Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 6 1888.djvu/236

 228 xii.—.

Four or five miles from Skibo there is a lake called Migdall, with a great granite rock of the same name to the north, of it. At one end a burn runs out past MoulinnaVauglia, or the kelpie's mill. It is also haunted by this banshee, which the miller's wife saw about three years ago. She was sitting on a stone, quiet, and beautifully dressed in green silk, the sleeves of which were curiously puffed from the wrist to the shoulder. Her long hair was yellow, like ripe corn, but on a nearer view she turned out to have no nose.—(Miller's wife.)

xiii.—.

A very old, coarse, and dirty banshee belongs to a small sheep-farm of Mr. Dempster's. A shepherd found her lying, apparently crippled, at the edge of a moss, and compassionately offered her a lift on his back. In going, he espied her feet, which were dangling down his back, and seeing she was web-footed, he threw her off, flung away the plaid on which she had lain, and ran as if for his life.

A weird woman, magnificently adorned, with gold and silken gear, was once seen by our old keeper running violently down a steep brae, on the east side of the river Shin. She disappeared in one of its deepest pools, but not before she had been seen by half-a-dozen trustworthy witnesses.

xiii.—.

The Highlanders distinguish between these fairies (dressed fairies) and the water-kelpies, who are more unmitigatedly mischievous in their tendencies. The kelpies preside over mills and fords, where they do a great deal of harm.

One William Monroe, and the grandfather of the person from whom we have this story, were one night leading half-a-dozen pack-horses across a ford in the Oikel, on their way to a mill. When they neared the river-bank, a horrid scream from the water struck their ears. "It is the Vaugh," cried the lad, who was leading the first horse; and,