Scottish Folk and Fairy Tales from Burns to Buchan (Penguin Classics) (4 page)

‘Tell me what you ask,’ said the seal catcher, ‘and I will do it, if it lies within my power.’

‘Follow me,’ answered his guide, and he led the way to the door through which he had disappeared when he went to seek the knife.

The seal catcher followed him. And there, in a smaller room, he found a great brown seal lying on a bed of pale pink seaweed, with a gaping wound in his side.

‘That is my father,’ said his guide, ‘whom you wounded this morning, thinking that he was one of the common seals who live in the sea, instead of a merman who has speech, and understanding, as you mortals have. I brought you here to bind up his wounds, for no other hand than yours can heal him.’

‘I have no skill in the art of healing,’ said the seal catcher, astonished at the forbearance of these strange creatures, whom he had so unwittingly wronged; ‘but I will bind up the wound to the best of my power, and I am only sorry that it was my hands that caused it.’

He went over to the bed, and, stooping over the wounded merman, washed and dressed the hurt as well as he could; and the touch of his hands appeared to work like magic, for no sooner had he finished than the wound seemed to deaden and die, leaving only a scar, and the old seal sprang up, as well as ever.

Then there was great rejoicing throughout the whole Palace of the Seals. They laughed, and they talked, and they embraced each other in their own strange way, crowding around their comrade, and rubbing their noses against his, as if to show him how delighted they were at his recovery.

But all this while the seal catcher stood alone in a corner, with his mind filled with dark thoughts, for although he saw now that
they had no intention of killing him, he did not relish the prospect of spending the rest of his life in the guise of a seal, fathoms deep under the ocean.

But presently, to his great joy, his guide approached him, and said, ‘Now you are at liberty to return home to your wife and children. I will take you to them, but only on one condition.’

‘And what is that?’ asked the seal catcher eagerly, overjoyed at the prospect of being restored safely to the upper world, and to his family.

‘That you will take a solemn oath never to wound a seal again.’

‘That will I do right gladly,’ the seal catcher replied, for although the promise meant giving up his means of livelihood, he felt that if only he regained his proper shape he could always turn his hand to something else.

So he took the required oath with all due solemnity, holding up his fin as he swore, and all the other seals crowded around him as witnesses. And a sigh of relief went through the halls when the words were spoken, for he was the most famous seal catcher in the North.

Then he bade the strange company farewell, and, accompanied by his guide, passed once more through the outer doors of coral, and up, and up, and up, through the shadowy green water, until it began to grow lighter and lighter, and at last they emerged into the sunshine of earth.

Then, with one spring, they reached the top of the cliff, where the great black horse was waiting for them, quietly nibbling the green turf.

When they left the water their strange disguise dropped from them, and they were now as they had been before, a plain seal catcher and a tall, well-dressed gentleman in riding clothes.

‘Get up behind me,’ said the latter, as he swung himself into his saddle. The seal catcher did as he was bid, taking tight hold of his companion’s coat, for he remembered how nearly he had fallen off on his previous journey.

Then it all happened as it happened before. The bridle was shaken, and the horse galloped off, and it was not long before the seal catcher found himself standing in safety before his own garden gate.

He held out his hand to say ‘goodbye’, but as he did so the stranger pulled out a huge bag of gold and placed it in it.

‘You’ve done your part of the bargain – we must do ours,’ he said. ‘Men shall never say that we took away an honest man’s work without giving him some compensation for it, and here is what will keep you in comfort to your life’s end.’

Then he vanished, and when the astonished seal catcher carried the bag into his cottage, and turned the gold out on the table, he found that what the stranger had said was true, and that he would be a rich man for the remainder of his days.

There was once a Scottish laird whose name was Graham of Morphie, and, as he was rich and great, he determined to build himself a grand castle. But, besides being rich, he was somewhat miserly, and he did not like the thought of having to pay a great deal of money for the building of it. So he hit on a plan by which he thought he could get labour cheaply. And this was the plan.

Down in the valley, close to where he lived, there was a large deep loch, and in the loch, so the country folk said, there dwelt a water kelpie.

Now water kelpies, as all the world knows, are cruel and malicious spirits, who love nothing better than to lure mortals to destruction. And this is how they set about it:

They take the form of a beautiful chestnut horse, and come out of the water, all saddled and bridled, as if ready to be mounted; then they graze quietly by the side of the road, until some luckless creature is tempted to get on their back. Then they plunge with him into the water, and he is no more seen. (At least, so the old folk say, for I have never met one of these creatures myself.)

To go on with the story, however. The Laird of Morphie knew that the water kelpie who haunted the loch on his property was in the habit of coming out of the water in the gloaming in the way I have described, and grazing quietly by the roadside.

