Black Grouse Reel - II

Some six months ago we published a blog giving Alexander Carmichael’s nature notes concerning Black Grouse or Coilich Dhubha. In a long, and somewhat rambling, letter that he sent in 1885 to the Rev. Alexander Stewart (1829–1901), or Nether-Lochaber as he was better known to his readers, Carmichael raises the topic once again. Stewart had been  resident in Onich in Nether Lochaber (Bun Loch Abar) since 1851, but he had been born in Benbecula where his father David had been an exciseman, just like Alexander Carmichael himself. The minister wrote a celebrated, more or less fortnightly column for the Inverness Courier which reflected interests just as eclectic as those of Carmichael. Indeed, Stewart’s columns proved so popular that some were subsequently published as the books Nether Lochaber: The Natural History, Legends and Folk-lore of the West Highlands (1883) and ’Twixt Ben Nevis and Glencoe: The Natural History, Legends, and Folk-lore of the West Highlands (1885). The excerpt concerning the Black Grouse Reel is as follows:

“I meant to have asked you long ago if you lived in a blackcock country, or if you are personally acquainted with the habits of black game? My reason for asking is this: you know the glorious old dance tune, or porst, sometimes post-a-bial [sic] called Ruidhleadh nan Caoileach Dubha–The Reeling of the Black Cocks. The tune proceeds thus:–

“Ruidhleadh na coilich-dhubha,

Dhannsadh an tunnagan,

Ruidhleadh na coilich-dhubha,

Air an tulaich bhoidheich.

“Air an tulaich, air an tulaich,

Air an tulaich, urrad ud,

Air an tulaich, air an tulaich,

Air an tulaich bhoidheich, &c.’

All this ‘reeling’ of the black cocks, and ‘dancing’ of the ducks, may probably seem foolish, if not absurd, to most men; but that the description is founded on the close observation of the characteristics of these birds, I am very sure. The old Highlanders were born naturalists. There were then close observers of nature–of birds and beasts, and of earth and sea, and sky. To that I can testify from having written down a good deal of their oral literature–Gaelic, Eachdraidh Chluais.

References:

Nether-Lochaber, ‘Nether-Lochaber’, The Inverness Courier, no. 4048 (06 Aug., 1885), p. 2, c. 6–7

Image: Black Grouse, Coilich Dhubha

Black Grouse Reel

Among Alexander Carmichael’s friends in Edinburgh was Mrs Mary Mackellar, née Cameron (1834–90), the poetess from Fort William who had lived in the capital since 1876. One of her stories preserved in Carmichael’s manuscripts concerns an unorthodox method of catching black grouse (blackcocks or coilich dhubha). There then follow some nature notes composed by Carmichael himself:

Mrs MacKellar the poetess went to visit a charming old lady full of the charming old lore of the people. She was greatly at a loss how to show hospitality to her guest and the hostess steeped some barley in whisky and after a time spread it out on a knoll behind the house. She went out after a short interval and found one or more black Grouse dead drunk. She took one – only one – and cooked it for her charming guest, who was so much amused at the thing that she could do nothing but laugh.

Ruidhl[idh] na Coil[ich] Dhubha

Air bruthach nan Gurradan [i.e. gurraban]

[The blackcock reel
Crouching down on a bank]

The Blackcock indicates coming snow with great certainty. When snow is imminent they begin to croon a durradhanaich, a durradhanaich, in a doleful tone especially should snow be coming on in March. When they are a ‘cathachadh’ [here, sparring in competitive courtship, or lekking] they crow – a fierce defiant crow as if inviting any blackcock in the land to mortal combat. The cock crows before snow.

Bliadhna Mhath Ùr, agus móran dhiubh, do ar luchd-leughaidh air fad.

Happy New Year, and many of them, to all our readers.

Sources:
CW MS 519 [not foliated]

Image:
Black Grouse / Coilich Dhubha