A man bought at a market from a stranger a mart or winter cow. When killing it, the blows of the axe made no impression. An old man who came the way, when told of this, examined the cow’s tail, and found a _red string_ tied round it. On this being taken away, the cow fell at the first blow. COUNTER-CHARMS. Of course the spells of witches could be counteracted. It would not be right that such dangerous powers should be unchecked. Some of the counter-charms were good disinfectants, but in general the efficacy of the remedy was as imaginary as the enemy whose machinations were to be defeated. It was to prevent the taking of milk from cows that nearly all the counter-charms were used. Anything in which people believed would be sufficient, but the antidotes in ordinary use were these. _Juniper_ (_Iubhar-beinne_, _aiteal_), pulled in a particular manner, was burned before the cattle and put in cows’ tails. A ball of hair (_gaoisid_), called a _Ronag_, was put in the milk-pail on Lammas-day or on the Thursday after, to keep its substance in the milk during the rest of the year. MacSymon (_Mac-Shiomoun_, a sept of MacArthurs), a native of Balemartin, Tiree, was much resorted to in former times for these constitution balls. On Lammas-day (_Lùnasdal_) he gave to all who came to him a little bag of plants, sewn up, to be placed in the cream jug (_croggan uachdair_) for the ensuing year, that the cattle and the milk might retain their virtue or substance (_toradh_). Stale urine (_maistir_) should be sprinkled on the door-posts and about the byre. It keeps away the evil eye. There was an old woman in Coll who was taken notice of by her neighbours for sprinkling cows and door-posts every night. Her intention no doubt was to make assurance doubly sure. The mountain ash (_Caorrunn_) was the most powerful charm of any. “A Rowan-tree and a red thread Gars a’ the witches dance to dead.” Its efficacy was known in England as well as in the Highlands. The peg of the cow-shackle (_Cnag chaorruinn sa bhuaraich_) should be made of it, as well as the handle and cross (_crois na loinid_) of the churn[6] staff. In Islay, not twenty years ago, a man had a rowan-tree collar for securing his cow at night, and every time the animal visited the bull he passed this collar thrice through the chimney crook. On Beltane-day annually he dressed all the houses with rowan. It was said of the man in Craignish who gathered potent herbs on St. Swithin’s day and studied magic with one foot in the chimney crook: “A tuft of rowan twigs From the face of Ailsa Craig, Put a red thread and a knot on it, And place it on the end of the sprinkler, And though the Witch of Endor came, Allan could manage her.”[7]