A pea-green jerkin on his back,
All dabbled by a splashing hack.--
The dress of this little stranger, and his manner of introducing himself
to the festival, must satisfy the reader that the Goblin Groom is one
of those supernatural sportsmen usually termed Fairies. In the sequel,
however, it will appear evident, that he owes his origin to the hardy
race of northern Elves, rather than to the more delicate family of
eastern Peris.[16]
The existence of the Fairy, like that of the Mermaid, no longer rests on
the credulity of the ignorant, but is confirmed and established by
attestations no less respectable than the affidavits so frequently made
before the Lord Mayor of London, in support of the infallibility of a
quack and his nostrums.
In the isle of Man, where sportsmen of more tangible materials enjoy a
temporary security, these little supernaturals, probably under similar
circumstances, find an agreeable retreat. In the Minstrelsy of the
Scottish Borders, on the unrefuted authority of Mr. Waldron, we have
the following interesting particulars.--
“Like the FELD ELFEN of the Saxons, the usual dress of the Fairies
is green; though, on the moors, they have been sometimes observed
in heath-brown, or in weeds dyed with the stoneraw, or lichen. They
often ride in invisible procession, when their presence is
discovered by the shrill ringing of their bridles. On these
occasions, they sometimes borrow mortal steeds; and when such are
found at morning, panting and fatigued in their stalls, with their
manes and tails dishevelled and entangled, the grooms, I presume,
often find this a convenient excuse for their situation; as the
common belief of the elves quaffing the choicest liquors in the
cellars of the rich, (see the story of Lord Duffus below), might
occasionally cloak the delinquencies of an unfaithful butler.
“The Fairies, beside their equestrian processions, are addicted, it
would seem, to the pleasures of the chace. A young sailor,
travelling by night from Douglas, in the Isle of Man, to visit his
sister, residing in Kirk Merlugh, heard the noise of horses, the
holla of a huntsman, and the sound of a horn. Immediately
afterwards, thirteen horsemen, dressed in green, and gallantly
mounted, swept past him. Jack was so much delighted with the sport,
that he followed them, and enjoyed the sound of the horn for some
miles; and it was not till he arrived at his sister’s house that he
learned the danger which he had incurred. I must not omit to
mention, that these little personages are expert jockeys, and scorn
to ride the little Manks ponies, though apparently well suited to
their size. The exercise, therefore, falls heavily upon the English
and Irish horses brought into the Isle of Man. Mr. Waldron was
assured by a gentleman of Ballafletcher, that he had lost three or
four capital hunters by these nocturnal excursions.