I forget which) is the cave where Ossian and his heroes
sit spellbound in a long deep sleep.
One day a bold fisher discovered this very cave, and entering, beheld
this grand band of sleepers. Near them hung the magic horn, at the third
blast of which, blown by mortal lips, he knew they would all awaken. He
was a brave man, who scorned all fear, so he put his lips to the horn
and blew such a shrill call that the cormorants and the sea-mews came
shrieking forth from the dark recesses of the cavern. A strange
indescribable dread took possession of him; nevertheless he repeated the
blast more loudly than before, and every rock seemed to echo back the
sound with strange spirit-laughter. Ere its tones had died away, he who
seemed chief of the heroes, and was in truth Ossian himself, stirred in
his sleep, and half awoke. He bade the rash intruder cease, and turning
on his side, slept once more. The terrified fisher fled, and straightway
sailed from the magic isle, and from that day to this no man has ever
been able to find the cave where the heroes of Ossian sleep.
Although the influence of the clergy and of the schoolmaster is rapidly
rooting out all traces of grey superstition, it still has some hold in
the more remote corners of the land; and the non-existence of kelpies
and brownies and _urisks_ is by no means so clearly proven, that a
midnight encounter with them would be a thing to risk lightly. The
kelpies, as you know, are water-spirits which are always malignant, and
delight in causing the floods to rise rapidly and overwhelm the unwary
traveller, while their mocking cry rings in his drowning ears; that the
kelpies are “bye-ordinar” irreverent is evident from the legend of the
old kirkyard at Conan—a green dreamy hillock, where autumn leaves float
silently down from overshadowing boughs, a russet covering for the grey
mossy stones. Round the foot of the hillock rushes the dark-brown river,
once the favourite haunt of a kelpie. One wild night when the storm was
raging and the river was in spate, the song of the kelpie was heard
above the voice of the winds and waters, and those who heard it
trembled, for they knew that the kelpie sought human blood. Then in hot
haste a messenger rode up whose errand would brook no delay, and he
urged his horse to swim the stream, but the steed shrank back
affrighted, and strong hands drew back the foolhardy rider, and vowed he
should not thus court destruction. So they locked him up within the old
chapel, and all night long the wild tempest battled and raved. When the
morning light dawned they went to release him, that he might go on his
way in safety, but they found him dead, for the kelpie had entered the
sanctuary, and had not even dreaded the holy water, but seizing its
victim, had held his face therein till he was drowned. So you see it was
a very irreverent kelpie indeed!
All over Scotland there are legends of these water-goblins. Thus at
Choill-a-chroin, “the wood of lamentation,” near Loch Vennachar, a
beautiful pony once came playfully up to a merry group of children, and
suffered several of the little innocents to clamber on its back. Then
suddenly wheeling round, it galloped off with them, and plunged into the
cold waves, and the mothers wept and wailed greatly for the little ones
who might never return. This was the form in which it constantly
appeared to the Shetlanders. Sometimes a kelpie would assume the form of
a splendid black horse, which would appear at the market in charge of
some strange uncanny-looking fellow. So fine a beast was sure to find a
purchaser, and for a while all would go well, only its strange love for
water was noticed, and it would prance and plunge with delight when a
bucketful was thrown over it. At last, on some distant expedition, it
was sure to be overtaken by a wild storm, and when the ford had swelled
to a raging torrent, and its master was compelled to trust to the good
swimming of its steed, he discovered too late that he was bestriding the
awful kelpie, who would plunge with him into the depths of the foaming
waters, never to rise again. We heard many a strange story, too, of
those kindly brownies, who used to do so many good turns to lighten the
drudgery of farm or household work, and take their payment in bowls of
cream and other delicacies, just as the glashans did in the Isle of Man,
or the pwaccas in Wales, or as the gins still do in the far-away deserts
of Scinde. In every case the description of the creature is the same; he
is like a dwarfish human being, covered with long hair, and breathing
heavily; having moreover large eyes and great strength, which he
willingly employs for any mortal to whom he takes a fancy, working for
him hard and faithfully year after year; but nevertheless apt to be
sullen and morose, and on slight provocation, to depart for ever.
