The liveliest of the Scottish versions of 'Rumpelstiltskin', to be found in Chambers's Popular Rhymes of Scotland. Chambers suggests that the name comes from the Scots 'stoor', meaning dust, and is inspired by the swirl of dust in which the fairies are supposed to travel. He also mentions that in another version the name for the fairy is 'Fittletot'. Rhys points out that the names of many of these
Tom Tit Tot fairies end in 'Tot', 'Trot' or other similar suffixes.

The Gudewife of Kittlerumpit had lost her man, — they thought he was pressed for the sea, — and she had nothing to care for but a wee lad bairn still sucking and a muckle big soo that was soon to farrow, and she hoped for a big litter. But one fine morning she went round the hoose to the stye and poured the swill out in the trough, and there was the soo grainin' and gruntin' like one at death's door. She called and she coaxed, but never a stir was in it, and at last she sat down at the knockin' stane at her door, and she burst oot greetin'. And as she grat and roared she saw an old, queer-like leddy in green coming up the brae to her housie, which was on a hill with a green wood behind it. She had a long staff in her hand and there was something aristocratical aboot her, and when she got near the gudewife rose up and gave her a curchie and she says —

'Oh yir leddyship, I'm the maist waefulest woman in the world, and there's nane to help me.'

'I'm no wanting lang tales,' says the leddy. 'I ken what ails ye; ye've lost yir man and ye're like to lose yir muckle big soo. I'll no can help ye with the first, but what'll ye give me if I save the second?'

'I'm shair I'll gie ye onything I have to give,' says the gudewife, foolish woman!

'Let's weet thumbs on that,' says the leddy.

So they wetted thumbs on the bargain, and the strange leddy went into the stye. She took a wee bottle oot of her pocket, and she muttered some words that sounded like 'Fitter, patter, holy water' and anointed the soo's neb with it; and the soo jumped up as well as ever she was, and gobbled up the swill.

The gudewife knelt down, and she wad ha kissed the strange leddy's green skirts, but the strange leddy says,

'I'm no ane for fashions, let's get to bargains. YeVe no muckle to give, so Fll e'en tak' yir bit bairn.'

The gudewife knew then what kind of a creature she was, and she fleeched an she prayed at her for mercy, and at last the strange leddy said:

'It's yir bairn I want and it's yir bairn I'll get; but I'll tell ye this, — by the law we leeve on I canna tak it till the third day from this, and no even then if ye can tell me my richt name.'

And with that she was awa'.

Well all that day the gudewife mourned and grat and kissed the bairn, and all that night she lay thinking on every name she could call to mind, but nane seemed right. So the evening of the second day she thinks to herself she'll do no good in the hoose, and maybe the caller air will clear her wits. So she picks up the bit bairn and awa' oot. She went this way and that through the wood ahint her hoosie, tills she comes to an old quarry, all o'ergrown with gorse, and with a bonnie spring in it. And she tippytaes to the edge o' the quarry, and there is the green leddy spinning, and singing o'er and o'er again:

Little kens oor gude dame at hame

That Whuppity Stoorie is my name!

Then thought the gudewife to herself: 'I've gotten the mason's word at last,' and she carried a licht heart back with her, that went oot with a heavy ane.

In the morn she thinks she'll hae some sport with the fairy, so she sits doon on the knockin' stane, wi' her mutch and her apron agley, and she makes a show of greeting and girning waur nor ever, and the old fairy comes up the braeside as licht as a lassie, and as she comes she skirls oot:

'Ye ken what I come for! Stand and deliver!'

'Oh yir leddyship,' says the gudewife. 'Dinna tak my bit bairn, tak' the auld soo!'

'It's the bairn I want and the bairn I'll hae,' says the fairy.

'Tak me yir leddyship,' says the gudewife, 'but spare the bit bairn.'

'Dae ye think I'm daft that I'd tak sic a muckle, ill-faured skelloch as yirsel, Gudewife?'

Well the gudewife kent she was nae beauty, but she wasna one to be misca'ed. So she raised herself up, and then she gied a laigh curchie and she says: 'Ah micht hae kent that a puir body like masell was na fit to tie the shoe strings of the heih and michty Princess Whuppity Stoorie.'

At that the fairy gave a great loup, and then she twirled roun and roun doan the brae and the gudewife never seed her again, and she picked up the bit bairn and gaed into her hoosie as prood as a doggie wi' twa tails.

[Type: 500. Motifs: C432.1; F381.1; H521; M242; N475]