Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 6 1888.djvu/229

Rh CHAPTER III.

OF WITCHES AND KELPIES.

i.—.

Once upon a time in Strathnaver there lived a woman who was both poor and old. She was able to do many wonderful things by the power of a white stone which she possessed, and which had come to her by inheritance.

One of the Gordons of Strathnaver having a thing to do wished to have both her white stone, and the power of it. When he saw that she would not lend it or give it up he determined to seize her, and to drown her in a little loch. The man and the woman struggled there for a long time, till he took up a heavy stone with which to kill her. She plunged into the lake, throwing her magic stone before her, and crying, "May it do good to all created things save to a Gordon of Strathnaver." He stoned her to death in the water, she crying, "Manaar! wawaar!"("Shame! shame!") And the loch is called the Lake of Shame to this day.

ii.—.

It came to pass that at a feast, when Fhion or Fin Maccoul or Fingal sat at meat with the giants that were his companions, he passed round to each the cup from which he drank—to all but to Dhumohr, the darkest man of all, the third for strength, and of great courage. So Dhumohr's anger rose in his breast, and he left the place and the service of Fhion, and took ship to Denmark, to the place where Lauchlin, the enemy of Fhion, lived. Wild was the shore in the land of Lauchlin, and great the waves, but the ship of Dhumohr came safe to land, and he pulled her up with his right hand till she was high on the beach. "Who is this?" said the men of Lauchlin. "This is one of the heroes of Fhion. When he comes we shall know him by his face." And they found that it was Dhumohr, third in strength of all the men of Morven.

Then Lauchlin made a feast of heroes, and Dhumohr sat by the queen (for he had made his head and his arm over to the foes of