It is curious to find this good brownie doing just the same work in the
far east as in these western isles; but this is only one of many kindred
superstitions. The people of Scinde have from time immemorial been able
to draw the milk from their neighbour’s cows, just as well as any
Highland wife; their witches divine from sheep-bones, and take the form
of tigers and other beasts, just as easily as a Scottish witch
transforms herself into a hare or a stag. They tell wild stories of
rakshas or demons of the mountains, and of bhoots or ghosts of the dead;
but those who have tried to collect these legends say that there, as in
our own Highlands, this becomes year by year more difficult, for the old
folk are dying off, and the rising generation do not care to speak of
these things, so that the old stories are fast disappearing from the
east as well as from the west.
Still there are tribes such as those of the Belooch hills who would be
as unwilling as a Highlander to seek out the haunts of a gin, and who
tell of magic caves through which the fairies sometimes admit mortals to
their subterranean Paradise, where they all dance unceasingly from one
year’s end to another beneath trees laden with fruit, which is all made
of gold and precious stones.
Precisely the same story is told of a rock in the forest of Glenavon, in
Strathspey, and of a green hillock in Strathglass, known as the Beatha
Og, or Young Birch, on account of the trees that overhang the fairy
knoll; as also of many another place both in Scotland and in Wales. In
every case some wanderers are beguiled into a lighted cavern, where they
find friends whom they had long since buried dancing with the fairies in
merry rounds and reels. Invariably some of the party taste of the
fairies’ good cheer, and forthwith join the dance, and the mere prudent
abstainers are forced to go home without them. Should they return to
seek for their lost friends, they hear only the waving of the birches
and the rippling of the stream, till perhaps seven years later, on some
mystic night such as Midsummer’s Eve or New Year, the cavern once more
becomes visible, the dancers are as merry as before, and any mortal who
has the courage to enter, armed either with a cross of the rowan-tree or
a dagger of cold steel, such as all fairies abhor, may rescue his
companions from their enchantment, though to them it will seem as if the
seven years of hard dancing had been but as one night’s merrymaking.
These fairies are always clad in green, and are particularly vicious
against anyone daring to wear their colour, more especially on Friday,
when they have double power, and when a genuine Highlander will shrink
from any allusion to them as being “no canny,” or at least to be made
with marked respect, as to beings invisibly present, and who need to be
conciliated. This is what Scott referred to when he told how
“The Highlander, whose red claymore,
The battle turned on Maida’s shore,
Will on a Friday morn look pale
If asked to tell a fairy tale.
He fears the vengeful Elfin King,
Who leaves that day his grassy ring;
Invisible to human ken,
He walks among the sons of men.”
Why these creatures should be called Daoine Shi’ich, or men of peace, I
cannot imagine, unless from that curious feeling which prompts so many
races to propitiate evil demons who might harm them, rather than serve
the good who will do them no ill. For these men of peace are spiteful
creatures, jealous of human joys, and especially anxious to abstract
new-born babies (which they have only power to do before baptism),
leaving in their place their own cross-grained brats, with voracious
appetites, always “skirling” for meat. These are known as changelings;
hence the use of that name to describe a puny unsatisfactory child.
In South Uist there is the valley of Glenslyte, haunted by spirits
called “Great Men,” and formerly whoever entered this valley must
perforce repeat certain sentences, committing themselves to the guidance
of these beings: for should this ceremony be omitted, they believed they
would inevitably go mad, which (like the Chinese custom of beating gongs
during an eclipse to save the sun from extinction) involved a risk too
great to run.
