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No spell, however, could bind the Fairies themselves to their own domain; an eternal restlessness seems to have been their doom; they remove," says Kirk, in a passage singularly curious," to other Lodgings at the Beginning of each Quarter of the Year, so traversing till Doomsday, being imputent and (impotent of?) staying in one Place, and finding some Ease by so purning (journeying) and changing Habitations. Their chamoelion-lyke Bodies swim in the Air near the Farth with Bag and Bagadge; and at such revolution of Time, SEEES, OF MEN OF THE SECOND SIGHT, (Foemales being seldome so qualified) have very terrifying Encounters with them, even on High Ways; who therefoir uswally shune to travell abroad at these four Seasons of the Year, and thereby have made it a Custome to this day among the Scottish-Irish to keep Church duely evry first Sunday of the Quarter to sene or hallow themselves, their Corns and Cattell, from the Shots and Stealth of these wandering Tribes; and many of these superstitious People will not be seen in Church againe till the nixt Quarter begin, as if no Duty were to be learned or done by them, but all the use of Worship and Sermons were to save them from these Arrows that fly in the dark.” *

Beside these quarterly migrations, an annual procession of the Fairy Court was supposed to take place on Hallowe'en, to which we have alluded in a former part of this work (vol. i. p. 342.), when describing the superstitions peculiar to certain periods of the year. A similar ceremony, though not upon so large a scale, was also believed, among the peasantry of Nithsdale, to occur at † Roodsmass;

When years combine with distance, let me be,
By all forgot, remembered yet by thee!"

If Mr. Scott, yielding to this appeal, would present us with a complete edition of the poetical works, together with a life, of his lamented friend, who was not less remarkable for his learning than his genius, he would confer no trifling obligation on the literary world.

* Kirk's Essay on Fairies, pp. 2, 3.

A remarkable instance of the continuance of this superstition, even in the present day, is recorded by Mr. Cromek, to whom an old woman of Nithsdale gave the following detail, "with the artless simplicity of sure belief." "I' the night afore Roodsmass," said

but the most common appearance of the Fairy in Scotland, as elsewhere, was conceived to be by moon-light, dancing in a circle, and leaving behind either a scorched, or a deep green, ringlet; nor was the period of noon-day scarcely deemed less dangerous than the noon of night; for, during both, the Fairies were imagined to exert a baneful power; in sleep, producing the oppression termed the Nightmare *, and, even at mid-day, weaving their pernicious spells, and subjecting to their power all who were tempted to repose on the rock, bank, hillock, or near the tree which they frequented.

Persons thus unfortunately situated, who had ventured within the fairy-circle after sunset, who had slept at noon upon a fairy-hill, or who, in an evil hour, had been devoted to the infernal powers, by the curses of a parent, were liable to be borne away to Elf-land for a period of seven years :—

"Woe to the upland swain, who, wandering far,
The circle treads, beneath the evening star!
His feet the witch-grass green impels to run,
Full on the dark descent, he strives to shun;

Till, on the giddy brink, o'erpower'd by charms,
The Fairies clasp him, in unhallow'd arms,

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she, "I had trysted wi' a neeber lass, a Scots mile frae hame, to talk anent buying braws i' the fair:we had nae sutten lang aneath the haw-buss, till we heard the loud laugh o' fowk riding, wi' the jingling o' bridles, an' the clanking o' hoofs. We banged up, thinking they wad ryde owre us; we kent nae but it was drunken fowk riding to the fair, i' the fore night. We glowred roun' and roun', an' sune saw it was the Fairie fowk's Rade. We cowered down till they passed by. A leam o' light was dancing owre them, mair bonnie than moon-shine: they were a wee, wee fowk, wi' green scarfs on, but ane that rade foremost, an' that ane was a gude deal larger than the lave, wi' bonnie lang hair bun' about wi' a strap, whilk glented lyke stars. They rade on braw wee whyte naigs, wi' unco lang swooping tails, an' manes hung wi' whustles that the win' played on. This, an' their tongue whan they sang, was like the soun of a far awa Psalm. Marion an' me was in a brade lea fiel' whare they cam by us, a high hedge o' hawtrees keep it them frae gaun through Johnnie Corrie's corn; - but they lap a' owre't like sparrows, an' gallop't into a greene knowe beyont it. We gade i' the morning to look at the tredded corn, but the fient a hoof mark was there, nor a blade broken." Remains of Nithsdale and Galloway Song, pp. 298, 299.

* Vide Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, vol. ii. p. 214.; and Tyrwhitt's Note on Canterbury Tales, v. 6457.

Doom'd, with the crew of restless foot, to stray
The earth by night, the nether realms by day;
Till seven long years their dangerous circuit run,
And call the wretch to view this upper sun."
""*

Pregnant and child-bed women were considered, as in Germany, peculiarly in danger of being stolen by the Fairies at noon-day, and various preventive charms were adopted against this abstraction. “The Tramontains to this day," says Kirk, speaking of "Women yet alive, who tell they were taken away when in Child-bed to nurse Fairie Children," "put bread, the Bible, or a piece of Iron, in Women's Bed when travelling, to save them from being thus stolen." +

Of the capture and subjection of those who had been devoted by execration, several instances are related both by Scotch and English writers; but the most general mode of abstraction practised by the Elvish race, was that of stealing or exchanging children, and so commonly was this species of theft apprehended in the Highlands of Scotland, that it was customary to watch children until the christening was over §, under the idea, that the power of the Fairies, owing to the original corruption of human nature, was chiefly to be dreaded

* Leyden's Scenes of Infancy, p. 24.

