wild beasts by the pathetic melody of his harp. state of desolation is poetically described ·

"He that werd the fowe and griis,

And on bed the purpur biis,

Now on hard hethe he lith,

With leves and gresse he him writh:

He that had castells and tours,

Rivers, forests, frith with flowers,

Now, thei it commence to snewe and freze,

This king mot make his bed in mese;

He that had y-had knightes of priis,

Bifor him kneland and leuedis,

Now seth he no thing that him liketh,
Bot wild wormes bi him striketh:
He that had y had plente

Of mete and drinke, of ich deynte,

Now may he al daye digge and wrote,
Er he find his fille of rote.

In somer he liveth bi wilde fruit,

And verien bot gode lite.

In winter may he nothing find,

Bot rotes, grasses, and the rinde.

His here of his berd blac and rowe,

To his girdel stede was growe

His harp, whereon was al his gle,
He hidde in ane holwe tre:

And, when the weder was clere and bright,

He toke his harpe to him wel right,

And harped at his owen will,

Into al the wode the soun gan shill,
That al the wild bestes that ther beth

For joie abouten him thai teth;
And al the foules that there wer,
Come and sete on ich a brere,

To here his harping a fine,

So miche melody was therein."

At last he discovers, that he is not the sole inha

bitant of this desert; for

"He might se him besides,

Oft in hot undertides,

The King of Fairi, with his rout,

Com to hunt him al about,

With dim eri and bloweing,

And houndes also with him berking:

Ac no best thai no nome,

No never he nist whider thai bi come.

And other while he might hem se

As a gret ost bi him te,

Wel atourned ten hundred knightes,
Ich y-armed to his rightes

Of cuntenaunce stout and fers,
With mani desplaid baners;

And ich his sword y-drawe hold,
Ac never he nist whider thai wold.

And otherwhile he seighe other thing;
Knightis and leuedis com daunceing,
In queynt atire gisely,

Queyete pas and softlie:

Tabours and trumpes gede hem bi,
And al maner menstraci

And on a day he seighe him biside,
Sexti leuedis on hors ride,
Gentil and jolif as brid on ris;
Nought o man amonges hem ther nis;
And ich a faucoun on hond bere,
And riden on hauken bi o river.
Of game thai found wel gode haunt,
Maulardes, hayroun, and cormoraunt;
The foules of the water ariseth,

Ich faucon her wele deviseth,

Ich faucoun his pray slough,

That seize Orfeo and lough.

'Par fay,' quoth he, there is fair game!
Hider Ichil bi Godes name,

Ich was y won swich work to se:'

He aros, and thider gan te;

To a leuedi hi was y-come,
Bihelde, and hath wel under nome,
And seth, bi all thing, that is
His owhen quen, dam Heurodis;
Gern hi biheld her, and sche him eke,
Ac nouther to other a word no speke:
For messais that sche on him scighe,
That had been so riche and so heighe,
The tears fel out of her eighe;
The other leuedis this y-seighe,
And maked her oway to ride,

Sche most with him no longer obide.
Allas!' quoth he, 'nowe is mi wo.
Whi nil deth now me slo!
Allas to long last mi liif.

When y no dare nought with mi wif,

Nor hye to me o word speke;

Allas whi nil miin hert breke!

Par fay,' quoth he, tide what betide, Whider so this leuedis ride,

The selve way Ichil streche;

Of liif, no dethe, mne no reche.""

In consequence, therefore, of this discovery, Orfeo pursues the hawking damsels, among whom he has descried his lost queen. They enter a rock, the king

ven :

"In at roche the leucdis rideth,
And he after and nought abideth:
When he was in the roche y-go,
Wele thre mile other mo,
He com into a fair cuntray,
As bright soonne somers day,
Smothe and plain and al grene,
Hill no dale nas none ysene.
Amiddle the lond a castel he seighe,
Rich and reale and wonder beighe;
Al the utmast wal

Was cler and schine of cristal;
An hundred tours ther were about,
Degiselich and bataild stout;
The butrass come out of the diche,
Of rede gold y-arched riche ;
The bousour was anowed al,
Of ich maner deuers animal;
Within ther wer wide wones
Al of precious stones,
The werss piler onto biholde,
Was al of burnist gold:
Al that lond was ever light,

For when it schuld be therk and night,
The riche stonnes light gonne,
Bright as doth at none the sonne:

No man may tel, no thenke in thought,
The riche werk that ther was rought.

