Thistle and Thyme (6 page)

The Changeling
and the Fond Young Mother

T
HERE WAS A FOND YOUNG MOTHER ONCE WHO THOUGHT
her babe was the bonniest in all the world. That is nothing uncommon, for every young mother thinks the same.

The trouble was that she would say it, although everyone told her not to because it was terribly unlucky.

“'Tis what I think,” she told them. “So why should I not say it?—there never was such a bonny wee bairn as my wee bairn—so there!”

“You'll regret it,” they said. And they shook their heads and told each other, “Just wait and see!”

He really was an uncommonly bonny lad and he thrived amazingly. That is, until the day his mother decided to step out upon the hill and pick whinberries.

She took the bairn upon one arm and the creel to hold the berries on the other, and off she went to the hill.

When she got to the place where the berries grew best, she saw a grand patch of soft green grass in an open space with the bushes all around it. So she spread her shawl there and laid the babe upon it. She knew she'd be fetching few enough berries home if she carried him along while she was doing the picking. His busy wee hands would be getting them out of the basket as fast as she put them in.

The way it is with berrypicking is that one's always seeing a better patch a little way on beyond. She kept getting farther and farther away from the place where she'd left the bairn, without taking heed of it at all. She'd gone a good piece, and had her creel well filled, when all of a sudden she heard the babe give a strange sort of cry.

“Lawks!” she cried. “I ne'er meant to leave him so long!” And she rushed back to him as fast as legs could carry her.

The face of the bairn on the shawl was all creased and red with weeping, so she took him up to soothe him, and patted him and petted him. But he wouldn't leave off wailing, no matter what she tried. So she took him and the creel of berries, and started off for home.

He kicked and screamed all the way home, and he shook his wee fists in the air, and wailed when she laid him in his cradle. Nothing she could do would quiet him and she was fair daft with the fright it gave her.

The only time he'd stop crying was when she fed him. It seemed as though she'd never get him filled up. As soon as she gave him a spoonful of porridge, his mouth was wide open for another. He ate three great bowls of porridge, a bowl of milk and half a dozen scones, and would have eaten more had she given it to him, but she didn't have the dare. She couldn't for the life of her see where a wee thing like himself was putting it all.

From that day the babe never did thrive. He seemed to change before her eyes. His legs and arms were thin as sticks, his breastbone stuck out like that of a plucked fowl, and his head was twice too big for the rest of him. He bawled from morn till night, and all the night through, and he was always hungry no matter how much she gave him to eat. He had the face of a cross old man, all wrinkled and red it was, with the crying that never let off. His mother didn't know what to make of it at all, at all.

When folks heard about the trouble she was having with the bairn, they went to her cottage to see what they could do. But after they'd had a good look at the babe, they shook their heads and made haste to go away again.

When they were well away from the house where she'd not be hearing them, they gathered together and talked.

“We told her so!” said they.

“'Tis plain as the nose on your face!” they said.

“We told her she'd be sorry!” said they again.

“All that foolish talk about him being so bonny. 'Twas just beggin' for trouble.” And they all nodded wisely. But not one of them would tell her what it was they were thinking. Not one.

Well, the word of the illfaring wean got to the ears of an old cailleach who lived by her lone a little bit beyond the village. She had the name for having all sorts of old wisdom, and some folks said she was a witch. When she heard the tales that were going about, she put on her shawl and shut up her house and went to have a look at the bairn.

“Tch! Tch! Tch!” she said when she got a sight of the bairn. “Well, mistress,” said she. “'Tis no wonder the babe's ill-favored. That's no bairn of your own! 'Tis a changeling that's lying there in that cradle.”

When the young mother heard that, she threw her apron over her face and burst into tears.

“I doubt ye've been goin' about telling folks how bonny your bairn was,” scolded the old woman.

“Och, I did! I did!” cried the young mother. “Even after they told me not to do so.”