And as he knew also that these uncanny horses were very strong, he determined to gain the mastery over this one, and force it to do his work. And the only way to do this was to take off the magic bridle which it wore and put it on again – no very easy task.

The Laird of Morphie, however, was a man who did not know what fear meant, and he was quite certain that he would be able to conquer the kelpie.

So one evening he took down his sword from the wall, and, calling to his wife, told her that he was in need of a servant, and that he thought the water horse would make a very good one, so he was going out to master him.

‘Only,’ he added, ‘I cannot do it without your help, so listen to what I tell you. You must go out into the garden, and pluck two twigs from the rowan tree that grows by the gate, and fashion them into a Cross, and put it up over the outside of the door, which you must bar and bolt.

‘That will keep the creature from entering the house; for no evil spirit can endure the rowan wood, let alone the Holy Sign.

‘Then you must open the kitchen window; for although I want to keep the kelpie out, I myself need to get in. Do you understand?’

But if the Laird was not afraid of water horses, his wife was, and, instead of answering him, she threw her arms around his neck and wept bitterly, and begged and besought him not to meddle with spirits, but to bide quietly at home.

Which, of course, he would not agree to do, and he pushed the poor woman away from him roughly, and told her not to be a fool, but to attend to his words and do his bidding. Then he went out and left her, and she was so terrified that she went at once and picked the rowan twigs and made a Cross of them, and put it up outside the door. Then she shut herself into the house, and opened the kitchen window, exactly as her husband had told her to do. After which she crept away to her bed, and hid her head below the blankets.

Meanwhile, the Laird walked boldly down the road, until he came to a place where it ran between two hills, and was out of sight of any house; and in this lonely spot he saw, as he had expected, a fine chestnut horse, nibbling the sweet short grass by the roadside.

It carried a saddle and bridle of the finest leather, and it looked so quiet and docile that it might have been a lady’s palfrey.

The Laird was not misled by its looks, however. As he
approached it he drew his sword, and when he came up to it he suddenly struck it a sharp rap on the side of the head, completely severing the strap which held its bridle in position.

The creature, taken by surprise, reared high in the air, and, seeing that there was no chance of tempting this cautious mortal to climb on its back, was turning to gallop down to the loch, when its bridle fell from its neck to the ground.

In a moment the Laird had picked it up, and put it into his pocket; for he knew that when a water horse lost its bridle its power was gone, and that it could not go back to its watery abode until it found it again.

No sooner had he done so, than, to his astonishment, the creature began to talk like any mortal, and to beg him to give it back its bridle, reminding him that it had never in its life done him any harm.

‘I cannot thank you for that,’ said the Laird drily, ‘for, methinks, had I once been fool enough to mount on your back we would soon have seen whether you would have done me harm or no. Ha, ha, my bonnie nag, I have your bridle safe in my pocket, and I think I had better keep it there.’

Then the water horse grew angry, and showed his teeth in a way that would have frightened most men.

‘You will never set foot in your own house,’ he said, ‘till you have given me back my bridle; for I can travel quicker than you can, and I will go and take possession of it.’

With these words he galloped off in the direction of the Laird’s house.

But the Laird only laughed, and followed at his leisure, for he knew that no spirit, be it witch, or warlock, or demon, could enter a dwelling that was guarded by a Cross of rowan.

And he was right, for when he reached home he found the water horse standing stock still in front of the door, apparently determined that, since it could get no further, it would at least prevent the owner of the house entering.

But, as we know, the kitchen window was open, and the Laird went round the back of the house and jumped in at that.

Then he went upstairs, and put his head out of one of the upper windows, and began to bargain with the kelpie.

‘See here,’ he said. ‘You’re very anxious to get your bridle back, for without it you are helpless, and must remain for the remainder of your life on land. I, on my side, have a castle to build, and I need a good strong horse to cart the stones. So if you’ll promise to do that for me, I will promise, when you are finished, to give you back your bridle.’

And as there seemed no other way, the water horse agreed to the bargain.

Now, if the kelpie were naturally cruel, I am afraid the Laird was cruel also, for he loaded the poor beast with such heavy loads that its shoulders were often chafed and bleeding, and it grew thin and miserable-looking.

Indeed, he worked it so hard that it was almost dead by the time the castle was completed.

Then, as he had no further use for it, he gave it back its bridle, and told it that it could go back to where it had come from.

Alas! he did not know what he had laid up in store for himself and his family. For the water kelpie, enraged at the sufferings which it had been made to endure, looked over its shoulder as it was about to plunge into the loch, and solemnly uttered these words:

And his words came only too true; for one misfortune after another fell on the Laird and his descendants, until at last his name died out altogether.

So by this token let all those who read this story learn that it is never wise to persecute anybody, not even a water kelpie.