The fairies, with their free, joyous temperament and love of beauty and
luxury, hold in great contempt the minor virtues of thrift and economy,
and, above all things, abhor the close, hard, niggardly nature that
spends grudgingly and never gives freely. Indeed, they seem to hold it
as their peculiar mission to punish such people, and make them suffer
for the sins of the hard heart and niggard hand, as may be seen by the
following tale:—
A farmer once lived near the Boyne, close to an old churchyard. He was
very rich, and had crops and cattle, but was so hard and avaricious
that the people hated him; for his habit was to get up very early
in the morning and go out to the fields to watch that no one took a
cabbage or a turnip, or got a cup of milk when the cows were being
milked, for the love of God and the saints.
One morning, as he was out as usual by sunrise spying about the place,
he heard a child crying bitterly—
“Oh, mother, mother! I am hungry. Give me something, or I’ll die.”
“Hush, darling,” said the mother, “though the hunger is on you, wait;
for the farmer’s cow will be milked presently, and I’ll knock down the
pail so the milk will be spilt upon the ground, and you can drink your
fill.”[6]
[6] The fairies have a right to whatever is spilt or falls upon the
ground.
When the farmer heard this he sent a stout man to watch the girl that
milked, and to tie the cow’s feet that she should not kick. So that
time no milk was spilled upon the ground.
Next morning he went out again by sunrise, and he heard the child
crying more bitterly even than before—
“Mother, mother! I am hungry. Give me to eat.”
“Wait, my child,” said the mother; “the farmer’s maid bakes cakes
to-day, and I’ll make the dish to fall just as she is carrying them
from the griddle. So we shall have plenty to eat this time.”