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

THE PEAT-FIRE FLAME
become sterile. Furthermore, there would be plenteousness
neither of crops nor of fish for a whole year : nor would any
children be born unto MacLeod.
A third version states that one of the chiefs of MacLeod
was betrothed to a faery, who dwelt on earth with him only
for a short space of time, and that, when she was bidding
him farewell before her return to faeryland, she presented
him with the Faery Flag as a keepsake. The actual spot
where the chief and the faery finally took leave of one
another is about three miles from Dunvegan. It is still
known as the Faery Bridge {Drochaid nan tri Allt, the
Bridge of the Brooks), and is situated just at the point where
the Portree, Dunvegan, and Vaternish roads converge.
For an account of the occasions on which the Faery Flag
was unfurled, and of the prophecies associated with it, I
would refer you to Chapter VII of my book, Over the Sea
to Skye.
Faery Millers.
Long ago the parish minister of Tiree employed a manservant
who, to his dying day, avowed that, when bringing
a cartload of meal home one night from the island mill, he
heard cjuern-stones operating in the centre of the Red
Knowes, by the road-side. He stopped the horse and cart
to listen for a while. The sound of the querns continued
unceasingly; and from this the minister's manservant
concluded that the faeries must have had a considerable
cjuantity of grain in their subterranean granary. All
attempts to dispel what many of his neighbours regarded as
a delusion failed completely. Neither minister nor kirksession
could disabuse his mind of belief in faeries, and of
the faeries' ability to grind corn with the cjuern, for he
inisisted that he had listened to this faery milling " with my
"
own ears !
The Little Folk of Sandwick Hill.
The belief that certain metals had the power of warding
off evil spirits and of ensuring safety in battle, or when
setting out on a journey, was widespread in the Highlands
22