Till very lately there existed all manner of curious methods for
consulting oracles, such as sewing up a man in a cow’s hide, and leaving
him for the night on some hill-top, that he might be made a
spirit-medium. The commonest sort of divination was practised by means
of the shoulder-blades of beasts slain in sacrifice, just as at the
present day the shepherds of Niolo in Corsica foretell coming events by
the left shoulder-blade of a goat or sheep. And it is a matter of firm
belief, now that charms exist whereby a man can spoil his neighbour’s
barm (yeast), and a woman can prevent cows from yielding their milk,
and, by some invisible agency, appropriate it for her own use. She can
also by evil arts take away the milk from nursing mothers. As to the
superstitions connected with death, they are still numberless. There are
warnings in the flight of birds, the howling of dogs, sights and sounds
mysterious and undefined; and which are readily construed into good or
evil. A hare or a fox crossing the path is held to be so sure a token of
evil, that educated men have been known to turn back, declaring they
could not travel after receiving such a sign of danger; and even in
civilized Morayshire and Perthshire I know one or two stalwart men who
have no hesitation in believing that certain poor harmless old wives are
witches, who have the power to take the form of those animals. One old
wife lately told us that there had been some talk lately about poaching
hares. “But deed she kent it was na auld Geordie, nor young Geordie
either. For ye see, we’re afeared o’ th’ hares. Ou gin ye wad kill a
hare ye dinna ken wha ye wad be killin’! Deed the half of them’s
witches!” This enlightened old lady was adorned with Prince Alfred’s
photograph, set as a brooch, in which she had invested capital to the
amount of one penny! Nor is it very long since one of the gamekeepers
(in whom our Sassenach friends are wont to behold their ideal of a
stalwart Highlander) wounded a hare, and triumphantly told us that the
next time he saw a certain innocent old wife at the kirk her arm was in
a sling, so surely there remained no room for doubt as to her dealing in
witchcraft! As to the stories concerning second sight (which answers to
the clairvoyance of the south), they are legion, and implicitly believed
to this day. There is scarcely a village in which some one has not been
favoured by ghostly apparitions from dead or living. Either the person
seen has already died, or else his doom is swiftly approaching.
That the faith in fairy lore is not by any means extinct was proved to
us only the other day when a lady in Banffshire asked an old woman how
she came to know of a rather unusual cure for some illness. She replied
that she had learnt that and many other things from a wife who had been
spirited away by the fairies, and had lived with them underground for
eight years. But having said thus much, the old lady relapsed into a
mysterious silence, and though much questioned as to the manners and
customs of the fairies and their guest, she refused to say another word,
for “Ou! it wasna safe to be speaking o’ the gude folk; maybe they would
be spiriting her awa’ next!”
One favourite story is of a lovely woman, clad in green robes and green
mantle, carrying in her arms a young goblin child. She enters a cottage
and sits down by the hearth, fanning the embers to warm her numbed
hands; then by mere action of the will she draws the heart’s blood of
one of the children to feed her young goblin, and sure enough when
morning breaks one of the little ones is dying.
The belief in all these weird and wondrous legends has been greatly kept
up by the old custom of story-telling round the peat fires in the long
winter evenings; but the ban of the Church now lies so heavily on all
that tends to encourage superstition, that the popular lore seems in
danger of dying out, or of being preserved only by such collectors as
Campbell of Islay, whose Gaelic mother tongue and local sympathies
enable him to “draw” every blue bonnet and white mutch that cross his
path. It is a matter of considerable difficulty nowadays to induce any
of the younger generation to relate these old stories, partly from the
dread of being laughed at by unbelievers, who look on their legends as
being “just blethers,” and still more because their solemn unimaginative
teachers try to put down all such foolish tales as utterly unworthy of
wise and Christian men, though at the same time the schoolmasters labour
hard to store the minds of their pupils with an amount of Greek and
Latin mythology that would astonish most village schools in England.
They little think what exceeding interest there may be for learned men
in this old Gaelic mythology which is so fast dying out, and of its many
strange analogies to the most ancient legends of the far east.
There is scarcely one of these fables which has not its twin brother in
those of far-distant lands, and in these days when the common origin of
the Aryan races is a question so widely discussed, when we are told how
strongly Gaelic is akin to Sanskrit, and that Ceylon and St. Kilda were
alike peopled by a Celtic race which started from a central point in
Asia, it is strange indeed to find that both these islands have from
time immemorial believed the same curious traditions, somewhat altered
of course in their oral transmission from generation to generation, but
virtually the same.
