Part 19

The above statement was thoroughly corroborated by another from the same locality, who “has often seen the red thread on beasts’ tails.” She spoke of the injury as gonadh (wounded).

An Islay woman remembers as a girl, in the case of a cow of her mother’s, where a string was put on the cow that was ill, but as they were all turned out of the byre she does not know what else was done.

Another reciter in the same island, in the case of one of his own horses, which was said to have been injured by the evil eyes of drovers, had it cured by a woollen thread being tied round its tail.

Before leaving the red thread, a reciter in Islay, whose aunt lived next to a professor, said that when this woman was consulted in cases of Evil Eye, she took a bottle containing a red thread and water, and for the purpose of discovering the cause of the animals’ illness she closed her eyes and repeated an incantation. This done she would open her eyes, and the first living creature bearing any burden or weight, that weight, whatever it might be, she maintained she saw pressing upon the animal. A case in point is the following. Having gone through her performance when consulted about a sick cow, on lifting up her eyes they rested on a man carrying a horse collar. She told the owner of the cow that the spirit of that man with the collar was pressing on the animal, and would continue so until the water which was in the bottle, over which she had repeated the incantation, was sprinkled on her. If after that the cow shivered all over she would not get better, but if she merely shook her ears she would be all right. The people about, the reciter added, had great confidence in this woman’s professions.

Another reciter said that when a child was not thriving a red thread was tied round its neck and allowed to remain on night and day. He has seen this where he knew both the child and its parents very intimately.

It must not, however, be supposed that red thread alone was used. Another Argyllshire reciter has seen on Hallowe’en different colours of worsted thread tied on cattle as a prophylactic.

The mother of the child, in which the symptom of injury by the Evil Eye was its seeming to sing “do re do,” gives the following account of the thread tied on it which cured it. His father went to an eolas woman and told her his business. She took some lint that she had ready to be put on the spindle and twisted a little bit into a thread. It must always be green lint that is used for these threads. She made a string that would go three times round his neck, and getting the man’s knife she wound the thread round the steel, and handing it to him ordered him to hold it in his hand all the way home, and not to open his hand or speak to anybody till he would reach home. He was then to put the string three times round the child’s neck, and as he was getting better one string at a time was to be taken off and thrown into the fire. This was all done as directed, the “humming” stopped, and the child got quite well.

A native of Strontian gave the following as his own experience of the use of a green thread. When a boy he had a “fallen” uvula, and was sent to a woman who was said to be able to “lift” it. She took him into a corner of the house and commenced manipulating the outside of his throat and below his chin, speaking all the time as if to herself. At all events he could not follow what she said, though he heard the words Sheumais, Eoin, ‘s Pheadair (James’, John’s, and Peter’s) frequently. Having done this some time, she tied a green thread about his neck and sent him away, saying it would be all right. Mr. McD. added the remark that he had nothing to give the operator, though it is essential that something pass from your hand into theirs. A reason for this was given by a native of Fort William, that “unless the curer got something for putting the trouble away the trouble would go on him- (her) self.”

A curer of cases of Evil Eye in the neighbourhood of Ballachulish, though her method of treatment was not wholly known to the reciter, part of it consisted in giving water and two threads (three articles), one black and one white. The threads were to be twisted in a prescribed manner round the person or animal affected, and if the threads showed any tendency to knot, it was taken as a sure sign that it was a case of the Evil Eye, i.e. apparently if they formed eyes on the thread.

Ligatures other than thread were used. A native of Easdale tells how his grandaunt used to tell him of a relative who lived with her father. He was a farmer, and losing his cattle, and believing that they were being affected by the Evil Eye, took his courage in both hands and marched off to consult Campbell of Skipness, distinguished for his skill in such cases. Having told his errand, Campbell took him into the barn and, excluding all light, made the people—that is, the Evil Eye people—pass before him, and he recognised them quite well. Campbell then gave him a gisreag (charm) made of a straw rope, and requested him to take it home with him and throw it into the fire as soon as he reached his destination. This was to protect him against further injury. The man burned the gisreag on reaching home, and from that day his cattle throve quite well.

