/^ 



Craic^inillay and its Environs. 



Scorpioun seine afore." ^ This passage throws a lurid 

 hght on the creduhty and superstition of the age — 

 characteristics which, we fear, are not altogether 

 extinct even in this more enlightened nineteenth 

 century, now rounding to its close. In all probability 

 the " scorpiouns " which caused such widespread 

 terror at that time were harmless creatures — possibl}' 

 the innocent blind-worm. Yet this incident seems 

 to have been thought of sufficient importance to be 

 noticed by another historian of that period in almost 

 identical terms, namely, by Holinshed, in his well- 

 known ' Chronicle.' This leads us to say that the 

 blind-worm [Angiiis fragilis) is found on the Braid 

 Hills, as well as in many other parts of the countr}- ; 

 and a specimen from the Braids was exhibited lately 

 at a meeting of the Edinburgh Field Naturalists' 

 Society. It is a perfectly harmless creature, its diet 

 consisting of snails, worms, insects, cS:c., and it cannot 

 even pierce the skin of a human being. From the 

 fact of the muscles of its tail becoming stiffened to 



^ Leslie's ' Historie of Scotland ' (Scottish Text Society ed.), Part 

 111., p. 132- 