In the Hebrides you will hear how John, the fisher’s son, leaped his
horse over a strait to an island in the Sound of Barra, where he slew a
dragon with nine heads and rescued a beautiful princess.
Precisely such a nine-headed dragon as is minutely described in these
Gaelic legends is found sculptured on temples in Cambodia and India,
where the old serpent worship prevailed in the most remote ages. One
magnificent temple in Cambodia sacred to a seven-headed serpent still
remains perfect, though probably more than a thousand years old. Many
more were doubtless destroyed by the Aryan conquerors, who waged war on
the Nagas, or serpent-worshippers, and who continually describe their
sun-god as strangling the serpents of night.
A parallel to the history of how the Hindu god, Indra, slew the water
monster, Vitra (as told in the _Rig Veda_), has been pointed out in the
Gaelic legend of how Fraoch killed a great serpent on the Ross of Mull.
The wildest tales of Ossian are found again in the old Persian poets;
and a thousand other instances might be adduced.
Nor is it alone in legends such as these that we mark strange
coincidences. Such fragments of the old Gaelic and Irish mythologies as
still exist, bear the strongest resemblance to those both of India and
Ceylon, a similarity all the more striking as existing between gods whom
neither the Aryans of east nor west would have worshipped in the days of
their pure early faith. For just as the most recent interpretations of
the ancient _Vedas_ prove that in the original worship of Brahma all use
of idols was strictly prohibited; so in these isles, and wherever the
Druids held sway, no images of any sort were tolerated, and there seems
no doubt that at one time the Celts adored only one supreme God. After a
while, however (probably after they had mingled with the aboriginal
races), they seem to have adopted a creed as complex, and fallen into
idolatry as gross, as that of their degenerate Hindu brethren.
It would seem as if our forefathers had even devised images of their
gods, for we find Gildas, a very old author, writing of “the monstrous
idols of our country, almost surpassing in number the very devilish
devices of Egypt, of the which we behold as yet some, both within and
without the walls of their forsaken temples now mouldering away, with
deformed portraitures, and terrible countenances, after the accustomed
manner.” But what is most singular of all is that the very names of
these gods and their histories are said to have a striking affinity to
those now worshipped in the East. To begin with, it is stated that the
most sacred name in the Celtic mythology—the holy and mystic title of
the Almighty, was that very word Om or Aum (He who is), a title so
sacred that a Brahmin will not utter it aloud, while the Buddhist
repeats it a thousand times in his daily worship, and sculptures it on
all holy places. Then Chreeshna was actually an old Irish name for the
sun-god whom the Hindus adore as Krishna. The cruel goddess, Kali, too,
had a namesake in Ireland, and the site where her altars stood is yet
known as Leeba Caili, or the bed of Caili. As further examples I may
quote
Saman answering to Samanaut.
Can „ „ Chandra.
Neith „ „ Nate.
Bud „ „ Buda.
Buda is the name under which, even to this day, the people of Ceylon
reverence the planet Mercury. It is curious to observe how, with them,
the system of Bali, or planetary worship, still reigns, in defiance of
all prohibitions of Buddhist or Christian masters; just as in these
British isles the same homage was rendered to all the host of heaven for
many centuries after Christianity had held its partial sway. We may
notice, by the way, that in the division of the week the people of
Ceylon have not only retained the seven days, but have actually named
each after the very same planet to which it had been dedicated in the
western world.
