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Fairy
Tales from the
land of Fairies
MAUNS’ STANE
In the latter end of the autumn of 18--, I set out by myself on an
excursion over the northern part of Scotland, and during that time my
chief amusement was to observe the little changes of manners, language,
etc., in the different districts. After having viewed on my
return the principal curiosities in Buchan, I made a little ale-house,
or “public,” my head-quarters for the
night. Having
discussed my supper in solitude, I called up mine host to enable me to
discuss my bottle, and to give me a statistical account of the country
around me. Seated in the “blue” end, and
well
supplied with the homely but satisfying luxuries which the place
afforded, I was in an excellent mood for enjoying the communicativeness
of my landlord; and, after speaking about the cave of Slaines, the
state of the crops, and the neighbouring franklins, edged him, by
degrees, to speak about the Abbey of Deer, an interesting ruin which I
had examined in the course of the day, formerly the stronghold of the
once powerful family of Cummin.
p. 144“It’s dootless a bonnie place about the
abbey,”
said he, “but naething like what it was when the great Sir
James
the Rose came to hide i’ the Buchan woods wi’
a’ the
Grahames rampagin’ at his tail, whilk you that’s a
beuk-learned man ’ill hae read o’, an’
may be
ye’ll hae heard o’ the saughen bush where he
forgathered
wi’ his jo; or aiblins ye may have seen ’t, for
it’s
standing yet just at the corner o’ gaukit Jamie
Jamieson’s
peat-stack. Ay, ay, the abbey was a brave place once; but
a’ thing, ye ken, comes till an end.” So
saying, he
nodded to me, and brought his glass to an end.
“This place, then, must have been famed in days of yore, my
friend?”
“Ye may tak my word for that,” said he,
“’Od,
it was a place! Sic a sight o’ fechtin’
as they had
about it! But gin ye’ll gan up the trap-stair to
the laft,
an’ open Jenny’s kist, ye’ll see sic a
story about
it, printed by ane o’ your learned Aberdeen’s fouk,
Maister
Keith, I think; she coft it in Aberdeen for twal’ pennies,
lang
ago, an’ battered it to the lid o’ her
kist. But gang
up the stair canny, for fear that you should wauken her, puir thing;
or, bide, I’ll just wauken Jamie Fleep, an’ gar him
help me
down wi’t, for our stair’s no just that canny for
them
’t’s no acquaint wi’t, let alane a frail
man
wi’ your infirmity.”
I assured him that I would neither disturb the young lady’s
slumber nor Jamie Fleep’s, and begged p. 145him to give me as
much information as he could about this castle.
“Weel, wishin’ your guid health
again.—Our minister
ance said that Solomon’s Temple was a’ in ruins,
wi’
whin bushes, an’ broom and thistles growin’ ower
the bonnie
carved wark an’ the cedar wa’s, just like our ain
abbey. Noo, I judge that the Abbey o’ Deer was just
the
marrow o ’t, or the minister wadna hae said that.
But when
it was biggit, Lord kens, for I dinna. It was just as you see
it,
lang afore your honour was born, an’ aiblins, as the by-word
says, may be sae after ye’re hanged. But
that’s
neither here nor there. The Cummins o’ Buchan were
a dour
and surly race; and, for a fearfu’ time, nane near
han’ nor
far awa could ding them, an’ yet mony a ane tried
it. The
fouk on their ain lan’ likit them weel enough; but the
Crawfords,
an’ the Grahames, an’ the Mars, an’ the
Lovats, were
aye trying to comb them against the hair, an’ mony a weary
kempin’ had they wi’ them. But some way
or ither they
could never ding them; an’ fouk said that they gaed and
learned
the black art frae the Pope o’ Room, wha, I myself heard the
minister say, had aye a colleague wi’ the Auld
Chiel. I
dinna ken fou it was, in the tail o’ the day, the hale
country
raise up against them, an’ besieged them in the Abbey
o’
Deer. Ye’ll see, my frien’” (by
this time mine
host considered me as one of his cronies), “tho’ we
ca’ it the abbey, it had naething to do wi’ p.
