The Macphie (MacDhubhsith) clan were the hereditary lords of Colonsay, regarded in island tradition as almost magical protectors of their people. The principal legend involves the last great Macphie laird, who on the third day of a failed hunting voyage found a jet-black puppy — its coat dark as ink — sitting patiently in his boat without having been called or placed there. Macphie took it as an omen, shouting 'The black dog's day is growing near!' The seas calmed and the wind turned favourable; the party sailed to Jura for the hunt.
The story
That night the men took shelter in a cave, feasting and boasting around the fire while the black dog slept at the laird's feet. When daylight came, Macphie found every man in his party dead. No cause was given, no enemy identified — only Macphie walked out of the cave alive, and neither dog nor men were seen again. The tale passed into proverbial use across the west Highlands: 'The black dog's day will come yet' is recorded as an Argyll saying for one now despised who will eventually prove useful — or, depending on the teller, one whose reckoning is merely deferred.
A separate cave tradition on Colonsay concerns another desperate Macphie laird who fled his enemies the MacNeills and hid in the Slochd dubh Mhic a Phi (MacPhee's Dark Cave), placing his three hounds at the sea entrance and cutting off the heads of each MacNeill who crawled through. Together these legends give Colonsay an unusually rich body of clan-specific supernatural folklore, documented through the Highlands and Islands folk tradition.