In the presence of an evil spirit, a dog defends its master, or crouches in terror about his feet, but a bitch jumps at his throat, and if it can will tear him. It is, however, rendered harmless, by taking blood from its ear, or tying a collar (_conghal_ i.e. _ceangal_), usually its master’s garter, about its neck. Similarly an entire horse was said to defend its master, but a mare attacked him. It was also a belief, that an entire horse could not be injured by witches or evil spirits. The best protection is a circle drawn round one’s self on the ground with the point of a sapling or dirk, saying “The Cross of Christ be upon us” (_Crois Chriosd oirnn!_) All the spirits that infest the night may dash in fury against this circle, but they can no more pass it, than the most threatening waves of the sea the rocks that form their appointed bounds. As already suggested, this circle is the superstitious representative of a person’s own integrity, within which he is safe from the attacks and wiles of the devil. It is known also in Ireland, as the following story told in Arisaig, Inverness-shire, by an Irish packman, shows. A priest’s brother having died, a young man, who had been a bosom friend of his, expressed an ardent wish some weeks after to see him again. That same evening he was met by the shade of his dead companion, and the two had a long talk together. They spoke of the pleasure, they had in each other’s society, and the dead man got the other to promise to meet him at the same spot the following evening. It added, “To make you sure it is indeed I, you will tell my brother the priest of such and such an occurrence [describing it], which nobody knows but he and I.” On his way home, the young man called upon the priest, and told what he had seen. “It is not my brother’s ghost at all,” said the priest, “but the devil, who is trying to decoy you into his power; I will go with you to-morrow night to meet him.” The two went together to the place of appointment, the priest taking with him a dirk, with which he traced a circle round them, and an iron hoop, inside of which also they stood. A figure in face and form like the priest’s brother, “most like, yet not the same,” came, but on finding itself outwitted, and a Bible being opened before it, went away in a flame of fire. THE _Bodach_, OR CARLE.