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                         FOLK–LORE AND LEGENDS

                               _ENGLISH_




                               FOLK–LORE
                                  AND
                                LEGENDS

                                ENGLISH

[Illustration: DECORATION]

                            W. W. GIBBINGS
                       18 BURY ST., LONDON, W.C.
                                 1890




INTRODUCTORY NOTE.


The old English Folklore Tales are fast dying out. The simplicity of
character necessary for the retaining of old memories and beliefs is
being lost, more rapidly in England, perhaps, than in any other part of
the world. Our folk are giving up the old myths for new ones. Before
remorseless “progress,” and the struggle for existence, the poetry
of life is being quickly blotted out. In editing this volume I have
endeavoured to select some of the best specimens of our Folklore. With
regard to the nursery tales, I have taken pains to give them as they
are in the earliest editions I could find. I must say, however, that,
while I have taken every care to alter only as much as was absolutely
necessary in these tales, some excision and slight alteration has at
times been required.

  C. J. T.




                               CONTENTS.


                                                 PAGE

  A Dissertation on Fairies,                        1

  Nelly the Knocker,                               39

  The Three Fools,                                 42

  Some Merry Tales of the Wise Men of Gotham,      46

  The Tulip Fairies,                               54

  The History of Jack and the Giants,              57

  The Fairies’ Cup,                                84

  The White Lady,                                  86

  A Pleasant and Delightful History of Thomas
  Hickathrift,                                     89

  The Spectre Coach,                              117

  The Baker’s Daughter,                           123

  The Fairy Children,                             126

  The History of Jack and the Beanstalk,          129

  Johnny Reed’s Cat,                              150

  Lame Molly,                                     156

  The Brown man of the Moors,                     159

  How the Cobbler cheated the Devil,              161

  The Tavistock Witch,                            165

  The Worm of Lambton,                            168

  The Old Woman and the Crooked Sixpence,         174

  The Yorkshire Boggart,                          177

  The Duergar,                                    181

  The Barn Elves,                                 185

  Legends of King Arthur,                         187

  Silky,                                          192




A DISSERTATION ON FAIRIES.

BY JOSEPH RITSON, ESQ.


The earliest mention of Fairies is made by Homer, if, that is, his
English translator has, in this instance, done him justice:—

  “Where round the bed, whence Achelöus springs,
  The wat’ry Fairies dance in mazy rings.”

  (_Iliad_, B. xxiv. 617.)

These Nymphs he supposes to frequent or reside in woods, hills, the
sea, fountains, grottos etc., whence they are peculiarly called Naiads,
Dryads and Nereids:

  “What sounds are those that gather from the shores,
  The voice of nymphs that haunt the sylvan bowers,
  The fair–hair’d dryads of the shady wood,
  Or azure daughters of the silver flood?”

  (_Odyss._ B. vi. 122.)

The original word, indeed, is _nymphs_, which, it must be confessed,
furnishes an accurate idea of the _fays_ (_fées_ or _fates_) of the
ancient French and Italian romances; wherein they are represented as
females of inexpressible beauty, elegance, and every kind of personal
accomplishment, united with magic or supernatural power; such, for
instance, as the Calypso of Homer, or the Alcina of Ariosto. Agreeably
to this idea it is that Shakespeare makes Antony say in allusion to
Cleopatra—

  “To this great fairy I’ll commend thy acts,”

meaning this grand assemblage of power and beauty. Such, also, is the
character of the ancient nymphs, spoken of by the Roman poets, as
Virgil, for instance:

  “Fortunatus et ille, deos qui novit agrestes,
  Panaque, Sylvanumque senem, Nymphasque sorores.”

  (_Geor._ ii. 493.)

They, likewise, occur in other passages as well as in Horace—

  “——gelidum nemus
  Nympharumque leves cum Satyris chori.”

  (_Carmina_, I., O. 1, v. 30.)

and, still more frequently, in Ovid.