146papistry;
na, na, no sae bad as a’ that either, but just a
noble’s
castle, where they keepit sodgers gaun about in airn an’
scarlet,
wi’ their swords an’ guns, an’ begnets,
an’
sentry-boxes, like the local militia in the barracks o’
Aberdeen.
“Weel, ye see, they surrounded the castle, an’ lang
did
they besiege it; but there was a vast o’ meat in the castle,
an’ the Buchan fouk fought like the vera deil. They
took
their horse through a miscellaneous passage, half a mile long, aneath
the hill o’ Saplinbrae, an’ watered them in the
burn
o’ Pulmer. But a’ wadna do; they took the
castle at
last, and a terrible slaughter they made amo’ them; but they
were
sair disappointed in ae partic’ler, for Cummin’s
fouk sank
a’ their goud an’ siller in a draw-wall,
an’ syne
filled it up wi’ stanes. They got naething in the
way of
spulzie to speak o’; sae out o’ spite they dang
doon the
castle, an’ it’s never been biggit to this
day. But
the Cummins were no sae bad as the Lairds o’ Federat, after
a’.”
“And who were these Federats?” I inquired.
“The Lairds o’ Federat?” said he,
moistening his
mouth again as a preamble to his oration. “Troth,
frae
their deeds ane would maist think that they had a drap o’ the
deil’s blude, like the pyets. Gin a’
tales be true,
they hae the warmest place at his bink this vera minute. I
dinna
ken vera muckle about them though, but the auldest fouk said they were
just byous wi’ cruelty. Mony a good man did p.
147they hing
up i’ their ha’, just for their ain sport;
ye’ll see
the ring to the fore yet in the roof o ’t. Did ye
never
hear o’ Mauns’ Stane, neebour?”
“Mauns’ what?” said I.
“Ou, Mauns’ Stane. But it’s no
likely. Ye
see it was just a queer clump o’ a roun’-about
heathen,
waghlin’ may be twa tons or thereby. It wasna like
ony
o’ the stanes in our countra, an’ it was as
roun’ as
a fit-ba’; I’m sure it wad ding Professor Couplan
himsel’ to tell what way it cam’ there.
Noo, fouk aye
thought there was something uncanny about it, an’ some gaed
the
length o’ saying that the deil used to bake ginshbread
upon’t; and, as sure as ye’re sitting there,
frien’,
there was knuckle-marks upon ’t, for my ain father has seen
them
as aften as I have taes an’ fingers. Aweel, ye see,
Mauns
Crawford, the last o’ the Lairds o’ Federat,
an’ the
deil had coost out (may be because the laird was just as wicked
an’ as clever as he was himsel’), an’ ye
perceive the
evil ane wantit to play him a trick. Noo, Mauns Crawford was
ae
day lookin’ ower his castle wa’, and he saw a
stalwart
carle, in black claes, ridin’ up the
loanin’. He
stopped at this chuckie o’ a stane, an’
loutin’
himsel’, he took it up in his arms, and lifted it three times
to
his saddle-bow, an’ syne he rade awa out o’ sight,
never
comin’ near the castle, as Mauns thought he would hae
done.
‘Noo,’ says the baron till himsel’, says
he, ‘I
didna think that there was ony ane in a’ the land that could
hae
p. 148played sic a ploy; but deil fetch me if I dinna lift it as weel
as he did!’ Sae aff he gaed, for there wasna sic a
man for
birr in a’ the countra, an’ he kent it as weel, for
he
never met wi’ his match. Weel, he tried, and
tugged, and
better than tugged at the stane, but he coudna mudge it ava;
an’
when he looked about, he saw a man at his ilbuck, a’ smeared
wi’ smiddy-coom, snightern an’ laughin’
at him.