Another very striking analogy has been shown to exist between the
symbols considered sacred in the planetary worship of Ceylon and those
which we find sculptured on the ancient memorial stones of pagan
Britain; stones which we believe to be relics of a faith almost
identical with the Bali. Not only do we find elaborately carved
crescents, discs, double wheels, linked together by a royal sceptre,
such as might naturally suggest themselves as emblems of the sun, but we
also find fish, geese, serpents, and highly idealized elephants and
camels,[28] the three last-named being creatures which would scarcely
have presented themselves to the minds of our ancestors had not some
tradition of these unknown forms reached them from the eastern world. It
is, therefore, very remarkable to find that the elephant, the crescent,
and the goose are sacred symbols in common use on the sculptured stones
of Ceylon. Also, but more rarely, I have observed the fish among the
emblematic paintings in the temples. It is also remarkable that another
emblem found on these stones, namely the figure of a man cutting the
throat of a bull, should be identical with the symbol of the Persian
sun-god, Mithras.
The extreme reverence of both peoples for fire and water is another link
between them. The Aryans of the east, we know, held Agni, the fire-god,
in such honour that he must needs be present at all their religious
ceremonies; indeed the presence of fire as a divine witness was often
their sole marriage service. Of the veneration of our own ancestors for
the same fire-god and for the water-spirits, we still find strange
traces, though devotion to fire and water has, in general, superseded
that of the simple elements. In Goojerat the presence of fire and water
is still held essential at all marriage ceremonies. A square is formed
in the centre of which a fire is kindled. At each corner of the square
nine water vessels are piled, one above the other. The bride and
bridegroom, standing by the fire, offer sacrifice; and after divers
ceremonies they walk four times, sunwise, round the sacred element, and
conclude by worshipping the polar star. Sometimes the marriage is by
proxy. The warrior husband sends his sword as his representative. In
this case the bride and her steel spouse make the circle round the fire
twice only and she repeats that ceremony twice when she has actually
reached the dwelling of her lord.
As to the divers forms of trial by ordeal, both with fire and water, we
know that they were just as highly esteemed in the east as in Britain.
There, as well as here, the accused was made to walk between burning
ploughshares, or plunge his arm into boiling water.[29] There, too, the
witches of old were thrown into ponds, either to prove their innocence
by sinking, or their guilt by floating; in which case they were
summarily despatched, and thus, whether innocent or guilty, society was
rid of them.
The minute similarity between these various forms of trial among our own
ancestors and the Hindus is very singular. In Britain the supposed
culprit was made to plunge his arm into a cauldron of boiling water and
thence pick out a pebble, after which the arm was tied up in linen and
woollen cloths, and judicial watchers were set over the man to see that
these were not unbound for three days. If at the end of that time no
scar was found on the arm the accused was held innocent. The custom in
India is, or was, that a man accused of a capital crime who chose this
method of trial should, for several days previous to the ordeal, have
his arm tied up in wax cloth to prevent any deceit. This cloth was
sealed up with the great State seal, and in British districts was sealed
with the Company’s arms, while a European guard watched over the
prisoner. On a given day a piece of money was dropped into a cauldron of
boiling oil, the prisoner’s arm was unsealed and washed, after which,
while the Brahmins offered prayers for a just decision, he plunged his
arm into the cauldron and picked out the coin. Then the wax cloth was
again sealed up, and the prisoner guarded for several days. When the
bandages were finally removed the condition of his arm revealed his
guilt or his innocence.
In the Rajmahal hills the form of trial still in use is to drop a ring
into a pot of boiling water, mixed with boiling oil and cow-dung; the
accused must plunge in his hand and draw out the ring. Should he be
innocent his hand will not be burnt, but if guilty the pot will boil up
and scald him. The ancient Cingalese had precisely the same custom.
The well-known Indian ordeal of making the persons accused of any crime
attempt to swallow a mouthful of consecrated rice, which would certainly
choke the guilty person, also had its counterpart among our forefathers
in the ceremony known as the Corsned, or morsel of execration. A piece
of barley bread and a bit of cheese were laid on the altar, and any
priest accused of crime was compelled to try and swallow a portion in
presence of his brethren and the congregation, all of whom prayed
fervently that if he were guilty the archangel might seal his throat
that he might be unable to do so. The custom may have existed long
before a Christian priesthood adopted it as their peculiar test, for
such it was generally, in later days considered; yet there is no doubt
that the laity also were subjected to the same ordeal, as when Godwin,
Earl of Kent, being accused of the murder of King Edward’s brother,
appealed to it, with fatal result.