"Than he gan biholde about al,
And seighe ful liggeand with in the wal.
Of folk that wer thidder y-brought,
And thought dede and nere nought;
Sum stode with outen hadde;

And some none armes nade;

And sum thurch the bodi hadde wounde;
And sum lay wode y-bounde;

And sum armed on hors sete;

And sum astrangled as thai ete;
And sum war in water adreynt ;
And sum with fire al for schreynt;
Wives ther lay on childe bedde;
Sum dede, and sume awedde;

And wonder fele ther lay besides,
Right as thai slepe her undertides;
Eche was thus in thus warld y-nome,
With fairi thidder y-come.*

Ther be seize his owhen wiif,
Dame Heurodis, his lif liif,

Slepe under an ympe tree;

Bi her clothes he knewe that it was sche.

"And when he had bihold this mervalis alle. He went unto the king's halle;

Then seigh he ther a semly sight,

A tabernacle blisseful and bright;

Ther in her maister king sete,

And her quen fair and swete;

Her crounes, her clothes shine so bright,
That unnethe bihold he them might."

Orfeo and Heurodis, M. S.

Orfeo, as a minstrel, so charms the Fairy King with the music of his harp, that he promises to grant him whatever he should ask. He immediately demands his lost Heurodis; and, returning safely with her to Winchester, resumes his authority; a catastrophe, less pathetic indeed, but more pleasing, than that of the classical story. The circumstances, mentioned in this romantic legend, correspond very exactly with popular tradition. Almost all the writers on demonology mention, as a received opinion, that the power of the demons is most predominant at noon and midnight. The entrance to the Land of Faery is placed in the wilderness; a circumstance which coincides with a passage in Lindsay's Complaint of the Papingo:

"Bot sen my spreit mon from my bodye go,

I recommend it to the Quene of Fary,
Eternally into her court to tarry

In wilderness amang the holtis hair."

LINDSAY'S Works, 1592, p. 222. Chaucer also agrees, in this particular, with our

romancer:

"In his sadel he clombe unon,
And priked over stile and ston,
An Elfe Quene for to expie;
Til he so long had riden and gone
That he found in a privie wone
The countree of Faĕrie.

"Wherein he soughte north and south,

And often spired with his mouth,

his idea of the Lunar Paradise, containing every thing that on It was perhaps from such description that Ariosto adopted earth was stolen or lost.

was twelve years of age; having lost the power of her syde, and having a familiarite with him for divers years, dealing with charms, and abuseing the common people by her arts of witchcraft, thir divers yeares by-past.

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Item, For hanting and repairing with the gude neighbours, and Queene of Elfland, thir divers years by-past, as she had confest; and that she had friends in that court, which were of her own blude, who had gude acquaintance of the Queene of Elfland, which might have helped her; but she was whiles well, and whiles ill, sometimes with them, and other times away frae them; and that she would be in her bed haille and feire, and would not wytt where she would be the morn; and that she saw not the Queene this seven years, and that she was seven years ill handled in the court of Elfland; that, however, she had gude friends there, and that it was the gude neighbours that healed her, under God; and that she was coming and going to St. Andrews to haile folkes thir many years past.

Item, Convict of the said act of witchcraft, in as far as she confest that the said Mr. William Sympsoune, who was her guidsir sone, borne in Stirleing, who was the King's smith, who, when about eight years of age, was taken away by ane Egyptian into Egypt; which Egyptian was a gyant, where he remained twelve years, and then came home.

