sh Islands, except in Scotland, rife among all the Eastern nations.
The Plague-demon is usually represented as female, but in the Esthonian
legends it is masculine.

The Plague once seated himself in a boat which was returning to the
Island of Rogoe,[75] which had hitherto escaped his ravages, in the shape
of a tall black man with a great scythe in his hand. He arrived among
the dead crew, and at once sprang on shore and began to destroy the
inhabitants. Some saw the Plague himself, and others not. If any one saw
him, his heart froze with terror before he could speak a word.[76] One
night during a violent storm, an old woman saw him enter her cottage as
she was sitting alone spinning; but she gathered courage to cry out,
"Welcome, in God's name." He stopped short, muttering, "That's enough,"
returned to the boat in which he had come, and went out to sea. The
storm ceased as he departed, and since then he has never reappeared.

In the Island of Nuckoe he appeared as an old grey man, with a taper in
one hand and a staff in the other, a book under his arm, and a
three-cornered hat on his head. As he went from house to house, he
looked up the names of his victims in his book, let his taper shine on
their faces to make sure that he had made no mistake, and touched the
doomed with his staff. A peasant once saw him enter his cottage, and
touch all with his staff, except himself and the infant in the cradle.
All the others died before cockcrow.[77]

Another time the Plague was driving down a steep path which led to a
village, when he upset his vehicle and broke the axle. A passing peasant
helped him to bind it up, and directed him to the smithy; but he
declared that he was the Plague, and for the good deed that had been
done him all the village should be spared. So he turned his horse, drove
back up the hill, and vanished like a cloud. When the news was brought
to the village, bonfires of rejoicing were lighted, and kept up for many
days.

[Footnote 75: There is a similar tale told of the arrival of the Cholera
in one of the Greek islands.]

[Footnote 76: Speaking of the Vad Velen, the Yellow Plague, in Britain,
we are told in the _Mabinogion_ that all who saw him were doomed to
die.]

[Footnote 77: This story somewhat resembles that of the old hag seen by
Lord Seaforth when lying ill of scarlet fever with several of his
schoolfellows. The narrative has been reprinted several times, and is
included in Stead's _More Ghost