GUNNA.
In olden times the tillage in Tiree was in common, the crop was raised here and there throughout the farm, and the herding was in consequence very difficult to do. In Baugh, or some farm in the west of the island (tradition is not uniform as to the locality), the cows were left in the pastures at night, and were kept from the crops by some invisible herdsman. No one ever saw him, or knew whence he came, nor, when he went away, whither he went. Ataibhseiror seer (i.e.one who had the second-sight or sight of seeing ghosts) remained up to see how the cattle were kept. He saw a man without clothes after them, and taking pity upon him made him a pair of trews (triubhas58) and a pair of shoes. When the ghostly herdsman put the trews on, he said (and his name then, for the first time, became known):
“Trews upon Gunna,Because Gunna does the herding,But may Gunna never enjoy his trews,If he tends cattle any more.”59
“Trews upon Gunna,Because Gunna does the herding,But may Gunna never enjoy his trews,If he tends cattle any more.”59
“Trews upon Gunna,Because Gunna does the herding,But may Gunna never enjoy his trews,If he tends cattle any more.”59
“Trews upon Gunna,
Because Gunna does the herding,
But may Gunna never enjoy his trews,
If he tends cattle any more.”59
When he said this he went away and was never more heard of.
Beings of this class seem to have had a great objection to presents of clothes. A pair of shoes made the Glaistig at Unimore leave; a cap, coat, and breeches the Phynnodderee in the Isle of Man (Keightley,Fairy Myth, p. 203); in the Black Forest of Germany, a new coat drove away a nix, one of the little water-people, with green teeth, that came and worked with the people all day (ibid., p. 261); and Brownie, as already mentioned, in several places.