But after two or three thousand years of this sport, I suppose Blackstick grew tired of it. Or perhaps she thought, ‘What good am I doing by sending this princess to sleep for a hundred years? By fixing a black pudding on to that fool’s nose? By causing diamonds and pearls to drop from one little girl’s mouth, and vipers and toads from another’s? I might as well shut my incantations up, and allow things to take their natural course., So she locked up her books in her cupboard, declined further magical performances, and scarcely used her wand at all except as a cane to walk about with.
When the Princess Angelica was born, her parents not only did not ask the Fairy Blackstick to the christening party, but gave orders to their porter to absolutely refuse her if she called. This porter’s name was Gruffanuff, and he had been selected for the post by their Royal Highnesses because he was a very tall fierce man, with a rudeness which frightened most such persons away.
Now this fellow tried his rudeness once too often, as you shall hear. For the Fairy Blackstick coming to call upon the prince and princess, who were actually sitting at the open drawing-room window, Gruffanuff not only denied them, but made the most odious vulgar sign as he was going to slam the door in the fairy’s face! “Get away, hold Blackstick!” said he. “I tell you, Master and Missis ain’t at home to you.” And he was, as we have said, going to slam the door.
But the fairy, with her wand, prevented the door being shut, and Gruffanuff came out again in a fury, swearing in the most abominable way, and asking the fairy ‘whether she thought he was a going to stay at that there door all day?’
“You are going to stay at that door all day and all night, and for many a long year,” the fairy said, very majestically.
Gruffanuff, coming out of the door, straddling before it with his great calves, burst out laughing, and cried, “Ha, ha, ha! This is a good un! Ha – ah – what’s this? Let me down –O–o–H’m!” and then he was dumb!
For, as the fairy waved her wand over him, he felt himself rising off the ground, and fluttering up against the door, and then, as if a screw ran into his stomach, he felt a dreadful pain there, and was pinned to the door, and then his arms flew up over his head, and his legs, after writhing about wildly, twisted under his body. He felt cold, cold, growing over him, as if he was turning into metal.
He was turned into metal! He was neither more nor less than a knocker! And there he was, nailed to the door in the blazing summer day, till he burned almost red-hot, and there he was, nailed to the door all the bitter winter nights, till his brass nose was dropping with icicles. And the postman came and rapped at him, and the boy with a letter came and hit him up against the door. And the king and queen (princess and prince they were then) coming home from a walk that evening, the king said, “Hello, my dear! You have had a new knocker put on the door. Why, it’s rather like our porter in the face! What has become of that boozy vagabond?” And the housemaid came and scrubbed his nose with sandpaper, and once, some larking young men tried to wrench him off, and put him to the most excruciating agony with a screwdriver. And then the queen had a fancy to have the colour of the door altered, and the painters dabbed him over the mouth and eyes, and nearly choked him, as they painted him pea-green. I warrant he had leisure to repent of having been rude to the Fairy Blackstick!
As for his wife, she did not miss him, and when the prince and princess chose to become king and queen, they left their old house, and nobody thought of the porter any more.
Connla and the Fairy Maiden
By Joseph Jacobs
READING TIME: 5 MINUTES
Connla of the Fiery Hair was son of Conn of the Hundred Fights. One day as he stood by the side of his father on the height of Usna, he saw a maiden clad in strange attire coming towards him.
“Whence comest thou, maiden?” said Connla.
“I come from the Plains of the Ever Living,” she said, “there where there is neither death nor sin. There we keep holiday always, nor need we help from any in our joy. And in all our pleasure we have no strife. And because we have our homes in the round green hills, men call us the Hill Folk.”
The king and all with him wondered much to hear a voice when they saw no one. For save Connla alone, none saw the Fairy Maiden.
“To whom art thou talking, my son?” said Conn the king.
