nailed round the castle. At last came Fach-Mòhr, and brought with him the "Flaggan Fiacallach";[1] with the oil he anointed the body of his brother, and restored him to health. Great was the joy of the Righ-na-Lirriach, and he commanded that when he died his kingdom should be equally divided between the two sons.—(Mrs. Young, Lairg.)
[The romance of Gillie-na-Cochlan-Crackenach is a specimen of the long-winded stories still told, the unwritten novels of the western highlands and islands. It is a wonderful fumble of many mythologies. Thor, Arthur, Theseus, Circe, Hercules, may all be traced, to say nothing of scriptural allusions.]
xxi.—Mr. Alexander Fraser's Pilgrimage.
(This story was told by a field labourer. It had been repeated to her by another woman, who said that it had never been written, but that she had heard it repeated by four generations.—Peggy Munroe, Achlach.]
Mr. Alexander Fraser was the priest of a hill parish in Invernessshire. A tall, grave man, he was feared and not much loved; but he had become moodier than ever, and men ceased to speak well of him in the last year of his residence among his flock. He had broken the vow of celibacy, and had implicated in his guilt one of his humblest parishioners. The evil tale got wind; but it was in an agony of remorse that this man bid his love farewell, and fell on his knees on the hill-side, where they had parted for the last time, vowing that he would neither shave his beard nor wear shoes till he had expiated his guilt, and obtained remission of his sin at the Sepulchre of our blessed Lord. He took leave of his sister and of his aged mother, who was blind, bidding her bless him, as he went on a needful errand. "Is it an errand of mercy, my son?" said the aged woman. "It is an errand of necessity, mother, and may God have mercy upon it." So Alex-
- ↑ In an Icelandic legend the mysterious phial appears. An old woman in a bine cloak, with a glass phial, goes over the corpses after a battle. She anoints them with the ointment, and life is restored.—Legends of Iceland, by Powell and Magnusson, p. 159.