Item, That she being in Grange Muir, with some other folke, she, being sick, lay downe; and, when alone, there came a man to her, clad in green, who said to her, if she would be faithful, he would do her good; but she, being feared, cried out, but naebodye came to her; so she said, if he came in God's name, and for the gude of her saule, it was well; but he gaid away that he appeared to her another time like a lustie man, and many men and women with him; that, at seeing him, she signed herself and prayed, and past with them, and saw them making merrie with pypes, and gude cheir and wine, and that she was carried with them; and that when she telled any of these things, she was sairlie tormentit by them; and that the first time she gaed with them, she gat a sair straike frae one of them, which took all the poustie* of her syde frae her, and left ane ill-far'd mark on her syde.

Item, That she saw the gude neighbours make their sawest with panns and fyres, and that they gathered the herbs before the sun was up, and they came verie fearful sometimes to her, and flaide‡ her very sair, which made her cry, and threatened they would use her worse than before; and, at last, they took away the power of her haile syde frae her, which made her lye many weeks. Sometimes they would come and sitt by her, and promise all that she should never want, if she would be faithful, but if she would speak and telle of them, they should murther her; and that Mr. William Sympsoune is with them, who healed her, and telt her all things; that he is a young man not six years older than herself, and that he will appear to her before the court comes; that he told her he was taken away by them, and he bid her sign herself that she be not taken away, for the teind of them are tane to hell everie year.

"Item, That the said Mr. William told her what herbs were fit to cure every disease, and how to use them; and particularlie tauld, that the Bishop of St. Andrews laboured under sindrie diseases, sic as the ripples, trembling, fever, flux, &c., and bade her make a sawe, and anoint several parts of his body therewith, and gave directions for making a posset, which she made and gave him."

For this idle story, the poor woman actually suffered death. Yet, notwithstanding the fervent arguments thus liberally used by the orthodox, the common people, though they dreaded even to think or speak about the Fairies, by no means unanimously acquiesced in the doctrine which consigned them to eternal perdition. The inhabitants of the Isle of Man call them the "good people, and say they live

in wilds and forests, and on mountains, and shun great cities, because of the wickedness acted therein: all the houses are blessed where they visit, for they fly vice. A person would be thought impudently profane, who should suffer his family to go to bed, without first having set a tub, or pail, full of clean water, for those guests to bathe themselves in, which the natives aver they constantly do, as soon as ever the eyes of the family are closed, wherever they vouchsafe to come."-WALDRON'S Works, p. 126. There are some curious, and perhaps anomalous facts, concerning the history of Fairies, in a sort of Cock-lane narrative, contained in a letter from Moses Pitt to Dr. Edward Fowler, Lord Bishop of Gloucester, printed at London in 1696, and preserved in Morgan's Phoenix Britannicus, 4to, London, 1732.

Anne Jefferies was born in the parish of St. Teath, in the county of Cornwall, in 1626. Being the daughter of a poor man, she resided as servant in the house of the narrator's father, and waited upon the narrator himself, in his childhood. As she was knitting stockings in an arbour of the garden, six small people, all in green clothes," came suddenly over the garden-wall; at the sight of whom, being much frightened, she was seized with convulsions, and continued so long sick, that she became as a changeling, and was unable to walk. During her sickness, she frequently exclaimed, "They are just gone out of the window! They are just gone out of the window! Do you not see them?" These expressions, as she afterwards declared, related to their disappearing. During the harvest, when every one was employed, her mistress walked out; and dreading that Anne, who was extremely weak and silly, might injure herself, or the house, by the fire, with some difficulty persuaded her to walk in the orchard till her return. She accidentally hurt her leg, and at her return Anne cured it, by stroking it with her hand. She appeared to be informed of every particular, and asserted, that she had this information from the Fairies, who had caused the misfortune. After this, she performed numerous cures, but would never receive money for them. From harvest time to Christmas, she was fed by the Fairies, and eat no other victuals but theirs. The narrator affirms, that looking one day through the key-hole of the door of her chamber, he saw her eating; and that she gave him a piece of bread, which was the most delicious he ever tasted. The Fairies always appeared to her in even numbers; never less than two, nor more than eight, at a time. She had always a sufficient stock of salves and medicines, and yet neither made nor purchased any; nor did she ever appear to be in want of money. She, one day, gave a silver cup, containing about a quart, to the daughter of her mistress, a girl about four years old, to carry to her mother, who refused to receive it. The narrator adds, that he had seen her dancing in the orchard among the trees, and that she informed him she was then dancing with the Fairies. The report of the strange cures which she performed, soon attracted the attention of both ministers and magistrates. The ministers endeavoured to persuade her, that the Fairies, by which she was haunted, were evil spirits, and that she was under the delusion of the devil. After they had left her, she was visited by the Fairies, while in great perplexity, who desired to cause those who termed them evil spirits, to read that place of Scripture, First Epistle of John, chap. iv. v. 1.—Dearly beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, whether they are of God, &c. Though Anne Jeffe ries could not read, she produced a Bible folded down at this passage. By the magistrates she was confined three months, without food, in Bodman jail, and afterwards for some time in the house of Justice Tregeagle. Before the constable appeared to apprehend her, she was visited by the Fairies, who informed her what was intended, and advised her to go with him. When this account was given, on May 1, 1696, she was still alive; but refused to relate any particulars of her connexion with the Fairies, or the occasion on which they deserted her,

