THE SCOTTISH SOLDIER

There was once a little Scottish soldier called James MacArthur who belonged to the clan of that same name. Like most young Scottish lads he was called to war as a young man. His fellow warriors fought valiantly at his first battle, but poor James fared poorly. It seemed that he had no heart for the fight at all. He could not commit himself in battle and did not slay even one of the enemy, whereas his fellow kinsmen killed many of them. “It is his first fight.’ said the Chief ‘we will see how he fares at the next fray. I am sure that the young man will find his heart soon, as do all good Scotsmen when the hour of need comes.’ Yet, at the next Clan fight he fared just as poorly. As well as the next and the next thereafter. It seemed as if the Chief would never be able to make a true soldier out of the likes of poor little James. The Chief sighed and asked the wise man of the tribe what was to be done about the matter. The wise man thought long and hard over the problem, and at last came up with a wonderful solution. He had made an instrument, which if blown upon with the right force, would emanate the most blood chilling howling sound ever heard by men. ‘I will call them the Bagpipes,’ he said to the Chief, ‘And the sound of them is sure to make the fiercest warriors out of the meekest of men.’ So, at the next royal fray, the Piper blew the bagpipes with the ferocity of the howling banshee itself. The sound was spine chilling and turned even cowards like little James into bloodthirsty savage beasts of war. James as fought valiantly as any man at the battle, and the Clan MacArthur was triumphant in war once more. The tradition was upheld, and from that day on he took many a head at many a great and blood curdling battle. That is how the war chant of the Scottish BagPipes was born, and to this day men still go into the battle of life and death to its glorious echoing and ghostly sounds of war. Sometimes all a young warrior needs is a little motivation. And still you can hear the tribal bag pipes howling eternally in many a royal fray and battles and war, mayhem and death.