THE WATER-HORSE AT LOCH BASIBOL, TIREE.
On the north side of this loch, which has been already mentioned as a haunt of the Water-horse, there was a farm, where there are now only blowing sand-banks, called the Town of the Clumsy Ones (Baile nan Cràganach) from five men, who resided there, having each six fingers on every hand. They were brothers, and it was said the Water-horse came every night, in the shape of a young man, to see a sister, who staid with them.
With the tendency of popular tales to attach themselves to known persons, this incident is related of Calum Mor Clarke and his family. Calum had three sons, Big Fair John (Iain Bàn Mòr), Young Fair John (Iain Bàn Og), and Middle Fair John (Iain Bàn Meadhonach). The four conspired to beguile the young man from the loch, who came to see the daughter, into the house, and got him to sit between two of them on the front of the bed. On a given signal these two clasped their hands round him and laid him on his back in the bed. The other two rushed to their assistance; the young man assumed his proper shape of a Water-horse and a fearful struggle ensued. The conspirators cut the horse in pieces with their dirks, and put it out of the house dead.61
Not far from the south end of the same loch there is a place calledFhaire na h-aon oidhch’, ‘the one night’s watch,’ said to derive its name from an incident of which the Water-horse was the hero, similar to that told of the Urisk of Glen Màili (see page 197).