A young woman in Islay was promised in marriage to a rich neighbour, and the marriage day was fixed. She had a sweetheart who, on hearing this, said to a brother older than himself that if he had means to keep a wedding feast he would run away with the bride. His brother promised him all he had, being thirty-five gallons of whisky. On getting this, the young man took the bride away, and gave a nuptial feast himself that lasted a month. At the end of that time, when he was taking a walk with his wife, an eddy wind was seen coming. As it passed the young man was seized with sickness, which in a short time ended in his death. Before his death his wife said to him, “If the dead have feeling, I ordain that you be not a night absent from your bed.”[30] The night after the funeral he came back, to the consternation of his wife. He told her not to be alarmed, that he was still sound and healthy (_slàn fallain_), that he had only been taken in the eddy by the Lady of the Green Island (_Baintighearna ’n Eilein Uaiue_), and that by throwing a dirk at the eddy wind, when next she encountered it, she would get him back again. The wife threw a dirk at the next eddy wind she saw, and her husband dropped at her feet. He told he had been with the light people (_sluagh eutrom_), and in the tomb in which they supposed him buried would be found only a log of alder wood (_maide fearna_). His wife’s relatives were sent for, and they came, thinking the young widow had lost her wits through grief. The grave was opened, and an alder stick found in the coffin instead of the body proved the husband’s account of his disappearance. THE CROWING OF THE BLACK COCK. A woman in Islay (the story was heard in Tiree) was taken by the Fairies, leaving an infant who was baptised by the name of Julia (_Sìle_). To appearance the mother died and was buried. Every night, however, she came back, and was heard singing to her child. Her husband watched one night and caught her. She told that by going to a hillock, which she named, on a certain night he might recover her. He went, taking with him, according to her instructions, a black cock born in the busy time of year (_coileach du màrt_)[31] and a piece of steel (_cruaidh_). He found the door of the brugh open, put steel in one of the posts, entered, having the cock in his arms, and hid himself in a corner. Towards morning the cock crew. The head or principal Fairy caused a search to be made, and ‘Big Martin without clemency or mercy’ (_Martuinn Mòr gun iochd gun tròcair_) was found in the brugh. On withdrawing the steel he was allowed to go home, and his wife along with him. THROWING THE ARROW.