Ossian Collection > Popular tales of the West Highlands > Volume 3

336 WEST HIGHLAND TALES.
finger on the black spot that came on the trout, and it
burnt him, and then he put it into his mouth. Then
he got knowledge that it was this Black Arcan w^ho had
slain liis father, and unless he should slay Black Arcan
in his sleep, that Black Arcan would slay him when he
should awake. The thing that happened w^as that he
killed the carle, and then he got a glaive and a hound,
and the name of the hound was Bran MacBuidheig.
Then he thought that he w^ould not stay any longer
in Eirinn, but that he would come to Alba, to get the
soldiers of his father. He came on shore in Farbaine.
There he found a great clump of giants, men of stature.
He understood that these were the soldiers that Ms
father had, and they (w^ere) as poor captives by the
Lochlaners hunting for them, and not getting (aught)
but the remnants of the land's increase for themselves.
The Loclilaners took from them the arms wdien war or
anything should come, for fear they should rise with the
foes. They had one special man for taking their arms,
whose name was Ullamh Lamh fhada (Pr. oolav lav ada
oolav long hand). He gathered the arms and he took
them wdth him altogether, and it fell out that the sword
of Fionn was amongst them. Fionn went after him,
Bachal ? Baculum. Here it seems to mean the method of roast-
ing fish, which I learned from Ijapps, and have practised scores
of times. Wooden skewers are stuck through slices of fish, and
a long rod is spitted through these, and one end is planted in the
ground to windward of a fire of sticks.
The incident of saw-dust, as wood that grew and is neither
crooked nor straight, is proverbial in the Highlands, and common
to many stories. So is the fish which gives knowledge when
eaten. (See No. 47. Vol. II. 362). This, then, is clearly some
wide-spread myth about a fish attached to a Celtic hero. It is
given in the transactions of the Ossianic Society of Dublin in
another shape, and has very old Irish manuscript authority.