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

THE PEAT-FIRE FLAME
the history of the clans. The participants were Sir James
MacDonald of Islay and Sir Lachlan MacLean of Duart,
together with their respective clansmen; and the feud has
been known ever since as the Battle of Gruinard Bay.
According to Gregory ^ and other authorities on matters
Highland, thirty MacDonalds were killed, and sixty of them
were wounded, whereas death claimed eighty of Sir Lachlan
MacLean's near kinsmen, in addition to roughly two
hundred other clansmen.
Tradition in Islay has it that a certain tiny fellow of the
brownie order, known as the Eighth Part Measure of a
Carle, and sometimes as the Black Elf, offered his services
in the feud to Sir Lachlan MacLean. But MacLean, himself
a valorous chief of giant proportions, contemptuously
declined the offer. So the Eighth Part Measure of a Carle,
not really minding on which side he fought, then made a like
offer to Sir James MacDonald, who immediately accepted
his help, only regretting that he did not have the support of
a hundred of his kind.
Throughout the conflict. Sir Lachlan remained encased
from head to toe in a suit of mail—immune to sword or
arrow, as he thought. But from the outset of the struggle
the Black Elf followed him closely and, on the first occasion
on which Sir Lachlan raised the vizor of his helmet, shot
into his forehead one of those arrows known as elf-bolts.
Sir James MacDonald expressed both regret at the premature
fall of his adversary, and interest in the person who
had encompassed it. After the conflict, he made enquiries
among his clansmen as to which of them was responsible
for it.
Then upspake a tiny creature, whom MacDonald did not
recognise. " It was myself," he said, " and a good thing
for you, because Lachlan would have killed yourself !
" What is your name? " enquired MacDonald of the very
diminutive figure now standing in front of him.
*' I am the Eighth Part Measure of a Carle," he
responded, " though they call me the Black Elf throughout
your green domains in Islay. And it was better for you
1 Gregory's West Ilighlands and Islands.
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