As to the ordeal of walking blindfold over red-hot ploughshares, we turn
from the page of English history to that of Hindu mythology to find
descriptions identical in all points. In the former we read how Queen
Emma, mother of Edward the Confessor, being accused of unfaithfulness to
her lord, triumphantly vindicated her innocence by walking barefoot and
blindfold, unhurt, over red-hot ploughshares. Precisely similar was the
test by which the Hindu king Rama made his beautiful wife, Seeta, prove
her purity, when rescued from the hands of Ravana, the king of Lanka.
One strongly-marked similarity between our common ancestors was that
firm faith in the immortality of the soul, which undoubtedly found a
place in the Celtic creed, and which Cæsar mentions as one of the tenets
of the Druids. In the tumuli of Britain, as well as those of India,
skeletons of animals have been found as if placed ready for food; swords
also that would have been precious to the living, were buried with the
dead, that they might not be left defenceless on awakening. The old
Gauls buried written statements of accounts and claims of debts, that
they might be carried on in the next life; and so well was this creed
acted upon that men would lend one another money, trusting to repayment
when they met in some new phase of existence. I doubt whether modern
Hindus would be equally trusting, or the Pharisees of olden days either,
if indeed, as Josephus affirms, they too held this doctrine. Certainly
we may infer that they did so from the readiness with which they
suggested that Christ was merely a new incarnation of Elijah, Jeremiah,
or one of the prophets, and also from that strange question respecting
the man who was born blind, “Did _this man_ sin or his parents, that he
was _born_ blind?”
A quaint trace of the old Druidical teaching of transmigration is the
notion not yet wholly extinct, that when a man is slowly lingering away
in consumption, the fairies are on the watch to steal his soul that they
may therewith give life to some other body. To prevent this, old wives
are often anxious to cut the nails of the sufferer, that they may tie up
the parings in a bit of rag, and wave this precious charm thrice round
his head, Deus Sol! Even to this day we are sometimes startled to find
persons believing, not only that certain animals are witches in
disguise, but that the dead have returned to earth in these strange
forms. I have heard such stories whispered with bated breath, in our own
hills, and the same traditions are common in the wilds of Cornwall,
where we heard a gamekeeper positively refusing to fire at a fox that
haunted a certain house, and came constantly baying under the windows.
He was not deterred by any fox-hunting scruples, but by the conviction
that the animal was really “poor Mr. Frank,” whose spirit returned to an
earthly form sometimes in the form of a hare, sometimes as a black cock,
but most often as a fox. No Brahmin could have been more decided in his
views.
Another curious link between the highlanders of India and of Scotland is
the custom now in use among the Khonds (a tribe in Madras), of gathering
together their forces in time of need, by sending round an “arrow of
summons,” which was identical with that “fiery cross” so well known to
our ancestors, who, in times of danger used to slay a goat, and making a
cross of wood, seared its extremities in fire, and extinguished them in
the blood of the sacrifice. This was in constant use so late as 1745,
and was known as the cross of gathering, or as Craan Tarigh, the cross
of shame, because shame, fire, and blood awaited any man from the age of
sixteen to sixty who failed to come to the help of his clan. It is said
that in the isle of Shetland the arrow was the sign retained till very
late days, just as it still is among these primitive Khonds, a race in
which each family still bears the name of some animal, which is its
Totem, or representative animal, so that the tribes are known as bears,
owls, monkeys, or deer. They have neither temples nor images, because
they cannot believe that a temple made with hands can be the favoured
abode of God, so they prefer to worship him on hoar rocks amid the
silence of the eternal hills, beside still fountains and by flowing
rivers, or in the deep shade of sacred groves where the sound of axe is
never heard. They reverence forests, rivers, and mountains, sun, moon,
and planets, as types of the Creator’s power, very much as our own
ancestors did in bygone ages.
