Whifflingpin
01-29-2010, 08:51 PM
A thread in the General Literature forum prompted me to write down this story that I told a bunch of lads as a bed-time story a week ago.
“I’m sorry, I know I promised you a scary story, but I haven’t really got one for tonight – don’t say ‘Oh’ like that - but since it’s nearly Burns’ Night I’ll tell you a bit about a haggis. What’s Burns’ Night? Well, Burns is, or was, the greatest of the Scottish poets, lived a couple of hundred years ago, and Scots everywhere celebrate his birthday by eating haggis – or at least an imitation of haggis.
The true haggis of Burns’ time, the Great Highland haggis, was a kind of animal about the size of a rugby ball. They used to live mainly around Ben Nevis and in the Cairngorms. They were eight-legged, and because they tended to run in circles round the hills their left legs grew shorter than their right legs – that’s right, they ran anti-clockwise. Hunting the haggis was a great sport, the older people could just sit in the haggis run and wait, but children and youngsters would always chase the haggis. The third weekend of January was always a great haggis hunting festival on Ben Nevis, because that gave just time to prepare the haggis before Burns’ Night – two days hanging, to get sweet, and two days boiling, to get tender.
Now, there are at least three known breeds of haggis, but the Great Highland Haggis are now quite rare.
What happened was that someone had the idea of improving the breed by bringing in some Rocky Mountain Grey Haggis. These have a sweeter flavour than the Great Highland. It seemed as if it might work quite well, but unfortunately the American Greys run clockwise round the hills, so they have short right legs and long left legs – No, they didn’t bump into each other, but they did find it much easier to meet with each other and mate. The problem was that their offspring ended up with legs of the same length, so they all rolled off the mountains and that was that. There are still a few Great Highland Haggis on the Isle of Skye. Most of the Grey Haggis died of broken hearts and damp.
The other breed of haggis in Britain is the Hampshire Red, found mainly in, er, Hampshire. Now Hampshire, as you know, does not have round hills, it has long ones, the South and North Downs. These are no use to the haggis, who much prefer to go round and round. So the Hampshire Red Haggis started to live by ponds, which are circular, and eventually became sort of amphibious, like, and about the size of, water rats.
Now a few years ago there was a chap called Mac, and he was camping on this site, or rather, since it was in January and pretty cold, he was staying in this hut. He was a Scot, and he wanted to have a real haggis on Burns’ Night, and he’d heard that there were some Hampshire Reds living in the pond, through the woods down there. So, four nights before Burns’ Night, he went quietly down to the pond to wait for a haggis. After an hour or so, he saw the eight-legged creature creeping through the alder bushes, and he made a grab for the wee cow’ring tim’rous beastie. Unfortunately for him, the Hampshire Red is not a bobbling vegetarian, like the Great Highland Haggis, but is a ravening carnivore with sharp teeth. Blood streaming from his bitten hand, Mac dropped the haggis, which jumped into the pond. Furious at his loss, and thirsting for revenge, Mac jumped in after it, but the blood in the water roused the other haggises that were just waking from hibernation, and before Mac knew it, his legs were pouring blood from fifty cuts.
He scrambled out of the pond, and dragged himself from tree to tree through the woods and back to his hut, this hut, slammed the door behind him and wrapped himself tight in his sleeping bag. Not long after, he heard the snuffling and short barks of the haggises that had followed the trail of blood up through the wood. For a while the door baffled them, but as you know, none of the doors to this hut fit very well, and in the morning all that was found in Mac’s sleeping bag was a heap of clean, but slightly slimy, bones.
Now it is said that each year, four nights before Burns’ Night, the haggises in the pond awake from their winter sleep and, remembering the scent of the trail of blood, make their way to this hut and that anyone in a sleeping bag is likely to go the same way as old Mac.
When exactly is Burns’ Night? It’s on 25th, so you needn’t worry because it’s only the 20th today. It’s what? The 21st? Oh, well, I’m sure there’s no truth in the story – sleep well!"
