Mauns' Stane

Noo, Mauns Crawford was ae day lookin’ ower his castle wa’, and he saw a stalwart carle, in black claes, ridin’ up the loanin’. He stopped at this chuckie o’ a stane, an’ loutin’ himsel’, he took it up in his arms, and lifted it three times to his saddle-bow, an’ syne he rade awa out o’ sight, never comin’ near the castle, as Mauns thought he would hae done. ‘Noo,’ says the baron till himsel’, says he, ‘I didna think that there was ony ane in a’ the land that could hae played sic a ploy; but deil fetch me if I dinna lift it as weel as he did!’ Sae aff he gaed, for there wasna sic a man for birr in a’ the countra, an’ he kent it as weel, for he never met wi’ his match. Weel, he tried, and tugged, and better than tugged at the stane, but he coudna mudge it ava; an’ when he looked about, he saw a man at his ilbuck, a’ smeared wi’ smiddy-coom, snightern an’ laughin’ at him. The laird d---d him, an’ bade him lift it, whilk he did as gin ’t had been a little pinnin. The laird was like to burst wi’ rage at being fickled by sic a hag-ma-hush carle, and he took to the stane in a fury, and lifted it till his knee; but the weight o ’t amaist ground his banes to smash. He held the stane till his een-strings crackit, when he was as blin’ as a moudiwort. He was blin’ till the day o’ his death,—that’s to say, if ever he died, for there were queer sayings about it—vera queer! vera queer! The stane was ca’d Mauns’ Stane ever after; an’ it was no thought that canny to be near it after gloaming; for what says the Psalm—hem!—I mean the sang—

’Tween Ennetbutts an’ Mauns’ Stane

Ilka night there walks ane!

“There never was a chief of the family after; the men were scattered, an’ the castle demolished. The doo and the hoodie-craw nestle i’ their towers, and the hare mak’s her form on their grassy hearth-stane.”

“Is this stone still to be seen?”

“Ou, na. Ye see, it was just upon Johnie Forbes’s craft, an’ fouk cam’ far an’ near to leuk at it, an’ trampit down a’ the puir cottar-body’s corn; sae he houkit a hole just aside it, and tumbled it intil ’t; by that means naebody sees’t noo, but its weel kent that it’s there, for they’re livin’ yet wha’ve seen it.