Part 21

From West Ross-shire, and from it alone, has information reached us of the use of the title “gold cure.” Our informant says, “I went to see a child that was unwell, and its mother told me that she believed that it had been hurt by the Evil Eye. She said she was going to try the ‘gold cure’ for it, but she had no gold of any description in the house, and she asked me if I had any about me that I could lend her for the purpose. I had none at the time, so I could not oblige her, but inquired of her how it was to be used. She said she would put it in a dish of water and wash the child with the water.”

STONES AND WATER

Above it was indicated that the water was put in contact with other things besides coins. In the case of the Mull woman already quoted, who had to use her butter from its unpleasant appearance for wool-greasing and such like, the eolas man whom she consulted put things right by getting water “and some kind of stones from a particular burn which he put in the water. It was necessary,” said the reciter, “that the stones should be taken from a particular burn.” She was unable to state what were the peculiar conditions which made that burn essential. The collector, who got this information in speaking to another woman in Tobermory and who believed that cronachadh was quite common, remembering the previous case, and hoping to draw information, suggested that certain stones were used for curing in Evil Eye cases. “Yes,” said the reciter, “but there is nothing so good as three pieces of silver, three silver coins of any kind. If the water is poured on three silver coins, and the words said over either beast or body, it will cure them.”

The following is a fairly circumstantial account from the parish of Clyne, Sutherlandshire, of the performance with stones and silver of a strong believer. She had a delicate daughter, and believed if people, especially strangers, looked at the girl she was sure to be ill after it, and often she would be so bad that she had to go to bed. The mother then tried the following cure, believed by many to be successful. She took a basin and put a silver coin into it, and went to a running stream near her house. From the bottom of the stream she chose seven small stones, which she put in the basin along with the coin, then dipping the basin in the stream so that the water ran into it on the top of the silver and the stones till slightly more than half full. She then went home, gave her daughter a little of the water to drink, and sprinkled a little of it on her. She kept the remainder beside her, and whenever there was any suspicion that an Evil Eye had again fallen upon her, the same process was carried out. Unfortunately the cure failed, the girl having died. It is more than probable that the weakly girl, imbued with her mother’s superstition, suffered when looked at by strangers, or when she thought she was regarded with curiosity; if she had merely been nervous she would probably have been cured.

A native of Jura told how, when living with her sister there, one of the children becoming unwell an eolas woman was sent for, who got some stones, a darning needle, water, and other things, and with these did something to the child, but it did not recover. Our informant said they were strong in the belief that the child had been air a cronachadh.

Another account of the use of the darning needle comes from Ardrishaig. Our informant’s grandmother had a cow grazing at the roadside, and a woman, suspected of having an Evil Eye, passing, said, “S mart bhriagh thu, ge bi leis thu” (“You are a bonnie cow, to whomsoever you belong”). Shortly after the cow was found “lying rolled up in a lump.” “My grandmother went with a luggie for water and put a darning needle, silver, and copper into the water. She then poured some of the water down the cow’s throat, rubbed her horns with the water, and sprinkled the rest all over her. In a little the cow was all right.”

The same reciter mentioned another case, in which the operator was her mother. A calf became ill, and the owners were in doubts what to do with it. “My mother, remembering my grandfather’s cow, put spring water in a luggie (it must be spring water) and a silver and a copper coin and a darning needle. She forced some of the water down the calf’s throat, and sprinkled the rest over it. The calf recovered, and the farmer’s wife was so pleased and said to my mother, ‘Well, well, Mrs. S., I never saw the like of you, you can do anything.’”

No detailed description was given of the stones used, but as clach-na-sùil, the stone (apple) of the eye, is common Gaelic, they were doubtless of a sort more or less representative of eyes.

From Kintyre, the following information in the words of the reciter gives us some indication. “They used tae hae a bunch o’ sea-shore stanes wi’ holes in them hanging up at the door tae keep awa‘ witches.” The collector had seen such stones in a house in Kintyre, but at the time did not know their purpose. They were of the honeycombed sort that may be found on shores where there are quantities of shingle. There were six or seven tied on a string hung above the inside of the inner door; they were of different sizes, guessed at from fourteen to sixteen ounces in weight.

From the island of Lewis we have another indication. There, there is a considerable amount of superstition connected with what is called a’ chlach nathrach (the serpent’s stone). The reciter, who had seen several of them, said they were usually round with one hole through them, though there may be two in some cases. The popular account of the information given was as follows: A number of serpents congregating at certain times form themselves into a knot and move round and round on the stone until a hole is worn. They then pass and repass after each other through the hole, leaving a coating of slime round the hole, which by-and-by becomes hard. It is this slime that gives to the stone the healing properties it is supposed to possess. The principal use of the stone was as a cure for the Evil Eye. Water is poured on the stone, and the person or beast affected is caused to drink the water, or has it sprinkled on them; sometimes the application is both external and internal. These stones are much prized by their possessors, who are very unwilling to part with them, and would not even willingly show them, or even acknowledge that they possessed them.