Then the maiden answered, “Connla speaks to a fair maid, whom neither death nor old age awaits. I love Connla, and now I call him away to the Plain of Pleasure, Moy Mell, where Boadag is king, nor has there been complaint or sorrow in that land since he has held the kingship. Oh, come with me, Connla of the Fiery Hair. A fairy crown awaits thee to grace thy comely face and royal form. Come, and never shall thy comeliness fade, nor thy youth, till the last awful day of judgment.”
The king in fear at what the maiden said, which he heard though he could not see her, called aloud to his druid, Coran by name.
“Oh, Coran of the many spells,” he said, “and of the cunning magic, I call upon thy aid. A task is upon me too great for all my skill and wit, greater than any laid Connla and the Fairy Maiden upon me since I seized the kingship. A maiden unseen has met us, and by her power would take from me my dear, my comely son. If thou help not, he will be taken from thy king by woman’s wiles and witchery.”
Then Coran the druid stood forth and chanted his spells towards the spot where the maiden’s voice had been heard. And none heard her voice again, nor could Connla see her longer. Only as she vanished before the druid’s mighty spell, she threw an apple to Connla.
For a whole month from that day Connla would take nothing, either to eat or to drink, save only from that apple. But as he ate it grew again and always kept whole. And all the while there grew within him a mighty yearning and longing after the maiden he had seen.
But when the last day of the month of waiting came, Connla stood by the side of his father on the Plain of Arcomin, and again he saw the maiden come towards him, and again she spoke to him.
“’Tis a glorious place that Connla holds among short-lived mortals awaiting the day of death. But now the folk of life beg and bid thee come to Moy Mell, the Plain of Pleasure, for they have learnt to know thee, seeing thee in thy home among thy dear ones.”
When the king heard the maiden’s voice he called to his men, “Summon swift my druid, for I see she has again this day the power of speech.”
Then the maiden said “Oh, mighty Conn, fighter of a hundred fights, the druid’s power is little loved; it has little honour in the mighty land, peopled with so many of the upright. When the Law will come, it will do away with the druid’s magic spells that come from the lips of the false black demon.”
Then the king observed that since the maiden came Connla his son spoke to none that spake to him. So Conn of the hundred fights said to him, “Is it to thy mind what the woman says, my son?”
“’Tis hard upon me,” then said Connla; “I love my own folk above all things, but yet a longing seizes me for the maiden.”
When the maiden heard this, she answered, “The ocean is not so strong as the waves of thy longing. Come with me in my curragh, the gleaming, crystal canoe. Soon we can reach Boadag’s realm. I see the bright sun sink, yet far as it is, we can reach it before dark. There is, too, another land worthy of thy journey, a land joyous to all that seek it. Only wives and maidens dwell there. If Connla and the Fairy Maiden thou wilt, we can seek it and live there together in joy.”
When the maiden ceased to speak, Connla of the Fiery Hair sprang into the curragh, the gleaming crystal canoe. And then they all, king and court, saw it glide away over the bright sea towards the setting sun. Away and away, till eye could see it no longer, and Connla and the fairy maiden went their way on the sea, and were no more seen.
The Smith and the Fairies
By Kate Douglas Wiggin
READING TIME: 6 MINUTES
It was a superstition in Celtic lands that fairies stole babies and left fairy babies (changelings) in their place. In this story the fairies ar
e called by their Gaelic name of Daione Sith, and the word for a changeling is Sibhreach. A dirk is a short knife.
Years ago there lived in Crossbrig a smith of the name of MacEachern. This man had an only child, a boy of about thirteen or fourteen years of age, cheerful, strong, and healthy. All of a sudden he fell ill, took to his bed and moped whole days away. No one could tell what was the matter with him, and the boy himself could not, or would not, tell how he felt. He was wasting away fast – getting thin, old, and yellow – and his father and all his friends were afraid that he would die.
