Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 7, 1896.djvu/89

Rh Though I did my best to avoid her I welcome her as my assistant, and am prepared to entertain her during the winter.

Another form of the toast was as follows: "To your health, good wife, who for harvest has come to help us, and if I live I'll try to support you when winter comes."

John MacCorquodale, Kilchrenan, says that at Crianlarich in Strath Fillan, they make a Cailleach of sticks and a turnip, old clothes and a pipe. In this case the effigy passed in succession to seven farms, which he mentioned, and finally settled with an innkeeper. The list suggested that the upper farms stood a bad chance, and perhaps that a prosperous innkeeper could more easily bear up against the reproach and loss (?) of supporting the Cailleach.

Duncan Maclntyre, Kilchrenan, says that in one case where the last field to be reaped was the most fertile land on the farm, the corn first cut in it, which was taken near the edge, was reserved to make a Cailleach, should the owner be so happy as to be able to pass her on to his neighbour. The last blades cut were generally in the middle or best part of the field. These in any event became the Maiden.

Having directed the attention of Miss Kerr, Port Charlotte, Islay, to the practice of having two different bunches on the mainland of Argyle, she informs me that in Islay and Kintyre the last handful is the Cailleach, and they have no Maiden. The same is the custom in Bernara and other parts of the Western Isles, while in Mull the last handful is the Maiden, and they have no Cailleach.

In North Uist the habit still prevails of putting the Cailleach over-night among the standing corn of lazy crofters.

The children here in the neighbourhood built on the 14th of August the conical heaps mentioned by M. R. C., but not of mud. The outer wall was of cinders (called in the common language clinkers), or, in other instances, of broken brick. The inside was filled with sand and ornamented with branches of green, and, where they could be had, with flowers. These little