“Och, aye. And the fairies heard you say it. They'd not rest after that, till they got hold of your bonny bairn and put one of their ugly brats in his place. When did they switch him on you?”

“It must have been whilst I was gathering whinberries on the hill, for he's never been the same since that day. 'Twas but a wee while I was away from him, but it could have been then they did it.” And she fell to weeping almost as loud as the squalling creature in the cradle.

“Hauld your whisht!” the old woman said sharply. “Be quiet, lass! Things are never so bad that they can't be mended, a bit at least. Run and fetch a bundle of grass that your bairn lay on, and give me the shawl you spread for him. We'll have the fairies' babe out of the cradle and your own back in gey soon.”

The bairn's mother ran off to the hill, and found the patch of bright green grass circled round with bushes where she'd laid her babe. She gathered a great bundle of it and happed it up in her apron and fetched it back to the old woman. Then the old woman asked for the shawl the bairn had lain upon. The old woman wrapped the bundle of grass in the shawl and set it on her knee and dandled it as if it were a bairn. “Sit ye down by the cradle,” she told the young mother, “and neither move nor speak till I give you leave.”

Then she got a huge big cauldron and filled it full of water and set it over the fire. And all the time, she nursed the bundle of grass in the shawl. She heaped up the fire until it blazed high and the water began to steam. By and by the water began to boil in the pot and when it was boiling high and thumping away like a drum, the old woman took the bundle in one arm and a big wooden spoon in the other, and began to stir the water round and round and round. And whilst she stirred, she sang over and over in a croodling tone:

Fire boil the cauldron

Hot, hot, hot!

Dowse the changeling

In the pot!

And all of a sudden she threw shawl, grass and all, into the boiling water!

The minute she did so, the bairn in the cradle sat up with an eldritch screech, and called out at the top o' his lungs. “E-e-e-eeh! Come fetch me quick, mammy, or they'll put me in the cauldron and boil me!

The door burst open with a terrible bang and in rushed a wild-looking fairy woman, with the young mother's bairn under her arm. She snatched the changeling out of the cradle and tossed the woman's child into it. “Take your bairn and I'll take mine!” she screamed, and out the door she flew.

“Well now!” said the old woman as she laid the wooden spoon on the table. “You can take up the bairn, for it's your own. You've got him back safe again.” And she put on her own shawl and started out the door.

The bairn's mother picked up her babe and wept for joy. She ran after the old woman to thank her, but all the old cailleach said was, “Have a care after this how you go about so braggart about your weans. 'Tis always unlucky to praise your own. A fairy might be hearing you.”

And to be sure, though that fond mother had a half a dozen bairns more and each one bonnier than the one before, she never was known to say a word in praise of them. At least not out loud. Because you never could tell. There might be a fairy hiding somewhere near.

The Bride
Who Out Talked the Water Kelpie

A
SOLDIER THERE WAS ONCE, AND HE WAS COMING HOME
from the foreign wars with his heart light and free, and his bagpipes under his arm. He was marching along at a good pace, for he had a far way to go, and a longing in his heart to get back to his home again. But as the sun lowered to its setting, he could plainly see that he'd not get there by that day's end so he began to be thinking about a place where he could bide for the night.

The road had come to the top of a hill and he looked down to see what lay at the foot of it. Down at the bottom was a village, and there was a drift of smoke rising from the chimneys where folks were getting their suppers, and lights were beginning to twinkle on here and there in the windows.

“There'll be an inn down there, to be sure,” said the soldier, “and they'll have a bite of supper for me and a place for me to sleep.”

So down the hill he went at a fast trot with his kilt swinging, and the ribbons on his bagpipes fluttering in the wind of his going.

But when he got near the foot of the hill, he stopped short. There by the road was a cottage and by the door of the cottage was a bench and upon the bench sat a bonny lass with black hair and blue eyes, taking the air in the cool of the evening.

He looked at her and she looked at him, but neither of them said a word, one to the other. Then the soldier went on his way again, but he was thinking he'd ne'er seen a lass he fancied so much.