Stories of the knot of serpents being seen are still told. A very old man, a labourer, without English, and who can neither read nor write, gives the following account:—

“All the serpents in the country round about gather together to one place on one day every year, where they have a day’s play. The play consists in rolling in a lump on a stone and running through a hole on the stone one after another. One time Georsa Cailean’s wife (the wife of George, the son of Colin) was going home to her father, and when she was just beside a beautiful green spot near Beinn Tartbheil (Islay), she noticed that it was covered with serpents as thick as they could lie on the top of one another. They had gathered there that year for their play. She got a fright and ran, but if she had gone among them she would have got the serpent’s stone.”

A strong endeavour was made to acquire one of these stones, said to have been found in a serpent’s den, but negotiations came to nothing, as the owners believing that it was good as a cure, especially for serpents’ bite, refused to part with it.

It is not necessary here to discuss St. Fillan, but it is a well-known fact that the three stones, supposed to have been in his possession and kept in the meal mill at Killin, were supposed to impart healing efficacy to water in which they were steeped, and which recently, at any rate, was given to diseased cattle as a curative.

The stones principally used then are stones with an eye or eyes in them—compare usual description of the hole in the top of a needle, the eye of the needle. The stones of St. Fillan seem the nearest symbolical equivalent we have to the protruded fingers of southern Europe, which again is nearly identical with the one-eyed Fachan—the Direach glinn Eiti (Straight of the downy glen?) of I. F. Campbell, and with which we may connect the protruded forefinger which was not to touch the yarn, mentioned on page 145.

“West Highland Tales,” iv. 326.

IRON AND WATER

An Islay woman tells the following of her mother. “She was telling me how one time the butter went away from their milk, and for a good while they could not get a bit of butter. She was advised to go to that woman, and she went. When she told her that she could get no butter the woman took an iron and put it into the fire until it was red-hot; she then took it out and put it into a stoup of water, repeating some words at the same time. Some of this water was given to my mother to put into the churn, and would you believe it, the butter came back, and not only that, but with the very first churning there was a great quantity, equal to all that had been lost since things had gone wrong.”

The reciter was a woman of about five-and-thirty, now a small farmer’s wife, and well educated for her station.

The iron in this case was heated, but in another instance, in which a horse belonging to the reciter’s grandfather was supposed to be injured by the Evil Eye, the eolas professor, a woman, having got water, dipped a bunch of keys into it and then hung the keys round the horse’s neck, and sprinkled the water over the animal, repeating words which the reciter could not catch. The horse got well.

That for the cold iron, and now for the heat. “Nan tigeadh neach a steach gus an tigh againne ‘nuair a bhitheamaid a’ maistreadh dhe nach biodh m’athair ro chinnteach, ghabhadh e eibhleag as an teine agus chuireadh e ann an soitheach uisg’ e, agus ghleidheadh sin an toradh.” (“If a person of whom my father would not be quite sure would come into our house when we would be churning, he would take a live ember from the fire and put it in a dish of water, and that would preserve the produce.”)

As a mere suggestion, a guess for what it is worth, knowing that the old process of preparing hot water by immersing heated stones in it was practised by Highlanders, we here may have the ordinary method of scalding the churn and dishes, at one time common, become a superstitious formula.

The power of iron as protective against witchcraft, fairies, and all supernatural powers is too widespread to need special consideration. We must not however always conclude that when what is used as a means of cure is composed of iron that the iron is the principal matter. A reciter near Campbeltown gave the following information:—

“Mattie Lavarty used to be going about the country here makin’ eolas. I mind yince a coo belongin‘ tae yin Neil R. took ill before calfing, an’ they sent for Mattie Lavarty. She worked aboot the coo wi’ water, an’ said her paternoster or somethin’ else o’er’t an left a horseshoe in front o’t. But the next mornin’ whan Neil gaed intae the byre the calf was lyin’ deed in the greep (byre gutter). That pit Neil frae gaun near Mattie or the like o’ her ever after.”

Our business here is not with Mattie’s success or failure, but with the subject matter used in her attempted cure. The illness of the cow was probably a protracted labour, and Mattie put before it what was symbolical of a free passage for the expected calf. It was no mere placing of something for luck, but a use of the symbol of reproduction on an appropriate occasion.

WOOD AND WATER

The reciter in this case was a native of Tarbert, Kintyre. Believing his cow to be suffering from the Evil Eye, he sent for a practitioner of eolas. When she arrived, the first thing she did was to procure various kinds of wood and “different kinds of water.” She made circles with a stick, repeating “words” the while. This done, she requested the owner to go out of the byre, she remaining alone in it for a considerable time. She put the water in which the wood had been steeped on the cow. The animal recovered.

It seems reasonable to conclude that the iubhar beinne (the juniper) would be one of the woods used, but no exact information was obtainable. (See page 119)