If all tales be true, the fairies had something to do with the eminent genius of the Mac Crimmons themselves. Once upon a time, to use the proper phrase, there was a great gathering of the clans at Dunvegan Castle. Mac Leod was entertaining the chiefs, and each chief was accompanied by his piper. The chiefs were great and the pipers were great, and somehow it was agreed that there should be a trial of skill among the musicians present—twelve in all. Mac Leod himself directed the proceedings, and one by one the great instrumentalists stepped into the hall and made the rafters dirl with their well-known strains. But Mac Leod became anxious as he noticed that there was no sign of his own piper, the old piper who had served him so long. He sent a boy to search, and the boy returned with the sad news—the piper was hopelessly drunk. The brow of Mac Leod grew dark with anger, for he was not to be humbled in his own household and in the presence of his guests. The tenth piper was tuning up—there was but another, and then his disgrace would be public property. In the desperation of despair Mac Leod seized the boy by the hand and whispered: “You are the twelfth piper, remember your chief’s words.” The boy, Mac Crimmon by name, left the hall, while the feasting and fun went on as merrily as ever, and lay down on the hillside and bemoaned his fate. But his good fairy was not far away. She came right out of the ground, as pretty a little fairy as ever helped poor mortal in desperate plight. She knew his trouble, and did not waste words, but gave the distracted boy a curiously-shaped whistle, and bade him play on it. The youngster would do anything to oblige the kind lady, so he blew on the whistle, and lo! the hills and the rocks re-echoed with the finest music ever heard in Skye. The good fairy disappeared, and the boy ran back to the castle, where the eleventh piper was playing the last notes of his pibroch. The chiefs and the pipers laughed to see the boy step it out into the centre of the assembled company, but their scorn was turned to admiration as compositions played in faultless and brilliant manner poured from the boy’s “pipes.” Thenceforth Mac Crimmon was prince of pipers, and we do not read that ever the good fairy came back to claim any recompense for what she had done; neither have we any explanation of why she gave him a whistle (? a chanter) and not a set of pipes right off.