^40 Fairy Beliefs in Galloway. 



In Syria Christianity has not extinguished the veneration 

 for sacred trees, where they are still prayed to in sickness 

 and hung- with rags, says Grant Allen. In Scotland and 

 Ireland, when rags were hung on trees, the real idea was not 

 that of transferring the disease to the tree or bush, but of 

 taking the spirit of the place to witness, as evidence of having 

 done one's own part — the deity may then be trusted to do his. 

 With belief in trees as the dwelling places of gods, belief in 

 their healing power was, of course, closely linked. Stone- 

 henge was believed to have been at some remote time the 

 seat of worship of a sacred tree. In all barbaric thought 

 breath is connected with life, and very naturally so, because 

 when a man dies he ceases to breathe. Such ideas as the 

 foregoing lead up to the widespread belief that trees are the 

 abodes of sprites, nymphs, etc., who died with the tree in which 

 they. dwell, and also of higher spirits than these — even of the 

 immortal gods. The same ideas explain the sacred character 

 given to forests and groves, which are the oldest temples in 

 all wooded countries.* 



To return to our fairy belief in Wigtownshire, Whithorn 

 is a stronghold of such things, and an old man in the neigh- 

 bourhood has remembered some stories that he learnt from 

 his mother, and he has lately related to a friend of mine in 

 the Isle of Whithorn the following. Just before his time, but 

 in his mother's early days, there was a corn mill that stood 

 on the road to Whithorn beside the Ersock Burn (where the 

 old water trough still stands). " Ae nicht the miller heard 

 the mill gaun, and taking his collie dog, he gaed awa' tae 

 see what was up. When he gaed intae the mill the fairies 

 were thrang grunin' the corn. They brocht some o' the meal 

 an' axed him tae taste it; sae he tasted it an' set some doon 

 tae the dog, but the dog wadna look at it: The miller then 

 gaed awa' hame, an' as he gaed through the door it cam' 

 tae wi' a bang and smashed the collie's head a' tae pieces." 

 There is a thorn tree still standing on the brae near that same 

 place, and the old folks feared to pass there on a very dark 

 night. (So much for the revenge of the fairies towards a dog 



* Edward Clodd, Childhood of lielujions. 



