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

FAERIES : THEIR RROPENSITIES AKD ACTIVITIES
of Peace, lived in a faery knoll not far off ; and she would
be seeking the kettle every day. Not a word did she utter
when she came to borrow the kettle. It was her wont to
enter the house silently, and appropriate the utensil without
any explanation or ado. As she was in the act of quitting
the house, the herd's wife would be saying to her :
" A smith is able to make
Cold iron hot with coal :
The due of the kettle is bones,
And to bring it back again whole."
Under the spell of this rhyme, the kettle was sure to
return to its owner before daybreak.
Every day the Woman of Peace came back with the
kettle filled with juicy bones. And, on a day that there was,
the herd's wife, before leaving for Castlebay on an errand,
instructed her goodman to tell the Banshee, should she
come for the kettle in her absence, whither she had gone.
" Surely it's myself that will tell her," replied the herd.
Now, he happened to be spinning a heather rope at the
gable-end of his cottage when he saw the Woman of Peace
approaching; and he took fear at the sight of her, fled into
the house, shut the door, and refused to open it to her.
Determined not to be outwitted, the Banshee climbed up to
the hole that was in the roof of the house, just above the
fire. Thereupon the kettle gave two jumps, and then flew
out by the hole in the roof.
When the herd's wife returned from Castlebay, she
asked her husband where was the kettle. And he confessed
to her how he had closed the door in the face of the Woman
of Peace, and how petrified with fear he was when the
kettle began to jump on the hearthstone, and ultimately
disappeared through the hole that was in the roof above the
fire.
Night came; but with the kettle the Woman of Peace
returned not. Having scolded her husband for his childish
conduct, the goodwife of Sandray hastened away to the
faery brugh, where she found the kettle awaiting her. On
lifting it, she discovered it to be heavv with the remnants
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