Another reciter remembers that her brother having gone to consult a professor of eolas on account of serious losses to his stock, while he was away a new horse, bought to take the place of one that had died, was taken ill between the plough chains. Well does she remember, on her brother’s return, seeing him take the tether with which it had been tied, and waving it three times over the horse, it got up at once, took the food offered it, and was soon all right.

From Tomintoul, Banffshire, we hear of one who had a wide reputation for skill in these matters, who was said to perform his charms by means of a bridle that was in his possession. We have no further particulars, but it is not impossible that the bridle was a rope one.

There has been mentioned the case of a young horse where the result of the Evil Eye was to make it pour of sweat and tremble. Having got it back into the stable, a recognised practitioner of eolas was sent for. Among his questions was one whether the lad who was leading it had, or had not, met any one on the road. He then asked for the halter which had been on the horse, and it having been brought him he said one or two words which nobody present seemed able to catch, after which, waving the halter three times over the animal, he said, “Rise and eat.” At once the horse got on its feet, began to eat, and was cured. McA., the eolas man, now said it was a case of cronachadh, and offered to tell who had done it. They assured him they did not wish to know. But the reciter made the naïve remark that “he knew already, for he knew who had met him on the road.”

UISGE A’ CHRONACHAIDH (WATER OF INJURY)

We have already mentioned, as one of the results of the Evil Eye, a bad attack of yawning. Here is the account of the sufferer’s cure in the words of the reciter. “Chuir iad airson sean-mhathair Sheumais Ruaidh so agus nur a thainig ise rinn i eolas le beagan uisge agus facailean, agus cha robh a chaileag tiota an deigh sin gus an robh i cho mhath ’s bha i riamh. Dh’innis a bhean a leighis i ra mathair gur h-ann air a cronachadh a bha i.” (“They sent for this Red James’ grandmother, and when she came she made science with a little water and words, and it was but a short time till the girl was as well as ever she was. The woman that cured her told her mother that she had been injured by cronachadh.”)

The water used here was what has been called in Arran at any rate “uisge a’ chronachaidh.”

One other account of this Evil Eye water we will give in the words of the reciter, an old man speaking of his daughter:“ ‘Nuair a bha ’m bas ag’oibrich rithe thainig i dhachaidh an so agus bha e soilleir gum b’ann air a cronachadh a bha i. Nis chuala mi fhein daoine ag radh nam biodh neach air a chronachadh agus nam biodh bonn airgeid air a chuir ann am bowl uisge a bhiodh air a thoirt a tobar o’n taobh deas, nan leanadh an t-airgiod ri grunnd a’ bhowl, nuair a dhoirte an t-uisge dheth, gun cuireadh an t-uisge sin an cronachadh air falbh nam biodh e air a chrathadh air a’ neach a bha fo’n chronachadh. Well, chaidh mi fhein gu tobar a bha ris an taobh deas de’n tigh agam agus chuir mi bonn se sgillinn an an lan bowl-de’n uisge ach nuair a thaomadh an t-uisge dheth, cha do lean am bonn ris a bhowl. Ach co dhiu chrath mi ’n t-uisge oirre ach ged a chrath cha d’rinn e feum sam bi, ’s cha deachaidh i riomh ni b’fhearr. Ach bha daoine ag radh nan robh an t-airgiod air leantuinn ris a’ bhowl gun deannadh an t-uisge an cronachadh a thoirt air falbh.” (“When death was working with her she came home here, and it was clear that she had been blighted. I myself heard people saying if any one were blighted and a coin put into a bowl of water, which would be taken from a southern well, if the money stuck to the bottom of the bowl when the water was poured off it, that that water would put away the injury if it were sprinkled on the person harmed. Well, I went myself to a well that was on the south side of my house, and I put a sixpenny piece in a bowlful of the water, but when the water was poured off the piece did not stick to the bowl; but however, I sprinkled the water on her, but though I did sprinkle it it was of no use whatever, and she never got any better. But people were saying, had the money stuck to the bowl the water would have caused the blight to be removed.”)

