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

THE PEAT-FIRE FLAME
MacQuarries of Ulva, for example, had their own Glaistig,
who used to attend to the cattle, and always gave vocal
warning when livestock
crops.
got in among the corn or other
Then, a Glaistig had her home in the Ross of Mull.
When a cattle-man in this neighbourhood was in the habit
of moving the cattle at nightfall, he used to hear an
invisible being say to him :
"
" There is a heifer behind you,
Son of Big Black John !
To this the cattle-man, by way of protecting himself
against any evil influence, always responded " : If there be
"
one behind me, there's a score in front of me !
And a local man, who frequently fished off the rocks of
the Ross, was followed constantly by the voice of a Glaistig,
as he proceeded home each evening with his catch. " Give
" the Glaistig used to say. Neil observed
me a cuddy, Neil !
that the oftener he conceded to the Glaistig's demand, the
more freciuent and troublesome became her solicitations.
Sometimes she pestered him so much when on his way home
from fishing that, by the time he reached his own threshold,
he had not a single fish left.
An Iona Glaistig.
In the shieling days of Iona when, during the summer
months, the inhabitants of the east end and of the west end
of that Island were wont to pasture their cows alternately
for fourteen days on the common grazing at a spot known
as Staonnaig, a Glaistig dwelt in a hollow rock near at hand.
For this Glaistig the Iona women at milking-time each
evening poured a little milk on what is still pointed out as
the Glaistig's Stone.
The story goes that on one occasion this Glaistig came
to the house of an old woman in Iona, seeking shelter from
a heavy downpour. The old woman, whose name was
Livingstone, prepared a meal for her, and bade her dry her
wet clothes by the peat-fire. Before the glowing peats
stood the Glaistig, extending her clothes to the warmth.
Suddenly they caught fire. This so annoyed her that she
rendered it impossible thereafter for any woman of the
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