Kirk's Essay on Fairies, pp. 5, 6.

Thus Gervase of Tilbury tells us, that one Peter De Cabinam residing in a city of Catalonia, being teazed by his daughter, wished in his passion, that the devil might take her, when she was instantly borne away. "About seven years afterwards, an inhabitant of the same city, passing by the mountain (adjacent to it), met a man who complained bitterly of the burthen he was constantly forced to bear. Upon enquiring the cause of his complaining, as he did not seem to carry any load, the man related, that he had been unwarily devoted to the spirits by an execration, and that they now employed him constantly as a vehicle of burden." As a proof of his assertion, he added, that "the daughter of his fellow citizen was detained by the spirits, but that they were willing to restore her, if her father would come and demand her on the mountain. Peter de Cabinam, on being informed of this, ascended the mountain to a lake (on its summit), and, in the name of God, demanded his daughter; when a tall, thin, withered figure, with wandering eyes, and almost bereft of understanding, was wafted to him in a blast of wind." Scott's Minstrelsy, vol. ii. pp. 181, 182.

See Pennant's Tour in Scotland, 8vo. 1769.

in the interval between birth and baptism. The Beings substituted for the healthy offspring of man were apparently idiots, monstrous and decrepid in their form, and defective in speech; and when the Fairies failed to purloin or exchange the infant, in consequence of the vigilance of its parents, it was usually found breath-blasted, “their unearthly breath making it wither away in every limb and lineament, like a blighted ear of corn, saving the countenance, which unchangeably retains the sacred stamp of divinity.” *

The cause assigned for this evil propensity on the part of the Fairies, was the dreadful obligation they were under, of sacrificing the tenth individual to the Devil every, or every seventh year; "the teind of them," says the indictment of Alison Pearson," are tane to hell everie year t," while the hero of the Ballad entitled The Young Tamlane, exclaims :

"And pleasant is the Fairy land ;

But, an eiry tale to tell!

Ay, at the end o' seven years,
We pay the teind to hell." ‡

For the recovery of the unfortunate substitutes thus selected for the payment of their infernal tribute, various charms and contrivances were adopted, of which one of the most effectual, though the most horrible, was the assignment to the flames of the supposed changeling, which it was firmly believed would, in consequence of this treatment, disappear, and the real child return to the lap of its mother. A beautiful child, of Caerlaveroc, in Nithsdale," relates Mr. Cromek from tradition, "on the second day of its birth, and before its baptism, was changed, none knew how, for an antiquated elf of hideous aspect. It kept the family awake with its nightly yells; biting the mother's breasts, and would neither be cradled or

* Cromek on Nithsdale and Galloway Song, p. 307.
+ Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, vol. ii. p. 208.
Scott's Minstrelsy, vol. ii. p. 238.

nursed. The mother, obliged to be from home, left it in charge to the servant girl. The poor lass was sitting bemoaning herself, • Wer't nae for thy girning face I would knock the big, winnow the corn, and grun the meal!'-Lowse the cradle band,' quoth the Elf, ' and tent the neighbours, an' Ill work yere wark.' Up started the elf, the wind arose, the corn was chaffed, the outlyers were foddered, the hand mill moved around, as by instinct, and the knocking mell did its work with amazing rapidity. The lass, and her elfin servant, rested and diverted themselves, till, on the mistress's approach, it was restored to the cradle, and began to yell anew. The girl took the first opportunity of slyly telling her mistress the adventure. ' What 'll we do wi' the wee diel?' said she. " I'll wirk it a pirn,' replied the lass. At the middle hour of night the chimney-top was covered up, and every inlet barred and closed. The embers were blown up until glowing hot, and the maid, undressing the elf, tossed it on the fire. It uttered the wildest and most piercing yells, and, in a moment, the Fairies were heard moaning at every wonted avenue, and rattling at the window boards, at the chimney head, and at the door. 'In the name o'God bring back the bairn,' cried the lass. The window flew up; the earthly child was laid unharmed on the mother's lap, while its grisly substitute flew up the chimney with a loud laugh."

Another efficacious mode of re-possessing either children or adults who had been borne away by the Fairies, depended upon watching their great annual procession or rade on Hallowe'en, within a year and a day of the supposed abstraction, and there seizing by force the hapless victim of their charms. This enterprise, however, which forms the chief incident in the Tale of the Young Tamlane, and has been mentioned in the first volume, required much courage and resolution for its successful performance, as the adventurer, regardless of all the terrors of the scene, and of all the appalling shapes which

* Remains of Nithsdale and Galloway Song, pp. 308, 309.

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