take the Book, when a shriek mair loud, believe me, than a mere woman's
shriek--and they can shriek loud enough, else they're sair wranged--came
over the water of Corrie, so sharp and shrilling, that the pewter plates
dinneled on the wall; such a shriek, my douce grandmother said, as rang
in her ear till the hour of her death, and she lived till she was aughty-
and-aught, forty full ripe years after the event. But there is another
matter, which, doubtless, I cannot compel ye to believe: it was the
common rumour that Elphin Irving came not into the world like the other
sinful creatures of the earth, but was one of the kane-bairns of the
fairies, whilk they had to pay to the enemy of man's salvation every
seventh year. The poor lady-fairy--a mother's aye a mother, be she
elves' flesh or Eve's flesh--hid her elf son beside the christened flesh
in Marion Irving's cradle, and the auld enemy lost his prey for a time.
Now, hasten on with your story, which is not a bodle the waur for me. The
maiden saw the shape of her brother, fell into a faint, or a trance, and
the neighbours came flocking in--gang on with your tale, young man, and
dinna be affronted because an auld woman helped ye wi 't."

"It is hardly known," I resumed, "how long Phemie Irving continued in a
state of insensibility. The morning was far advanced, when a
neighbouring maiden found her seated in an old chair, as white as
monumental marble; her hair, about which she had always been solicitous,
loosened from its curls, and hanging disordered over her neck and bosom,
her hands and forehead. The maiden touched the one, and kissed the
other; they were as cold as snow; and her eyes, wide open, were fixed on
her brother's empty chair, with the intensity of gaze of one who had
witnessed the appearance of a spirit. She seemed insensible of any one's
presence, and sat fixed and still and motionless. The maiden, alarmed at
her looks, thus addressed her:--'Phemie, lass, Phemie Irving! Dear me,
but this be awful! I have come to tell ye that seven of your pet sheep