HIGHLAND FOLK-LORE. 223 



delighted, and a cow or other animal, running about excitedly and 

 wildly, and, to all human investigation, causelessly, was supposed 

 to be the work of a passing Fingalian hunting party, invisible to 

 mortal eyes, Luath, unmatched in spirit-land as upon earth, still 

 leading the chase as of old. On the lines about St. Patrick's dairy- 

 maid or milkmaid Mr. Cannichael has the following note, which 

 will be read with interest, and which we give in his own words : 



" ' Banachag Phadriug mu'r casan.' 



(St. Patrick's dairymaid be around your feet. ) 



Banachag is the Hebridean form of the Banarach of the mainland, 

 and Banachogach or Banacach is the Hebridean term for the 

 smallpox. You will observe the close resemblance between the 

 Gaelic word for a dairymaid and that for the smallpox. I think 

 the explanation is obvious. Dairymaids were wont to get the cow- 

 pox, and people confounded the cow-pox with the smallpox. 

 Hence, in the Highlands old people will tell you that effects of the 

 cow-pox were known long before Jenner's celebrated discovery. 

 Hence, also, you will rarely meet with a woman in the Highlands 

 disfigured from the effects of smallpox. Not so the men, however. 

 In England, again, in the rural parishes, the case is reversed. There 

 you will see women pox-marked, but seldom men. The reason I 

 take it to be is this : In the Highlands it is the woman who milk 

 the cattle, and in doing so they get the cow-pox off the cows in 

 milking them. A Highlander would consider it unmanly to milk a 

 cow. I have never seen or heard of one who could or would do 

 this, except a young man in Lismore. Three or four young 

 men, brothers, had a small farm among them. Their mother died 

 and their two sisters married, and probably remembering Calum- 



Cille's celebrated saying 

 if 



' Far am bi bo bith'dh bean, 



S' far am bi bean bitbidh buaireadh.' 

 (Where there is a cow there will be a woman, 

 And where there is a woman there will be mischief.) 



