Kennedy
and the _claistig_, or fairy, whom he captured, and whom he compelled
to build him a house in one night, we read that she set her people to
work speedily:

And they brought flags and stones
From the shores of Cliamig waterfall,
Reaching them from hand to hand.[15]

Again, the Round Tower of Ardmore, in Ireland, was built with stones
brought from Slieve Grian, a mountain some four or five miles distant,
"without horse or wheel," the blocks being passed from hand to hand
from the quarry to the site of the building. The same tradition
applied to the Round Tower of Abernethy, in Perthshire, only it is in
this case demonstrated that the stone of which the tower is composed
was actually taken from the traditional quarry, even the very spot
being geologically identified.[16] In like manner, too, was Rama's
bridge built by the monkey host in Hindu myth, as recounted in the
_Mah[=a]bh[=a]rata_ and the _R[=a]m[=a]yana_.

Tales, as apart from beliefs, are not often encountered in connexion
with the monuments. Indeed, Sebillot, in the course of his researches,
found only some dozen of these all told.[17] They are very brief,
and appear for the most part to deal with fairies who have been shut
up by the power of magic in a dolmen. Tales of spirits enclosed in
trees, and even in pillars, are not uncommon, and lately I have
heard a peculiarly fearsome ghost story which comes from Belgium, in
which it is related how certain spirits had become enclosed in a
pillar in an ancient abbey, for the saintly occupants of which they
made it particularly uncomfortable. Mr George Henderson, in one of
the most masterly and suggestive studies of Celtic survivals ever
published, states that stones in the Highlands of Scotland were
formerly believed to have souls, and that those too large to be moved
"were held to be in intimate connexion with spirits." Pillared
stones are not employed in building dwellings in the Highlands,
ill luck, it is believed, being sure to follow their use in this
manner, while to 'meddle' with stones which tradition connects with
Druidism is to court fatality.[18]

_Stones that Travel_

M. Salomon Reinach tells us of the Breton belief that certain sacred
stones go once a year or once a century to 'wash' themselves in the
sea or in a river, returning to their ancient seats after their
ablutions.[19] The stones in the dolmen of Esse are thought to change
their places continually, like those of Callernish