The Washer of the Ford: Legendary moralities and barbaric tales

And, again, the birdeen, that had the blue of Isla’s eyes and the dream of Eilidh’s, looked into Ula’s sleeping soul: and he saw that it was not Isla nor yet Eilidh, but that it was like unto himself, who was made of Eilidh and Isla.

For a long time the child dreamed. Then he put his ear to Isla’s brow, and listened. Ah, the sweet songs that he heard. Ah, bitter-sweet moonseed of song! Into his life they passed, echo after echo, strain after strain, wild air after wild sweet air.

“Isla shall never die,” whispered the child, “for Eilidh loved him. And I am Isla and Eilidh.”

Then the little one put his hands above Isla’s heart. There was a flame there, that the Grave quenched not.

“O flame of love!” sighed the child, and he clasped it to his breast: and it was a moonshine glory about the two hearts that he had, the heart of Isla and the heart of Eilidh, that were thenceforth one.

At dawn he was no longer there. Already the sunrise was warm upon him where he lay, newborn, upon the breast of Eilidh.

“It is the end,” murmured Isla when he waked. “She has never come. For sure now, the darkness and the silence.”

Then he remembered the words of Maol the Druid, he that was a seer and had told him of Orchil, the dim goddess who is under the brown earth, in a vast cavern, where she weaves at two looms. With one hand she weaves life upward through the grass: with the other she weaves death downward through the mould: and the sound of the weaving is Eternity, and the name of it in the green world is Time. And, through all, Orchil weaves the weft of Eternal Beauty, that passeth not, though its soul is Change.

And these were the words of Orchil, on the lips of Maol the Druid, that was old, and knew the mystery of the Grave:

When thou journeyest towards the Shadowy Gate take neither Fear with thee nor Hope, for both are abashed hounds of silence in that place: but take only the purple nightshade for sleep, and a vial of tears and wine, tears that shall be known unto thee and old wine of love. So shalt thou have thy silent festival, ere the end.

So therewith Isla, having in his weariness the nightshade of sleep, and in his mind the slow dripping rain of familiar tears, and deep in his heart the old wine of love, bowed his head.

It was well to have lived, since life was Eilidh. It was well to cease to live, since Eilidh came no more.

Then suddenly he raised his head. There was music in the green world above. A sun-ray opened the earth about him: staring upward he beheld Angus Ogue.

“Ah, fair face of the god of youth,” he sighed. Then he saw the white birds that fly about the head of Angus Ogue, and he heard the music that his breath made upon the harp of the wind.

“Arise,” said Angus; and, when he smiled, the white birds flashed their wings and made a mist of rainbows.

“Arise,” said Angus Ogue again; and, when he spoke, the spires of the grass quivered to a wild sweet haunting air.

So Isla arose, and the sun shone upon him, and his shadow passed into the earth. Orchil wove it into her web of death.

“Why dost thou wait here by the Stone of Sorrow, Isla that was called Ula at the end?”

“I wait for Eilidh, who cometh not.”

At that the wind-listening god stooped and laid his head upon the grass.

“I hear the coming of a woman’s feet,” he said, and he rose.

“Eilidh! Eilidh!” cried Isla, and the sorrow of his cry was a moan in the web of Orchil.

Angus Ogue took a branch, and put the cool greenness against his cheek.

“I hear the beating of a heart,” he said.

“Eilidh! Eilidh! Eilidh!” Isla cried, and the tears that were in his voice were turned by Angus into dim dews of remembrance in the babe-brain that was the brain of Isla and Eilidh.

“I hear a word,” said Angus Ogue, “and that word is a flame of joy.”

Isla listened. He heard a singing of birds. Then, suddenly, a glory came into the shine of the sun.

“I have come, Isla my king!”

It was the voice of Eilidh. He bowed his head, and swayed; for it was his own life that came to him.

“Eilidh!” he whispered.

And so, at the last, Isla came into his kingdom.

But are they gone, these twain, who loved with deathless love? Or is this a dream that I have dreamed?

Afar in an island-sanctuary that I shall not see again, where the wind chants the blind oblivious rune of Time, I have heard the grasses whisper: Time never was, Time is not.

1

Oh, alas, alas! (Literally, Oh, my undoing, or Oh, my utter ruin.)

2

Alas my torment!

3

The “leabhar-aifrionn” (pron. lyo-ur-eff-runn) is a missal: literally a mass-book, or chapel-book. Bru-dhearg is literally red-breast.

4

“O my Grief, my Grief!”

5

Ioua was one of the early Celtic names of the moon. The allusion (in the fourth line) to the sun, in the feminine, is in accordance with ancient usage.

6

Deo-uaine.

7

These four short episodes are reprinted, by courteous consent of the Editor of Harper’s Magazine, where they appeared, interpolated in “From the Hebrid Isles.”

8

As there are several Macarthurs on Iona, I may say that the old man I allude to was not so named. Out of courtesy I disguise his name: though, since the above was written, he is no more.

9

Pronounce Ha aun ah-ween do’-inn; fēw-ar, fēw-ar; do’-inn, do’-inn.

10

(1) Caiodh (a wailing lament) is a difficult word to pronounce. The Irish keen will help the foreigner with Kúë-yh or Kúë-yhn. (2) The Cumha fir Arais (pronounce Kŭv’ah feer Arooss) means the lament of the man of Aros —i. e., the chieftain. Aros Castle, on the great island of Mull, overlooking the Sound, was one of the strongholds of Macdonald, Lord of the Isles. (3) The quicken (rowan, mountain-ash, and other names) is a sacred tree with the Celtic peoples, and its branches can either avert or compel supernatural influences. (4) The green-clad Lady is the Cailleach, the Siren of the Hill-Sides, to see whom portends death or disaster. When she is heard singing, that portends death soon for the hearer. The grass is that which grows quick and green above the dead. The dark hour is the hour of death —i. e., the first hour after death.

11

Baille ’n Bad-a-sgailich: the Farm of the Shadowy Clump of Trees. Cairstine, or Cairistine, is the Gaelic for Christian, as Tormaid is for Norman, and Giorsal for Grace. “The quiet havens” is the beautiful island phrase for graves. Here, also, a swift and fatal consumption that falls upon the doomed is called “The White Fever.” By “the mainland,” Harris and Lewis are meant.

12

A cochall a’ chridhe: his heart out of its shell – a phrase often used to express sudden derangement from any shock. The ensuing phrase means the month from the 15th of July to the 15th of August, Mios crochaidh nan con, so called as it is supposed to be the hottest if not the most waterless month in the isles. The word claar used below, is the name given a small wooden tub, into which the potatoes are turned when boiled.

13

Pronounce mogh-rāy, mogh-rēe (my heart’s delight —lit., my dear one, my heart).

14

The word “Seanachas” means either traditionary lore, or “telling of tales of the olden time” – and it is in this sense that it is used here.

15

“O beauty of my love the Sun-lord” (lit. “O Youth, son of the Sun, how fair he is!”)

16

The first part of the story of Ula and Urla, as Isla and Eilidh, is told in “Silk o’ the Kine,” at the end of The Sin-Eater. [The name, Eilidh, is pronounced Eily (liq.) or Isle-ih.]