supposed to be particularly extensive.

As they are supposed to be invisibly present, they are at all times to be spoken of with respect.

The Fairies of Scotland are represented as a diminutive race of beings, of a mixed, or rather dubious nature, capricious in their dispositions, and mischievous in their resentment. They inhabit the interior of green hills, chiefly those of a conical form, in Gaelic termed Sighan, on which they lead their dances by moonlight; impressing upon the surface the marks of circles, which sometimes appear yellow and blasted, sometimes of a deep green hue; and within which it is dangerous to sleep, or to be found after sunset. The removal of those large portions of turf, which thunderbolts sometimes scoop out of the ground with singular regularity, is also ascribed to their agency. Cattle, which are suddenly seized with the cramp, or some similar disorder, are said to be elf-shot; and the approved cure is, to chafe the parts affected with a blue bonnet, which, it may be readily believed, often restores the circulation. The triangular flints, frequently found in Scotland, with which the ancient inhabitants probably barbed their shafts, are supposed to be the weapons of Fairy resentment, and are termed elf arrow-heads. The rude brazen battle-axes of the ancients, commonly called celts, are also ascribed to their manufacture. But, like the Gothic duergar, their skill is not confined to the fabrication of arms; for they are heard sedulously hammering in linns, precipices, and rocky or cavernous situations, where, like the dwarfs of the mines, mentioned by Georg. Agricola, they busy themselves in imitating the actions and the various employments of men. The Brook of Beaumont, for example, which passes, in its course, by numerous linns and caverns, is notorious for being haunted by the Fairies; and the perforated and rounded stones which are formed by trituration in its channel, are termed, by the vulgar, fairy cups and dishes. A beautiful reason is assigned by Fletcher for the fays frequenting streams and fountains: He tells us of

"A virtuous well, about whose flowery banks
The nimble-footed Fairies dance their rounds,
By the pale moonshine, dipping oftentimes
Their stolen children, so to make them free
From dying flesh and dull mortality."

Faithful Shepherdess.

It is sometimes accounted unlucky to pass such places, without performing some ceremony to avert the displeasure of the elves. There is, upon the top of Minchmuir, a mountain in Peebles-shire, a spring called the Cheese Well, because, anciently, those who passed that way were wont to throw into it a piece of cheese, as an offering to the Fairies, to whom it was consecrated.

Like the feld elfen of the Saxons, the usual dress of the Fairies is green; though on the moors, they have been sometimes observed in heath-brown, or in weeds dyed with the stoneraw, or lichen.* They often ride in invisible procession, when their presence is discovered by the shrill ringing of their bridles. On these occasions, they sometimes borrow mortal steeds; and when such are found at morning, panting and fatigued in their stalls, with their manes and tails dishevelled and entangled, the grooms, I presume, often find this a convenient excuse for their situation; as the common belief of the elves quaffing the choicest liquors in the cellars of the rich (see the story of Lord Duffus, below) might occasionally cloak the delinquencies of an unfaithful butler.