Even in simple questions of food, of clean and unclean meats, many
curious coincidences occur in the customs of brown men and white.
Readers of Ossian and kindred Gaelic lore have sometimes been struck by
the readiness with which mighty hunters of old feasted on the wild boars
they had slain in the chase, as when Fingal and his son Ossian, and all
the other heroes devoured the boar Scrymner. They note this fact in
connection with the Scotch abhorrence of pork and pig’s flesh in all
forms. It is, therefore, not without interest to notice that though the
modern Hindus abhor the domestic pig almost as much as do the
Mahommedans, they will feast on wild boar to any extent. Even high-class
Brahmins will sometimes partake of this dainty, in remembrance of their
sacred hog Baraha, who was an incarnation of Vishnu. Several learned men
assert that in this land also the wild boar was once held sacred, and
even in later times his effigy has been represented on the ancient
British coinage.
It is curious that in Egypt also the Copts mark precisely the same
distinction between the wild and tame pig, a prejudice which they are
supposed to have retained from the remotest times; an inheritance
doubtless from their Phœnician ancestors, who held pig in such
abhorrence that they bequeathed the antipathy to all their race. It has
been recorded even of the gluttonous Heliogabalus that he rigidly
abstained from pork and bacon in every form, because of his Phœnician
descent. As to these modern Egyptians, they will in no case rear pigs or
taste the flesh of the tame animal, whereas that of the wild boar is
considered a most desirable feast. One difference assigned is that the
latter is almost entirely a vegetarian, whereas civilization has
degraded the appetite of his tame brother. So hateful to the old
Egyptians were the domestic swine, that should a man accidentally touch
one with the hem of his garment he was rendered unclean. Yet at the full
moon pigs were freely sacrificed to Bacchus, and the people feasted on
their flesh. Each family slew a pig at their own door, while those who
were too poor to afford one made an image of dough, which they offered
instead. Doubtless the Jewish sin of eating pig was hence associated
with idolatry, as we generally find that eating swine’s flesh and broth
made thereof is associated with burning incense to strange gods, and on
forbidden altars. This, too, would account for the intense abhorrence
with which the Jew regarded poor piggy—far in excess of that merited by
other things equally prohibited by the Levitical law. Thus in the
account given in Maccabees of the persecution under Antiochus, we find
that they submitted to every species of degradation, to the defilement
of their altars, and the dedication of their temples at Jerusalem and
Mount Gerizim, to Jupiter. They even submitted to walk in idolatrous
processions at the licentious feast of Bacchus, carrying ivy like the
rest of his worshippers, but when it came to the question of swallowing
swine’s flesh, there they stood firm, from the least to the greatest,
and we hear even of a mother standing by to see her sons murdered
piecemeal with indescribable tortures rather than purchase life and
wealth by this concession. One by one her seven sons were thus slain,
while she encouraged then to endure to the end, and finally died with
them.
Another interesting point of resemblance between the ancient Celt and
the modern Hindu is the religious abhorrence in which the latter holds
poultry, as being unclean, so that he will on no account taste it or
touch it. The poultry market of India is, I believe, entirely supplied
by Mahommedans, or by men too degraded to have any caste. The Celts we
know were forbidden to eat a hen, a goose or a hare. The repugnance to
the latter is not yet wholly extinct in some districts.
As to the goose it seems to have been held too sacred for food in all
parts of the world. Here our forefathers sculptured it among the sacred
emblems on their holy stones, together with elephants and horses. We
find it, in the same company, carved on the most ancient stones of
Ceylon. In Rajpootana and other parts of Hindostan it is specially
dedicated to Hari, the Hindoo god of battle, who is also worshipped
under the symbol of a sword. In Burmah the goose still floats on the
royal standard as the national emblem. We find it receiving solemn
worship in ancient Egypt, as also in Scandinavia, where it was sacred to
Odin, and where the goose festival has been christianized to the honour
of St. Martin instead of St. Michael as in this land. As to the old
Romans, we all remember how the sacred geese of Juno saved the capitol,
but though they doubtless gained great popularity thereby, their
sanctity was a much older story. Even to this day the modern Italians
fatten geese which are rarely, if ever, brought to table.
