288 Mr. Hardy on the Wolf in Scotland 



" But thought the sheep she'd geen the wolf to had 

 When she had choice o' sic a neiper made." 



" Twa wolves may worrie ane sheep," says one proverb ; and 

 Alexander Arbutlinot laments among the woes of a poor 

 scholar that — 



" This warld has maid the proverb manifest 

 Quha is ane scheip the wolf will sune him rent ;" 



in other words, " The lone sheep's in danger of the wolf." 

 " A Avolf is still a ravenous beast, though it be in chains," 

 says Boston. " Dark as a wolf's mouth," is an expression we 

 owe to Walter Scott. " Wolves'-birds," /. e. offspring, occurs 

 in one of Principal RoUock's Sermons, (Select Works, i. p. 

 519, Wod. Soc.) On this the editor, De Gunn, remarks 

 " This seems to be an attempt of the [original] editors to 

 Anglicise the Scottish expression ' Tod's birds,' or ' bairns,' 

 used by Robert Bruce, p. 354, Wodrow edition." But the 

 fact is this occurs as a native term in the title of a Scottish 

 act against the wolves. " The woolfe and woolfe birdes suld 

 be slaine," (Glendook's Scots Acts, James i. p. 18). Scott 

 has once more rendered it current. " She-wolf be silent with 

 thine ill-omened yell. There shall never be coronach cried, 

 or dirge played, for thee or thy bloody Avolf-bird." (Highland 

 Widow, Chron. of Canongate, 1st Ser. i. p. 257.) 



It has been suggested by the Rev. R. Lambe of Norham, in 

 his notes to the Battle of Flodden, p. 164, that the Scottish 

 lullaby, laloiD, or he halelow, may be rendered in French he 

 has, la le loup, " Hush ! there is the wolf." In Boucher's 

 Glossary it is, Bn has le loup, "The wolf below!" while 

 Jamieson explains it, Bas, Id le loup, " Be still, the wolf is 

 coming." " Hae ye been a loup-hunting ? " a query, ad- 

 dressed to one who has been very early abroad, is supposed 

 by Jamieson, to allude to the hunting of the wolf in former 

 times. 



In the Skye and Berneray versions of the Sea Maiden in 

 Campbell's Highland Tales, pp. 94, 96, 98, the wolf appears 

 as a " kindly grateful beast," but this may be owing to his 

 having a Norse prototype, as in " The Giant who had no 

 heart in his body," (Dasent, pp. 49, 56); for the wolf was 

 one of Odin's sacred beasts. So the Avere-wolf that carried 

 off William in the old romance treated him tenderly. Mr. 

 Campbell (Vol. I. p. 272) communicates a Gaelic fable, where 

 the fox cheats the wolf into the belief that the reflection of 

 the moon on the ice is a cheese, and thereby it loses its tail. 