The Fairies, besides their equestrian processions, are addicted, it would seem, to the pleasures of the chase. A young sailor, travelling by night from Douglas, in the Isle of Man, to visit his sister residing in Kirk Merlugh, heard the noise of horses, the holloa of a huntsman, and the sound of a horn. Immediately afterwards, thirteen horsemen, dressed in green, and gallantly mounted, swept past him. Jack was so much delighted with the sport, that he followed them, and enjoyed the sound of the horn for some miles; and it was not till he arrived at his *Hence the hero of the ballad is termed an" elfin grey."

132.

sister's house, that he learned the danger which he had incurred. I must not omit to mention, that these little personages are expert jockeys, and scorn to ride the little Manks ponies, though apparently well suited to their size. The exercise, therefore, falls heavily upon the English and Irish horses, brought into the Isle of Man. Mr. Waldron was assured by a gentleman of Ballafletcher, that he had lost three or four capital hunters by these nocturnal excursions.-WALDRON'S Works, p. From the same author we learn, that the Fairies sometimes take more legitimate modes of procuring horses. A person of the utmost integrity informed him, that having occasion to sell a horse, he was accosted among the mountains by a little gentleman plainly dressed, who priced his horse, cheapened him, and, after some chaffering, finally purchased him. No sooner had the buyer mounted, and paid the price, than he sunk through the earth, horse and man, to the astonishment and terror of the seller; who experienced, however, no inconvenience from dealing with so extraordinary a purchaser.t— Ibid, p. 135.

It is hoped the reader will receive, with due respect. these, and similar stories, told by Mr. Waldron; for he himself, a scholar and a gentleman, informs us, as to circles in grass, and the impression of small feet among the snow, I cannot deny but I have seen them frequently, and once thought I heard a whistle, as though in my ear, when nobody that could make it was near me.' In this passage there is a curious picture of the contagious effects of a superstitious atmosphere. Waldron had lived so long among the Manks, that he was persuaded to believe their legends.

The worthy Captain George Burton communicated to Richard Bovet, gent., author of the interesting work, entitled "Pandemonium, or the Devil's Cloister Opened," the following singular account of a lad called the Fairy Boy of Leith, who, it seems, acted as a drummer to the elves, who weekly held rendezvous in the Calton Hill, near Edinburgh.

"About fifteen years since, having business that detained me for some time at Leith, which is near Edinburgh, in the kingdom of Scotland, I often met some of my acquaintance at a certain house there, where we used to drink a glass of wine for our refection; the woman which kept the house was of honest reputation among the neighbours, which made me give the more attention to what she told me one day about a fairy boy, (as they called him,) who lived about that town. She had given me so strange an account of him, that I desired her I might see him the first opportunity, which she promised; and not long after, passing that way, she told me there was the fairy boy, but a little before I came by; and, casting her eye into the street, said, Look you, sir, yonder he is at play with those other boys; and designing him to me, I went, and, by smooth words, and a piece of money, got him to come into the house with me; where, in the presence of divers people, I demanded of him several astrological questions, which he answered with great subtilty; and, through all his discourse, carried it with a cunning much above his years, which seemed not to exceed ten or eleven.

"He seemed to make a motion like drumming upon the table with his fingers, upon which I asked him, Whether he could beat a drum? To which he replied, Yes, sir, as well as any man in Scotland; for every Thursday night I beat all points to a sort of people that used to meet under yonder hill, (pointing to the great hill between Edenborough and Leith.) How, boy? quoth I, What company have you there?

["Under each of these six heads of dissertation, a number of curious out-of the way relations are compiled from the forgotten repositories of fabulous marvels. Many of them will serve for the story of future ballads, and the decoration of yet unwritten metrical romances. They constitute the elements of British mythology; and in the hands of a Modern Ovid, may be shapen into a wild catalogue of metamorphoses, into amusing anecdotes of sorcery, fableries of romance, or tales of wonder, into a Thousand and One Nights' Entertainment, or golden legends of There is something here as much the spirit of prophecy as of crishuddering astonishment." Critical Review, November, 1903.

ticism.-ED.]