Thomas of the Thumb

From Catherine Macfarlane in 1809. John Dewar. THERE was one before now whose name was Tomas

na h òrdaig, and he was no bigger than the thumb of a stalwart man. Tomas went once to take a walk, and there came a coarse shower of hailstones, and Tomas went in under a dock leaf; and there came a great drove of cattle past, and there was a great brindled bull amongst them, and he was eating about the docken, and he ate Tomas of the Thumb. His mother and his father missed him, and they went to seek him. They were going past the brindled bull, and quoth Tomas na h ordaig,

“Ye are there a seeking me,

Then they killed the brindled bull, and they sought Tomas nah érdaig amongst the paunches and entrails of the bull, but they threw away the great gut in which he was.

There came a carlin the way, and she took the great gut, and as she was going along she went over a bog.

Tomas said something to her, and the old wife threw away the great gut from her in a fright.

There came a fox the way, and he took with him the gut, and Tomas shouted

“Bies taileù! the fox. Bis taileù! the fox.” Then the dogs ran after the fox, and they caught him, and they ate him; and though they ate the gut they did not touch Tomas na h ordaig.

Témas went home, where his mother and _ his father were, and he it was indeed that had the queer story for them.

This varies from the book adventures of our old friend Tom Thumb, who is now supposed to have been the dwarf of King Arthur. The story comes from Glenfalloch, which is not far from Dumbarton, which was, according to family tradition, the birth-place of King Arthur’s son. It was told to Dewar by a girl who took charge of him when a child, and it is known to one other man whom I know. I used to hear the adventures of “Comhaoise Ordaig” (Thumb’s co-temporary), from my piper nurse myself, but I] was so young at the time that I have forgotten all but the name.

The cry of “bis taileu” may still be heard in the mouths of herd laddies addressing their collies, and it may be the same as “tally-ho!” for which a French derivation has been sought and found—“tallis hors.” I would rather imagine King Arthur, and his knights, and his dwarf, shouting an old Celtic hunting cry, and red-coated sportsmen keeping it up till now, than trace it to Norman-French; but in any case, here is something like tally-ho in the mouth of Tom Thumb, and in a glen where tally-ho has never been heard.

From a stone at Inverness.—Sculptured Stones of Scotland, Pl. xxxviii.

The following is a very good gloss upon the language of bulls, The imitation can be made very close by any one who will repeat the Gaelic conversation of the champions, with the intention of imitating the sound of their angry bellowings. These go by the name of “Boor-eech ” in Gaelic, and oo, ee, and r, express the prevailing sounds. I have tried to spell these sounds, but I have small hopes of conveying an idea of them by letters.

Whether this is a story founded on some old battle between tribes, which fought near the “Stone of the Bulls,” or if so, who these may have been, I will not attempt to guess.

There are bulls and bulls’ heads in the armorial bearings of several of the Highland clans; and the nickname of “John Bull” must have had some origin. There is a bull sculptured on an old stone near Inverness, which is figured in “The Sculptured Stones of Scotland,” from which work the drawing above is copied. The story is certainly the invention of some one familiar with bulls, whatever it means.