The laird d---d him, an’ bade him lift it, whilk he did as
gin
’t had been a little pinnin. The laird was like to
burst
wi’ rage at being fickled by sic a hag-ma-hush carle, and he
took
to the stane in a fury, and lifted it till his knee; but the weight o
’t amaist ground his banes to smash. He held the
stane till
his een-strings crackit, when he was as blin’ as a
moudiwort. He was blin’ till the day o’
his
death,—that’s to say, if ever he died, for there
were queer
sayings about it—vera queer! vera queer! The stane
was
ca’d Mauns’ Stane ever after; an’ it was
no thought
that canny to be near it after gloaming; for what says the
Psalm—hem!—I mean the sang—
’Tween Ennetbutts an’ Mauns’ Stane
Ilka night there walks ane!
“There never was a chief of the family after; the men were
scattered, an’ the castle demolished. The doo and
the
hoodie-craw nestle i’ their towers, and the hare
mak’s her
form on their grassy hearth-stane.”
“Is this stone still to be seen?”
p. 149“Ou, na. Ye see, it was just upon Johnie
Forbes’s craft, an’ fouk cam’ far
an’ near to
leuk at it, an’ trampit down a’ the puir
cottar-body’s corn; sae he houkit a hole just aside it, and
tumbled it intil ’t; by that means naebody sees’t
noo, but
its weel kent that it’s there, for they’re
livin’ yet
wha’ve seen it.”
“But the well at the Abbey—did no one feel a desire
to enrich himself with the gold and silver buried there?”
“Hoot, ay; mony a ane tried to find out whaur it was, and,
for
that matter, I’ve may be done as foolish a thing myself; but
nane
ever made it out. There was a scholar, like
yoursel’, that
gaed ae night down to the Abbey, an’, ye see, he summoned up
the
deil.”
“The deuce he did!” said I.
“Weel, weel, the deuce, gin ye like it better,”
said
he. “An’ he was gaun to question him
where the
treasure was, but he had eneuch to do to get him laid without deaving
him wi’ questions, for a’ the deils cam’
about him,
like bees biggin’ out o’ a byke. He never
coured the
fright he gat, but cried out, ‘Help! help!’ till
his very
enemy wad hae been wae to see him; and sae he cried till he died, which
was no that lang after. Fouk sudna meddle wi’ sic
ploys!”
“Most wonderful! And do you believe that Beelzebub
actually appeared to him?”
p. 150“Believe it! What for no?” said he,
consequentially tapping the lid of his snuff-horn.
“Didna
my ain father see the evil ane i’ the schule o’
Auld
Deer?”
“Indeed!”
“Weel, I wot he did that. A wheen idle callants,
when the
dominie was out at his twal’-hours, read the Lord’s
Prayer
backlans, an’ raised him, but couldna lay him again, for he
threepit ower them that he wadna gang awa unless he gat ane
o’
them wi’ him. Ye may be sure this put them in an
awfu’ swither. They were a’
squallin’ an’
crawlin’ and sprawlin’ amo’ the couples
to get out
o’ his grips. Ane o’ them gat out
an’ tauld the
maister about it, an’ when he cam’ down, the melted
lead
was runnin’ aff the roof o’ the house wi’
the heat,
sae, flingin’ to the black thief a young bit kittlen
o’ the
schule-mistress’s, he sank through the floor wi’ an
awsome
roar. I mysel’ have heard the mistress
misca’in her
man about offering up the puir thing, baith saul and body, to
Baal. But troth, I’m no clear to speak o’
the like
o’ this at sic a time o’ night; sae if your honour
bena for
another jug, I’ll e’en wus you a gude-night, for
it’s
wearin’ late, an I maun awa’ to Skippyfair
i’ the
mornin’.”
I assented to this, and quickly lost in sleep the remembrance of all
these tales of the olden times.
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