Folk-Lore and Legends | Page 6

now rose suddenly from her seat in the window-sill, the
living dread of shepherds, for she travelled the country with a brilliant
reputation for witchcraft, and thus she broke in upon the narrative: "I
vow, young man, ye tell us the truth upset and down-thrust. I heard my
douce grandmother say that on the night when Elphin Irving
disappeared--disappeared I shall call it, for the bairn can but be gone
for a season, to return to us in his own appointed time--she was seated
at the fireside at Johnstone Bank; the laird had laid aside his bonnet to
take the Book, when a shriek mair loud, believe me, than a mere
woman's shriek--and they can shriek loud enough, else they're sair
wranged--came over the water of Corrie, so sharp and shrilling, that the
pewter plates dinneled on the wall; such a shriek, my douce
grandmother said, as rang in her ear till the hour of her death, and she
lived till she was aughty- and-aught, forty full ripe years after the event.
But there is another matter, which, doubtless, I cannot compel ye to
believe: it was the common rumour that Elphin Irving came not into the
world like the other sinful creatures of the earth, but was one of the
kane-bairns of the fairies, whilk they had to pay to the enemy of man's
salvation every seventh year. The poor lady-fairy--a mother's aye a
mother, be she elves' flesh or Eve's flesh--hid her elf son beside the
christened flesh in Marion Irving's cradle, and the auld enemy lost his

prey for a time. Now, hasten on with your story, which is not a bodle
the waur for me. The maiden saw the shape of her brother, fell into a
faint, or a trance, and the neighbours came flocking in--gang on with
your tale, young man, and dinna be affronted because an auld woman
helped ye wi 't."
"It is hardly known," I resumed, "how long Phemie Irving continued in
a state of insensibility. The morning was far advanced, when a
neighbouring maiden found her seated in an old chair, as white as
monumental marble; her hair, about which she had always been
solicitous, loosened from its curls, and hanging disordered over her
neck and bosom, her hands and forehead. The maiden touched the one,
and kissed the other; they were as cold as snow; and her eyes, wide
open, were fixed on her brother's empty chair, with the intensity of gaze
of one who had witnessed the appearance of a spirit. She seemed
insensible of any one's presence, and sat fixed and still and motionless.
The maiden, alarmed at her looks, thus addressed her:--'Phemie, lass,
Phemie Irving! Dear me, but this be awful! I have come to tell ye that
seven of your pet sheep have escaped drowning in the water; for Corrie,
sae quiet and sae gentle yestreen, is rolling and dashing frae bank to
bank this morning. Dear me, woman, dinna let the loss of the world's
gear bereave ye of your senses. I would rather make ye a present of a
dozen mug-ewes of the Tinwald brood myself; and now I think on 't, if
ye'll send over Elphin, I will help him hame with them in the gloaming
myself. So, Phemie, woman, be comforted.'
"At the mention of her brother's name she cried out, 'Where is he? Oh,
where is he?' gazed wildly round, and, shuddering from head to foot,
fell senseless on the floor. Other inhabitants of the valley, alarmed by
the sudden swell of the river, which had augmented to a torrent, deep
and impassable, now came in to inquire if any loss had been sustained,
for numbers of sheep and teds of hay had been observed floating down
about the dawn of the morning. They assisted in reclaiming the
unhappy maiden from her swoon; but insensibility was joy compared to
the sorrow to which she awakened. 'They have ta'en him away, they
have ta'en him away,' she chanted, in a tone of delirious pathos; 'him
that was whiter and fairer than the lily on Lyddal Lee. They have long

sought, and they have long sued, and they had the power to prevail
against my prayers at last. They have ta'en him away; the flower is
plucked from among the weeds, and the dove is slain amid a flock of
ravens. They came with shout, and they came with song, and they
spread the charm, and they placed the spell, and the baptised brow has
been bowed down to the unbaptised hand. They have ta'en him away,
they have ta'en him away; he was too lovely, and too good, and too
noble, to bless us with his continuance on earth; for what are the sons
of men compared to him?--the light of the moonbeam to