The very name of the bird has altered strangely little in its westward
journey. Thus in the ancient Pali, it is _Hanza_; in Egyptian, _Hanza_;
with the Romans, _Anser_. In Malay, _Gangsa_; in old German, _Ganza_; in
English, _Gander_.
Equally wide-spread seems to have been the reverence for certain fish.
It was affirmed by an ancient writer[30] that the people of Caledonia
never ate fish. Certainly it is remarkable that in all Ossian’s songs of
the chase, when he skims over flood and field, rivers and seas, no
allusion whatever is made to the catching of fish. Yet we find these
rudely carved on many holy stones, together with the mirror, which the
sea-faring folk to this day declare to be always seen in the hands of
mermaids. Their description of these fishy maidens and mermen answer,
precisely to the old accounts of the fish god and goddess, Dagon and
Derceto, which were worshipped by the Syrians and Phœnicians, who, for
their sakes, would eat no fish. The temple of Derceto, at Ascalon, was
on the edge of a deep lake full of fish, which, like those in the tanks
in India, were held sacred, and religiously fed. Venus also protected
the finny tribes, and on certain old Phœnician coins, fish appear in
connection with the crescent moon. The priests of ancient Egypt were
also forbidden to eat fish; and to this day certain tribes exist in
Caufiristan and the remote Hindu-Koosh mountain ranges, who worship a
god whom they call Dagon, and who religiously abstain from eating fish.
The ancient prohibition of the use of poultry, seems no wise to have
interfered with its use as a most suitable propitiatory offering in all
cases of need. In Britain as in India and Ceylon, a red cock seems from
time immemorial to have possessed peculiar virtue, and to have retained
such hold on the popular mind, that Christian teachers have found it
well-nigh as difficult to check this sacrifice in the one land as in the
other, even among their most hopeful converts. Among the Santhals, and
various other tribes both of Northern and Southern India, it is
customary in every case of dangerous illness, to sacrifice a cock beside
the patient, to whatever demon is supposed to have caused his malady. A
live cock is also nailed to the funeral pyre. And in our own Western
Highlands, and in some of the border counties, it was till very recently
quite a common ceremony to kill a cock beside the sick man, and either
bury it beneath the floor of the cottage, or at least let its blood
trickle into a hole in the floor. To this was probably added some of the
patient’s hair, and some parings of his nails! This is generally
supposed to be a trace of the old Roman worship of Esculapius, but I
fancy that some older tradition still, must have taught the same
practice to the Hindus. I believe this custom to be by no means extinct
in Britain.
Sir James Simpson mentions several instances within his own knowledge in
which this strange remedy has been resorted to, for the cure of fits,
epilepsy, and insanity. In one case a cock was killed and deposited in a
hole in the kitchen floor, on the spot where a child had fallen down in
a fit of convulsions; and a Ross-shire lassie told him that the
neighbours were urging her mother to try the like cure for the same
cause! He also speaks of the sacrifice of cats, moles, and other
animals. Thus, at Nigg, in Ross-shire, a lad being attacked with
epilepsy, his friends laid on his head a plate, and above it, held a
living mole, by the tail. They then cut off its head, and allowed the
blood to drip on to the plate. Three moles were thus killed in
succession, but without effect.
This offering a life for a life is the common Hindu practice in cases of
sickness. Various domestic animals are brought into the room from a
belief that they will absorb the noxious principles of disease, and act
as disinfectants. When they are supposed to have done their work, they
are thrown from the window. Even in the case of so enlightened a Hindoo
as the young Rajah of Kolapore, whose recent death at Florence was a
cause of so much regret, the presence of four European physicians would
have been considered by no means sufficient had these traditional Hindu
prescriptions been neglected; and as the Florentine authorities might
justly have objected had these wretched animals been cast from the
windows into the street, they were thrown down into an open courtyard!