At the inn they told him that they could find him a place to sleep and he could have his supper too, if he'd not be minding the wait till they got it ready for him. That wouldn't trouble him at all, said he. So he went into the room and laid off his bagpipes and sat down to rest his legs from his day's journey.

While the innkeeper was laying the table, the soldier and he began talking about one thing or another. At last the soldier asked, “Who is the bonny lass with the hair like the wing of a blackbird and eyes like flax flowers who bides in the house at the foot of the hill?”

“Och, aye,” said the innkeeper. “That would be the weaver's lass.”

“I saw her as I passed by on the road,” said the soldier, “and I ne'er saw a lass that suited me so fine.”

The innkeeper gave the soldier a queer sort of look, but said naught.

“I'm minded to talk to her father,” the soldier said, “and if she could fancy me as I do her, happen we could fix it up to wed.”

“Happen you'd better not,” said the innkeeper.

“Why not, then?” asked the soldier. “Is she promised to someone already?”

“Nay, 'tis not that,” the innkeeper replied quickly. “Only … Och, well! You see she's not a lass to be talking o'ermuch.”

“'Tis not a bad thing for a lass to be quiet,” the soldier said. “I ne'er could abide a woman with a clackiting tongue.”

The innkeeper said no more, so that was the end o' that.

When he'd had his supper, the soldier went out of the house and back up the road till he came to the cottage again. The bonny lass was still sitting on the bench by the door.

“I'll be having a word with your father, my lass,” said the soldier. She rose from the bench and opened the door and stood aside to let him go in. When he had gone in, she shut the door and left him standing in the room on one side of the door and herself outside on the other. But not a word did she say the while.

The soldier looked about the room, and saw at the far side a man who was taking a web of cloth from the loom.

“Is it yourself that's the weaver?” asked the soldier.

“Who else would I be?” asked the man, starting to fold the cloth.

“Then I've come to ask about your daughter.”

The man laid the cloth by, and came over to the soldier. “What would you be asking then?” he asked.

“'Tis this,” the soldier said, coming to the point at once. “I like the looks of your lass and if you've naught to say against it, I'd like to wed with her.”

The weaver looked at the soldier, but said nothing at all.

“You need not fear I could not fend for her,” the soldier said. “She'd want for naught. I have a good wee croft waiting for me at home and a flock of sheep and some bits of gear of my own. None so great, of course, but it would do fine for the lass and me, if she'd have me.”

“Sit ye down,” said the weaver.

So the two of them sat down at either side of the fire.

“I doubt ye'll be at the inn?” the weaver asked.

“Where else would one from a far place stay?” asked the soldier.

“Och, aye. Well, happen the folks at the inn were telling you about my lass?”

“What could they say that I could not see for myself?” the soldier said. “Except that she doesn't talk o'ermuch. They told me that.”

“O'ermuch!” exclaimed the weaver. “She doesn't talk at all!”

“Not at all?” the soldier asked.

“Och, I'll tell you about it,” said the weaver. “She went out to walk in the gloaming a year or two ago, and since she came home that night, not a word has come from her lips. Nobody can say why, but folks all say she's bewitched.”

“Talk or no,” said the soldier, “I'll have her if she'll take me.” So they asked her and she took him.

Then they were married, and the soldier took the lass away with him to his own croft.

They settled in, she to keep the house and look after the hens and do the cooking and baking and spinning, and he to tend his sheep and keep the place outside up good and proper.

The lass and he were well pleased with each other and all went well for a while. Though she did not talk, she was good at listening and it took a time for the soldier to tell her all about himself. Then she had a light hand with the baking and a quick hand at the spinning, and she kept the house tidy and shining clean. And she had a ready smile that was sweet as a song. The soldier was off and away most of the day, tending his sheep or mending his walls or working about the croft. When he came home to the lass, the smile and the kiss he got from her were as good as words.