The peat-fire flame : folk-tales and traditions of the Highlands & Islands

IT
CHAPTER XVII
RIEVERS' AND CATERANS' TALES
is curious that nearly all the Highland and Island
folk-tales, into which the bow and arrow are
introduced—and their number is inexhaustible—relate
the exploits of rievers and caterans, and the manner in which
such lawless members of society in olden times were either
killed or disabled, or were otherwise prevented from
achieving what they desired, as when the bow and arrow
were used for sending a fragment of flaming lint into the
thatched roof of an edifice harbouring an enemy difficult
to dislodge. Tales, such as that recounted in the previous
chapter about Black Neil and his retreat on Arrow Island,
are much less common.
But the folk-tales of the bow and arrow by no means
exhaust the supply of traditional story connected with the
endeavours, achievements, and failures of robbers and
footpads, and perhaps more especially of that species of
Highland society known as the cattle-riever. At a period
when livestock comprised almost the entire moveable
property of the bulk of the community, it is not surprising
that the practice of cattle-lifting should have been so
prevalent, and should have occupied so prominent a place in
the everyday life of the people.
The following tales are but a selection from an endless
number still recounted at winter ceilidhs round the peat-fires
in the more remote parts of the Highlands and in the
Hebrides.
The Fate of MacNeish.
On Innis Bhuidhe, that islet in the centre of the River
Dochart overshadowed bv gloomy pines and larches, is the
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