The last words of the sheep when he left Paradise, where the beasts had the gift of speech, were, "Do not burn my bones." Since then it has not been considered right to throw any sheep-bones on the fire.[1]
Where there are nine otters, there is the dobhar chu, the male otter. There is a spot under his breast, and he can only be killed by wounding this. The rest of his body is protected by enchantment. The smoke of him will fell a man sixty yards away.
If the field-mouse (in Gaelic called the grass-mouse) passes in front of a cow or horse, it betokens ill-luck to the creature.
Formerly, if people wished to have she-calves, they buried the matrix at a boundary-stream.
The bee, the corn-crake, and the stone-chat and the cuckoo, are all enchanted creatures—possibly because they disappear in winter, unlike most of the sea-birds, more familiar to the islanders.
A wren is lucky about a house. There is a Gaelic saying, "No house ever dies out that the wren frequents."
When eggs are set, an odd number should always be placed under the hen, for one will not hatch, it goes into the tithe (deachanch.) The wren never pays tithes, and all her twelve eggs are hatched, but she pays more than the full penalty, for only one will survive, and, moreover, she always has an ooze in her nest.
The crow cannot be put to shame. The lapwing, who, as everybody knows, has a trick of repeating himself, said to the grey crow, "I never saw your like for stealing eggs, for stealing eggs." The crow, rubbing his beak on the grass, replied, "Nor did we ourselves, though it is we who are older."
Knowledge of the whereabouts of the lost, if dead, is called "raven's knowledge." When Cuchullin was dying the host of his enemies dispatched a crow (fiannag) to see
- ↑ [Cf. Folk-Lore, x., 262.—Ed.]
