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

RIEVERS AND CATERANS TALES
century found the artful MacKenzies of Kintail in full
possession of the Lewis, and of everything that pertained
to the MacLeods' heritage.^
Now, it was while a MacLeod woman was herding cows
on the machar at Aignish that a storm compelled her to
seek shelter in the old burying-place of the Siol Torquil
Chieftains. At the greying of day, she heard a scurrying
of feet outwith the dyke separating the burying-place from
the machar. On turning her attention to the direction from
which the sound came, she observed that a band of Mac-
Kenzies was in the act of ' lifting ' the cattle grazing on the
machar. This happened, of course, about the time that the
MacKenzies were scheming to displace the poor MacLeods
Straightway the MacLeod woman rose to her
of Lewis !
feet ; and, pretending that she was the wraith of one of the
nineteen departed Chiefs mouldering in the mools, she
shouted in a loud voice "
: A Chlann 'ic Leoid, nach eirich
sihhf O Clan Leod, will you not rise?"
Thereupon the rieving MacKenzies fled from Aignish,
leaving behind them the cattle they fain would have stolen.
Fate of a Lochaber Cateran.
Lochaber in olden times was notorious for its caterans
and footpads; and the story I have just related about the
rievers at Aignish, in the Lewis, recalls the folk-tale of the
fate that overtook a Lochaber riever, who sought to
interfere with the cattle belonging to the minister of Glen
Elg.
It is said that in former years the parish manse of Glen
Elg was situated in the adjacent valley known as Glen
Beag, up beside the ancient Pictish brochs. Indeed, the
site is still pointed out. It happened that on one occasion,
when the Lochaber caterans came over the hills to rieve,
they repulsed the Glen Elg men in a skirmish in which one
of the caterans was severely wounded. The Glen Elg
minister took the wounded man to his manse, kept him
1 For a detailed description of Aignish, see Chapter V of my book,
The Haunted Isles.
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