every night by the farisees, and the stone will brush them off."] In a curious and rare book, entitled Paradoxical Assertions and Philosophical Problems, by R. H., 1664, 2d part, p. 14, "Why Englishmen creep to the chimney in winter and summer also?" we read: "Doth not the warm zeal of an Englishman's devotion (who was ever observed to contend most stifly pro aris et focis) make them maintain and defend the sacred hearth, as the sanctuary and chief place of residence of the tutelary lares and household gods, and the only court where the lady fairies convene to dance and revel?" Aubrey, in his Miscellanies, p. 158, gives us the following most important piece of information respecting fairies: "He reports, that when he was a boy at school in the town of Forres, yet not so young but that he had years and capacity both to observe and remember that which fell out, he and his schoolfellows were upon a time whipping their tops in the churchyard, before the door of the church; though the day was calm, they heard a noise of a wind, and at some distance saw the small dust begin to arise and turn round, which motion continued, advancing till it came to the place where they were; whereupon they began to bless themselves. But one of their number (being it seems a little more bold and confident than his companions) said, horse and hattock with my top, and immediately they all saw the top lifted up from the ground, but could not see what way it was carried, by reason of a cloud of dust which was raised at the same time. They sought for the top all about the place where it was taken up, but in vain; and it was found afterwards in the church-yard, on the other side of the church. Mr. Steward (so is the gentleman called) declared to me that he had a perfect remembrance of this matter." In Sir John Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland, 1792, iv. 560, the minister of the parishes of Strachur and Stralachlan, in Argyleshire, tells us, in his description of them, that "About eight miles to the eastward of Cailleach-vear a small conical hill rises considerably above the neighbouring hills. It is seen from Inverary, and from many parts at a great distance. It is called Sien-Sluai, the fairy habitation of a multitude." Adding, in a note: "A belief in fairies prevailed very much in the Highlands of old; nor at this day is it quite obliterated. A small conical hill, called Sien, was assigned them for a dwelling, from which melodious music was frequently heard, and gleams of light seen in dark nights." Ibid. xii. 461, Account of Kirkmichael, we read: "Not more firmly established in this country is the belief in ghosts than that in fairies. The legendary records of fancy, transmitted from age to age, have assigned their mansions to that class of genii, in detached hillocks, covered with verdure, situated on the banks of purling brooks, or surrounded by thickets of wood. These hillocks are called sioth-dhunan, abbreviated sioth-anan, from sioth, peace, and dun, a mound. They derive this name from the practice of the Druids, who were wont occasionally to retire to green eminences to administer justice, establish peace, and compose differences between contending parties. As that venerable order taught a saoghl hal, or world beyond the present, their followers, when they were no more, fondly imagined that seats where they exercised a virtue so beneficial to mankind were still inhabited by them in their disembodied state. In the autumnal season, when the moon shines from a serene sky, often is the wayfaring traveller arrested by the music of the hills, more melodious than the strains of Orpheus. Often struck with a more solemn scene, he beholds the visionary hunters engaged in the chace, and pursuing the deer of the clouds, while the hollow rocks, in long-sounding echoes, reverberate their cries. There are several now living who assert that they have seen and heard this aerial hunting, and that they have been suddenly surrounded by visionary forms, and assailed by a multitude of voices. About fifty years ago a clergyman in the neighbourhood, whose faith was more regulated by the scepticism of philosophy than the credulity of superstition, could not be prevailed upon to yield his assent to the opinion of the times. At length, however, he felt from experience that he doubted what he ought to have believed. One night as he was returning home, at a late hour, from a presbytery, he was seized by the fairies, and carried aloft into the air. Through fields of ether and fleecy clouds he journeyed many a mile, descrying, like Sancho Panza, on his clavileno, the earth far distant below him, and no bigger than a nut-shell. Being thus sufficiently convinced of the reality of their existence, they let him down at the door of his own house, where he afterwards often recited to the wondering circle the marvellous tale of his adventure." 