Blair Collection > Popular tales of the West Highlands > Volume 2

THE WIDOW AND HER DAUGHTERS. 275
swnrd on the smior chailleach (spinal marrow) till it cools, be-
fore the head goes on again."
The girl did as she was told ; and he took the three sisters;
alive, and his gold and his sword, in the sacks with the hay on
his back to the mother, and said each time, " So a ciiAiLLEAfiH
SIX AGDD SOP DON BHo," " Here carlin, there thou hast a whisp
for the cow."
On the third day he went home, and when he lay down and
found that she was not there, he went to the poor woman's house,
and the youngest daughter chopped his head off as he went in at
the door ; and then she went back to the castle and stayed in it
with the king's daughter.
3d. This is manifestly the same story as " The history of Mr.
Greenwood," in Mr. Peter Buchan's unpublished MS. The
scene of that story is laid in the Western Isles ; it is brought
down to a much later period than the Gaelic story ; and the lan-
guage is not that of peasants.
It is the same as the Old Dame and her Hen, Norse Tales.
No. TIL, published 1859, and it resembles bits of other tales in
the same collection. It is the same as Fitcher's Vogel, Grimm,
No. 46; and Old Rink Eank, 196. It is in French as Barbe Bleu :
in English as Bluebeard ; and according to the notes in Gi-imm's
third volume, it is very old and very widely spread. Of all these
the Norse and Gaelic resemble each other most.
The same idea pervades a number of other Gaelic stories,
namely, that of a people living underground, who assumed the
shape of various creatures, and lived by hunting ; possessed gold
and silver, and swords ; carried off women and children ; ate
some, murdered others, and kept a larder of dead gentlewomen,
whom it appears that they carried off, married, and murdered.