After the boy had been lying in this condition for a long time, getting neither better nor worse (but with an extraordinary appetite) an old man, well known for his knowledge of out-of-the-way things, walked into the smith’s workshop. Forthwith the smith told him the occurrence which had clouded his life.
The old man looked grave as he listened; and after sitting a long time pondering over all he had heard, gave his opinion thus:
“It is not your son you have got. The boy has been carried away by the Daione Sith, and they have left a Sibhreach in his place.”
“Alas! And what then am I to do?” said the smith. “How am I ever to see my own son again?”
“I will tell you how,” answered the old man. “But, first, to make sure that it is not your own son you have got, take as many empty eggshells as you can get, go into his room, spread them out carefully before his sight, then proceed to draw water with them, carrying them two and two in your hands as if they were a great weight, and arrange them when full, around the fire.”
The smith proceeded to carry out all his instructions. He had not been long at work before there arose from the bed a shout of laughter, and the voice of the seeming sick boy exclaimed:
“I am eight hundred years of age, and I have never seen the like of that before.” The smith returned and told the old man.
“Well, now,” said the old man to him, “did I not tell you that it was not your son you had: your son is in Borracheill in a digh there (that is, a round green hill frequented by fairies). Get rid as soon as possible of this intruder, and I think I may promise you your son. You must light a very large and bright fire before the bed on which this stranger is lying. He will ask you, ‘What is the use of such a fire as that?, Answer him at once, ‘You will see that presently!, and then seize him, and throw him into the middle of it. If it is your own son you have got, he will call out to you to save him, but if not, the thing will fly through the roof.”
The smith again followed the old man’s advice: kindled a large fire, answered the question put to him as he had been directed to do, and seizing the child flung him in without hesitation. The Sibhreach gave an awful yell, and sprang through the roof, where a hole had been left to let the smoke out.
The old man told the smith that on a certain night the green round hill, where the fairies kept the boy, would be open. On that date the smith, having provided himself with a Bible and a dirk, was to proceed to the hill. He would hear singing and dancing, and much merriment going on, but he was to advance boldly – the Bible he carried would be a safeguard to him against danger from the fairies. On entering the hill he was to stick the dirk in the threshold, to prevent the hill from closing upon him.
“And then,” said the old man, “on entering you will see a spacious apartment before you, and there, standing far within, working at a forge, you will also see your son. When you are questioned, say you come to seek him, and will not go without him.”
Not long after this, the time came round, and the smith sallied forth, prepared as instructed. Sure enough as he approached the hill, there was a light where light was seldom seen before. Soon after, a sound of piping, dancing, and joyous merriment reached the anxious father on the night wind.
Overcoming every impulse of fear, the smith approached the threshold steadily, stuck the dirk into it as directed, and entered. Protected by the Bible he carried on his breast, the fairies could not touch him, but they asked him, with a good deal of displeasure, what he wanted there. He answered, “I want my son, whom I see down there, and I will not go without him.”
The fairies, incensed, seized the smith and his son, and throwing them out of the hill, flung the dirk after them, and in an instant all was dark.
For a year and a day the boy never did a turn of work, and hardly ever spoke a word. At last one day, sitting by his father and watching him finishing a sword, he suddenly exclaimed, “That is not the way to do it,” and taking the tools from his father’s hands he set to work himself in his place, and soon fashioned a sword, the like of which was never seen in the country before.
From that day the young man wrought constantly with his father, and became the inventor of a peculiarly fine and well-tempered weapon, the making of which kept the two smiths, father and son, in constant employment, spread their fame far and wide, and gave them the means in abundance, as they before had the disposition, to live content with all the world and very happily with each other.
The Maiden of the Green Forest
By William Elliot Griffis
READING TIME: 10 MINUTES
Many a palace lies under the waves that wash Cymric land, for the sea has swallowed up more than one village, and even cities.