Not far from Rome, as we are told by Chorier, was a place formerly
called “Ad Nymphas,” and, at this day, “Santa Ninfa,” which without
doubt, he adds, in the language of our ancestors, would have been
called “The Place of Fays” (_Recherches des Antiquitez, de Vienne_,
Lyon, 1659).

The word _faée_, or _fée_, among the French, is derived, according
to Du Cange, from the barbarous Latin _fadus_ or _fada_, in Italian
_fata_. Gervase of Tilbury, in his _Otia Imperialia_ (D. 3, c. 88),
speaks of “some of this kind of _larvæ_, which they named _fadœ_, we
have heard to be lovers,” and in his relation of a nocturnal contest
between two knights (c. 94) he exclaims, “What shall I say? I know not
if it were a true _horse_, or if it were a fairy (_fadus_), as men
assert.” From the _Roman de Partenay_, or _de Lezignan_, MS. Du Cange
cites—

  “Le chasteau fut fait d’une fée
  Si comme il est partout retrait.”

Hence, he says, _faërie_ for spectres:

  “Plusieurs parlant de Guenart,
  Du Lou, de l’Asne, et de Renart,
  De faëries, et de songes,
  De fantosmes, et de mensonges.”

The same Gervase explains the Latin _fata_ (_fée_, French) a divining
woman, an enchantress, or a witch (D. 3, c. 88).

Master Wace, in his _Histoire des Ducs de Normendie_ (confounded by
many with the _Roman de Rou_), describing the fountain of Berenton, in
Bretagne, says—

  “En la forest et environ,
  Mais jo ne sais par quel raison
  La scut l’en les fées veeir,
  Se li Breton nos dient veir, etc.”

  (In the forest and around,
  I wot not by what reason found,
  There may a man the fairies spy,
  If Britons do not tell a lie.)

but it may be difficult to conceive an accurate idea, from the mere
name, of the popular French _fays_ or _fairies_ of the twelfth century.

In Vienne, in Dauphiny, is _Le puit des fées_, or Fairy–well. These
_fays_, it must be confessed, have a strong resemblance to the nymphs
of the ancients, who inhabited caves and fountains. Upon a little rock
which overlooks the Rhone are three round holes which nature alone has
formed, although it seem, at first sight, that art has laboured after
her. They say that they were formerly frequented by Fays; that they
were full of water when it rained; and that they there frequently took
the pleasure of the bath; than which they had not one more charming
(Chorier, _Recherches_, etc.).

Pomponius Mela, an eminent geographer, and, in point of time, far
anterior to Pliny, relates, that beyond a mountain in Æthiopia, called
by the Greeks the “High Mountain,” burning, he says, with perpetual
fire, is a hill spread over a long tract by extended shores, whence
they rather go to see wide plains than to behold [the habitations]
of Pans and Satyrs. Hence, he adds, this opinion received faith,
that, whereas, in these parts is nothing of culture, no seats of
inhabitants, no footsteps—a waste solitude in the day, and a mere waste
silence—frequent fires shine by night; and camps, as it were, are seen
widely spread; cymbals and tympans sound; and sounding pipes are heard
more than human (B. 3, c. 9). These invisible essences, however, are
both anonymous and nondescript.

The _penates_ of the Romans, according to honest Reginald Scot, were
“the domesticall gods, or rather divels, that were said to make men
live quietlie within doores. But some think that _Lares_ are such as
trouble private houses. _Larvæ_ are said to be spirits that walk onelie
by night. _Vinculi terrei_ are such as was Robin Goodfellowe, that
would supplie the office of servants, speciallie of maides, as to make
a fier in the morning, sweepe the house, grind mustard and malt, drawe
water, etc. These also rumble in houses, drawe latches, go up and down
staiers,” etc. (_Discoverie of Witchcraft_, London, 1584, p. 521). A
more modern writer says “The Latins have called the fairies _lares_
and _larvæ_, frequenting, as they say, houses, delighting in neatness,
pinching the slut, and rewarding the good house