“I’m sorry, I know I promised you a scary story, but I haven’t really got one for tonight – don’t say ‘Oh’ like that - but since it’s nearly Burns’ Night I’ll tell you a bit about a haggis. What’s Burns’ Night? Well, Burns is, or was, the greatest of the Scottish poets, lived a couple of hundred years ago, and Scots everywhere celebrate his birthday by eating haggis – or at least an imitation of haggis.
The true haggis of Burns’ time, the Great Highland haggis, was a kind of animal about the size of a rugby ball. They used to live mainly around Ben Nevis and in the Cairngorms. They were eight-legged, and because they tended to run in circles round the hills their left legs grew shorter than their right legs – that’s right, they ran anti-clockwise. Hunting the haggis was a great sport, the older people could just sit in the haggis run and wait, but children and youngsters would always chase the haggis. The third weekend of January was always a great haggis hunting festival on Ben Nevis, because that gave just time to prepare the haggis before Burns’ Night – two days hanging, to get sweet, and two days boiling, to get tender.
Now, there are at least three known breeds of haggis, but the Great Highland Haggis are now quite rare.
What happened was that someone had the idea of improving the breed by bringing in some Rocky Mountain Grey Haggis. These have a sweeter flavour than the Great Highland. It seemed as if it might work quite well, but unfortunately the American Greys run clockwise round the hills, so they have short right legs and long left legs – No, they didn’t bump into each other, but they did find it much easier to meet with each other and mate. The problem was that their offspring ended up with legs of the same length, so they all rolled off the mountains and that was that. There are still a few Great Highland Haggis on the Isle of Skye. Most of the Grey Haggis died of broken hearts and damp.
The other breed of haggis in Britain is the Hampshire Red, found mainly in, er, Hampshire. Now Hampshire, as you know, does not have round hills, it has long ones, the South and North Downs. These are no use to the haggis, who much prefer to go round and round. So the Hampshire Red Haggis started to live by ponds, which are circular, and eventually became sort of amphibious, like, and about the size of, water rats.
Now a few years ago there was a chap called Mac, and he was camping on this site, or rather, since it was in January and pretty cold, he was staying in this hut. He was a Scot, and he wanted to have a real haggis on Burns’ Night, and he’d heard that there were some Hampshire Reds living in the pond, through the woods down there. So, four nights before Burns’ Night, he went quietly down to the pond to wait for a haggis. After an hour or so, he saw the eight-legged creature creeping through the alder bushes, and he made a grab for the wee cow’ring tim’rous beastie. Unfortunately for him, the Hampshire Red is not a bobbling vegetarian, like the Great Highland Haggis, but is a ravening carnivore with sharp teeth. Blood streaming from his bitten hand, Mac dropped the haggis, which jumped into the pond. Furious at his loss, and thirsting for revenge, Mac jumped in after it, but the blood in the water roused the other haggises that were just waking from hibernation, and before Mac knew it, his legs were pouring blood from fifty cuts.
He scrambled out of the pond, and dragged himself from tree to tree through the woods and back to his hut, this hut, slammed the door behind him and wrapped himself tight in his sleeping bag. Not long after, he heard the snuffling and short barks of the haggises that had followed the trail of blood up through the wood. For a while the door baffled them, but as you know, none of the doors to this hut fit very well, and in the morning all that was found in Mac’s sleeping bag was a heap of clean, but slightly slimy, bones.
Now it is said that each year, four nights before Burns’ Night, the haggises in the pond awake from their winter sleep and, remembering the scent of the trail of blood, make their way to this hut and that anyone in a sleeping bag is likely to go the same way as old Mac.
When exactly is Burns’ Night? It’s on 25th, so you needn’t worry because it’s only the 20th today. It’s what? The 21st? Oh, well, I’m sure there’s no truth in the story – sleep well!"