When Welsh fairies yield to their mortal loves and consent to become their wives, it is always on some promise. Sometimes there are several of these, which the fairy ladies compel their mortal lovers to pledge them, before they agree to become wives. In fact, the fairies in The Maiden of the Green Forest Cymric land are among the most exacting of any known.
A prince named Benlli, of the Powys region, found this out to his grief, for he had always supposed that wives could be had simply for the asking. All that a man need say, to the girl to whom he took a fancy, was this:
‘Come along with me, and be my bride,’ and then she would say, ‘Thank you, I’ll come,’ and the two would trot off together. This was the man’s notion.
Now Benlli was a wicked old fellow. He was already married, but wrinkles had gathered on his wife’s face. She had a faded, washed-out look, and her hair was thinning out. She would never be young again, and he was tired of her, and wanted a mate with fresh rosy cheeks, and long, thick hair. He was quite ready to fall in love with such a maiden, whenever his eyes should light upon her.
One day, he went out hunting in the Green Forest. While waiting for a wild boar to rush out, there rode past him a young woman whose beauty was dazzling. He instantly fell in love with her.
The next day, while on horseback, at the same opening in the forest, the same maiden reappeared, but it was only for a moment, and then she vanished.
Again, on the third day, the prince rode out to the appointed place, and again the vision of beauty was there. He rode up to her and begged her to come and live with him at his palace.
“I will come and be your wedded wife on three conditions: You must put away the wife you now have, you must permit me to leave you, one night in every seven, without following after or spying upon me, and you must not ask me where I go or what I do. Swear to me that you will do these three things. Then, if you keep your promises unbroken, my beauty shall never change, no, not until the tall vegetable flag-reeds wave and the long green rushes grow in your hall.”
The Prince of Powys was quite ready to swear this oath and he solemnly promised to observe the three conditions. So the maiden of the Green Forest went to live with him.
‘But what of his old wife?’ one asks. Ah! He had no trouble from that quarter, for when the newly-wedded couple arrived at the castle, she had already disappeared.
Happy, indeed, were the long bright days, which the prince and his new bride spent together, whether in the castle, or outdoors, riding on horseback, or in hunting the deer. Every day, her beauty seemed diviner, and she more lovely. He lavished various gifts upon her, among others that of a crown of beryl and sapphire. Then he put on her finger a diamond ring worth what was a very great sum – a king’s ransom. H
e loved her so dearly that he never suspected for a moment that he would ever have any trouble in keeping his three promises.
But without variety, life has no spice, and monotony wearies the soul. After nine years had passed, and his wife absented herself every Friday night, he began to wonder why. His curiosity, to know the reason for her going away, so increased that it so wore on him that he became both miserable in himself and irritable towards others. Everybody in the castle noticed the change in their master, and grieved over it.
One night, he invited a learned monk from the white monastery, not far away, to come and take dinner with him. The table in the great banqueting hall was spread with the most delicious food, the lights were magnificent, and the music gay.
But Wyland, the monk, was a man of magic and could see through things. He noticed that some secret grief was preying upon the prince’s mind. He could see that, amidst all this splendour, he, Benlli, the lord of the castle, was the most miserable person within its walls. So Wyland went home, resolved to call again and find out what was the trouble.
When they met, some days later, Wyland’s greeting was this:
“Christ save thee, Benlli! What secret sorrow clouds thy brow? Why so gloomy?”
Benlli at once burst out with the story of how he met the maiden of the Green Forest, and how she became his wife on three conditions.
“Think of it,” said Benlli, groaning aloud. “When the owls cry and the crickets chirp, my wife leaves my bed, and until the daystar appears, I lie alone, torn with curiosity, to know where she is, and what she is doing. I fall again into heavy sleep, and do not awake until sunrise, when I find her by my side again. It is all such a mystery, that the secret lies heavy on my soul. Despite all my wealth, and my strong castle, with feasting and music by night and hunting by day, I am the most miserable man in Cymric land. No beggar is more wretched than I.”
50 Fairy Stories Page 3