The methods of preparation of this water undoubtedly vary, not merely because the reciters do not give the particulars, but because the operators make differences. A messenger being sent to a woman for eolas, we are told “she gave the one that went a bottle of water with directions that it was to be thrown on the cow.”

Another reciter said that a woman being brought to see a sick cow (D. MacC.’s grandmother), “when she came she took a cog with water and went in to where the cow was. She was a decent woman, and whatever she did to the cow she got better.”

In another case the local practitioner, when sent for, walked round the cow three times, and our reciter said, she may have done something more, but in any case she failed to do any good, and the cow continued ill. They then sent a messenger to another woman of the same sort, but of greater repute, and who lived at a greater distance. This woman gave the messenger a bottle of something like water, with instructions that it was to be sprinkled over the cow. When the messenger returned home and the stuff in the bottle was sprinkled on the cow, she got up, shook herself, began to show signs of recovery, and in a short time was all right.

In another case the woman sent for, “when she came said it was a case of injury by cronachadh, and having repeated some words over the cow, she sprinkled water she had prepared upon her with the result that the cow soon got well.”

A male professor made up a bottle for a shepherd whose cow was ill, and instructed him on reaching home to sprinkle “all that was in the bottle” on certain parts of the cow. It is not advisable to take too literally statements which apparently are very exact; “all the water” in this case may simply mean the water that was in the bottle more or less in its totality. Or it may have been the instruction was so worded that if some of the water, even a drop or two, might be supposed not to have got on the cow that the charm would be ineffective. The destination of the water for particular parts of the animal was undoubtedly a usual proviso.

So far the information might lead one to suppose that an incantation said over water was sufficient in the beliefs of the operators. This is however not the case, and there can be little doubt that to make the incantation effective the water should have been in contact with silver. A native of Harris said that he has heard of the “water of silver” as a cure for people and beasts affected by the Evil Eye, and also as a preventative of such injury if apprehended. In one instance which came under his own observation, a respectable and intelligent woman, to protect her cow and the milk and butter, first time she went to milk the cow after calving, put a half-crown piece in the bottom of the pail and drew the milk on to it. A friend who accompanied her saw the whole performance.

A native of Islay informed us that for curing eyes of those suffering from cronachadh you should put “three bawbees in the water”; while a native of Oban says that in all cases of cronachadh where water is used as a cure it must be poured on silver.

A clergyman living in Skye recently heard of a case in the parish of Kildonan where water in which silver had been immersed was sprinkled upon a cow which was unwell. The further information in this case was that the woman in the district specially referred to was exceedingly superstitious, and expressed her belief that she would become a bird after death. She always repeated a rhyme when operating upon cattle. She had died shortly before our reciter went to Skye.

A school teacher, a native of Skye and carrying on her occupation in Argyllshire, confirms the strong belief in the Evil Eye in certain places. A few years ago in D—— a young woman was driving her cow to pasture when the cow fell. Her owner turned towards a neighbour’s daughter who had been looking at them passing and scolded her for the accident, finishing by stating that the onlooker was “mad.” The retort was that that affliction was hereditary with the cow’s owner. The interchange of compliments got the credit of curing the cow, which arose and went its way. The cure, according to this reciter, for any sudden sickness in cattle was to take a threepenny bit, or any small silver, and ask a blessing on it in the name of the Father, place it in a basin, pour water on it, and dash over the cow in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

In the following case the operation, though carried out by Gaelic-speaking Highlanders, was conducted in the Lowlands. A child was supposed to be the victim of cronachadh, and the operator was the daughter of a woman who had practised eolas. A fellow-servant of the operator was the reciter. “Water was procured from a running stream, it being necessary that the person bringing the water should have a piece of bread of some sort in his possession at the time. A silver coin was put in the dish in which the water was, and the operator waved the dish in a particular manner and then sprinkled some of the water on the child. The remainder was then dashed against a large stone. Stress was laid on the necessity of this part of the performance, it being essential that the stone was immovable. A solid wall, for instance the gable of a house, was said to be equally efficient.

If, as the writer believes, the original fluid was that mentioned in 1 Kings xiv. 10, xvi. 11, the deduction is that it should be that of a male, not a female.