1 A note at page 462 adds; "Notwithstanding the progressive increase of knowledge and proportional decay of superstition in the Highlands, these genii are still supposed by many of the people to exist in the woods and sequestered valleys of the mountains, where they frequently appear to the lonely traveller, clothed in green, with dishevelled hair floating over their shoulders, and with faces more blooming than the vermil blush of a summer morning. At night, in particular, when fancy assimilates to its own preconceived ideas every appearance and every sound, the wandering enthusiast is frequently entertained by their music, more melodious than he ever before heard. It is curious to observe how much this agreeable delusion corresponds with the superstitious opinion of the Romans concerning the same class of genii, represented under different names. The Epicurean Lucretius describes the credulity in the following beautiful verses: "Hæc loca capripedes satyros, nymphasque tenere "The fauni are derived from the eubates or faidhin of the Celtæ. Faidh is a prophet; hence is derived the Roman word fari, to prophesy.' In the same work, xv. 430, parishes of Stronsay and Eday, co. Orkney, we read: "The common people of this district remain to this day so credulous as to think that fairies do exist, that an inferior species of witchcraft is still practised, and that houses have been haunted, not only in former ages, but that they are haunted; at least noises are heard which cannot be accounted for on rational principles, even in our days. An In plain English, I should suspect that spirits of a different sort from fairies had taken the honest clergyman by the head, and, though he has omitted the circumstance in his marvellous narration, I have no doubt but that the good man saw double on the occasion, and that his own mare, not fairies, landed him safe at his own door. instance of the latter happened only three years ago in the house of John Spence, boat-carpenter.' The following from O'Brien's Dict. Hib. is cited by General Vallancey, in a note in his Collectanea de Rebus Hibernicis, iii. 461: "Sith-bhreog, the same as sigh-brog, a fairy; hence bean-sighe, plural mna-sighe, women-fairies; credulously supposed by the common people to be so affected to certain families, that they are heard to sing mournful lamentations about their houses by night, whenever any of the family labours under a sickness which is to end by death: but no families which are not of an ancient and noble stock" (of Oriental extraction he should have said) "are believed to be honoured with this fairy privilege." In a very rare tract, entitled Strange and Wonderful News from the County of Wicklow in Ireland, what happened to one Dr. Moore (late schoolmaster in London), how he was invisibly taken from his friends, 1678, we read,-1, how Dr. Moore said to his friend that "he had been often told by his mother, and several others of his relations, of spirits which they called fairies, who used frequently to carry him away, and continue him with them for some time, without doing him the least prejudice; but his mother, being very much frighted and concerned thereat, did, as often as he was missing, send to a certain old woman, her neighbour in the country, who, by repeating some spells or exorcisms, would suddenly cause his return." "" His friend very naturally disbelieved the facts, "while the doctor did positively affirm the truth thereof." But the most strange and wonderful part of the story is, that during the dispute the doctor was carried off suddenly by some of those invisible gentry, though forcibly held by two persons; nor did he return to the company till six o'clock the next morning, both hungry and thirsty, having, as he asserted, "been hurried from place to place all that night." At the end of this marvellous narration is the following advertisement: "For satisfaction of the licenser, I certifie this following" (it "The Queen of Fairie, mentioned in Jean Weir's indictment, is probably the same sovereign with the Queen of Elf-land, who makes a figure in the case of Alison Pearson, 15th May, 1588; which I believe is the first of the kind in the record." Additions and Notes to Maclaurin's Arguments and Decisions in remarkable Cases. Law Courts, Scotland, 1774, p. 726. ought to have been preceding) "relation was sent to me from Dublin by a person whom I credit, and recommended in a letter bearing date the 23d of November last, as true news much spoken of there. John Cother." The licenser of the day must have been satisfied, for the tract was printed; but who will undertake to give a similar satisfaction on the subject to the readers of the present age? [The Irish fairy legends have been collected and immortalized by Mr. Crofton Croker, whose popular work on the subject is so widely known that any abstract of it here would be superfluous. Mr. Croker classes the fairies under the heads of shefro, cluricaune, banshee, phooka, merrow, dullahan, and the fir darrig. The name shefro literally signifies a fairy-house or mansion, and is adopted as a generic name for the elves who are supposed to live in troops or communities, and were popularly supposed to have castles or mansions of their own. The cluricaune was distinguished by his solitary habits. The banshee, an attendant fairy or spirit, especially observed to mourn on the death of any member of a family to which it attached itself. The phooka appears to be a modification of Robin Goodfellow or Puck. The merrow is a mermaid. The dullahan is a malicious, sullen spirit or goblin, and the fir darrig a little merry red man, not unlike in its disposition and movements to Puck.] ROBIN GOODFELLOW. ["THERE can be little doubt," observes Mr. Halliwell, "that, in the time of Shakespeare, the fairies held a more prominent position in our popular literature than can now be concluded from the pieces on the subject that have descended to us. The author of Tarlton's News out of Purgatory, printed in 1590, assures us that Robin Goodfellow was 'famosed in every old wives chronicle for his mad merry pranks;' and we learn from Henslowe's Diary that Chettle was the writer of a drama on the adventures of that merry wanderer of the night.' These have disappeared; and time has dealt so harshly with the memory of poor Robin, that we might almost imagine his spirit was still leading us astray over massive volumes of an |