Saining Rites
On the eve of Beltane, the fairies, witches, and all the uncanny creatures of the Otherworld were abroad, ready and eager to work scaith on mortals, and every precaution had to be taken to ward them off. The rowan was the great protector, but in some districts the elder or the juniper was substituted, being usually hung above windows and doors.
Charm stones used for healing purposes were particularly potent at Beltane, and the domestic animals were sprinkled with the water in which they had been dipped. Urine was also effective and tar was put on the horns and ears of the cattle.
It was of the utmost importance that no fire (in the shape of kindling) should be given out. A schoolmaster in Ross-shire noted many instances of this superstition. Here is one:--
“An old wife came to a neighbor’s house to get a kindling for her fire. There was no one in the house but a wide-awake lassie eight years old. So well versed was the child in this fire lore that she would give neither a match nor a cinder. Having turned out the poor old body, the little girl went immediately to fetch two friends, and they followed the old woman to her home, where, sure enough, they found a blazing fire and a boiling pot.
‘See you,�?said the lassie, ‘gin the cailleach had gotten the kindling, my father would not get a herring this year!�?�?/FONT>
“I know that in many of the remote glens of Perthshire,�?writes Miss Gordon-Cumming, “there are still living (towards the end of the nineteenth century) women who on Beltane morn always throw ashes and a live peat over their own heads, repeating a certain formula of words to bring them luck. But the strictest secrecy is observed, lest the practices should reach the ear of the minister.�?/FONT>
“To look nearer home (Gordonstoun),�?says the same authority, “we know of one good old wife living in Banffshire who carries a live peat round her cottage every night, just as regularly as she says her prayers. Moreover she is most particular about keeping a red thread twisted round her cow’s tail, as other wise she is convinced that the milk would pass from the cow to her neighbour’s.�?/FONT>
The curious fear of ill-luck connected with the giving or stealing of fire assuredly derives from the Druidic fire-festivals, on the eve of which the fires which burned all day and smoldered all night on the hearth were extinguished, to be re-lit the next day with a kindling from the new sacred fire created ritually by the Druids, and thus sanctifying the hearth anew.
Besides saining the fire, there was saining with water, and Beltane was the great season for visiting “magic�?or “holy�?wells. The custom has by no means died out, the most notable survival being the annual “pilgrimage�?to the Cloutie Well on Culloden Moor, near Inverness, which is described elsewhere.
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