From digging in the sandy, over-triturated soil of times historical,
all dotted with date and number and sign, how exquisite the relief in
turning to the dear days outside history—yet not so very far off
neither for us nurslings of the northern sun—when kindly beasts would
loiter to give counsel by the wayside, and a fortunate encounter with
one of the Good People was a surer path to Fortune and the Bride than
the best-worn stool that ever proved step-ladder to aspiring youth. For
then the Fairy Wicket stood everywhere ajar—everywhere and to each and
all. “Open, open, green hill!”—you needed no more recondite sesame than
that: and, whoever you were, you might have a glimpse of the elfin
dancers in the hall that is litten within by neither sun nor moon; or
catch at the white horse’s bridle as the Fairy Prince rode through. It
has been closed now this many a year (the fairies, always strong in the
field, are excellent wicket-keepers); and if it open at all, ’tis but
for a moment’s mockery of the material generation that so deliberately
turned its back on the gap into Elf-Land—that first stage to the
Beyond.
It was a wanton trick, though, that these folk of malice used to play
on a small school-boy, new kicked out of his nest into the draughty,
uncomfortable outer world, his unfledged skin still craving the
feathers whereinto he was wont to nestle. The barrack-like school, the
arid, cheerless class-rooms, drove him to Nature for redress; and,
under an alien sky, he would go forth and wander along the iron road by
impassive fields, so like yet so unlike those hitherto a part of him
and responding to his every mood. And to him, thus loitering with
overladen heart, there would come suddenly a touch of warmth, of
strange surprise. The turn of the road just ahead—that, sure, is not
all unfamiliar? That row of elms—it cannot entirely be accident that
they range just _so?_ And, if not accident, then round the bend will
come the old duck-pond, the shoulder of the barn will top it, a few
yards on will be the gate—it swings-to with its familiar click—the dogs
race down the avenue—and then—and then! It is all wildly fanciful; and
yet, though knowing not Tertullian, a _“credo quia impossibile”_ is on
his tongue as he quickens his pace—for what else can he do? A step, and
the spell is shattered—all is cruel and alien once more; while every
copse and hedge-row seems a-tinkle with faint elfish laughter. The
Fairies have had their joke: they have opened the wicket one of their
own hand’s-breadths, and shut it in their victim’s face. When next that
victim catches a fairy, he purposes to tie up the brat in sight of his
own green hill, and set him to draw up a practical scheme for Village
Councils.
One of the many women I ever really loved, fair in the fearless old
fashion, was used to sing, in the blithe, unfettered accent of the
people: “I’d like to be a fairy, And dance upon my toes, I’d like to be
a fairy, And wear short close!” And in later life it is to her sex that
the wee (but very wise) folk sometimes delegate their power of torment.
Such understudies are found to play the part exceeding well; and many a
time the infatuated youth believes he sees in the depth of one sole
pair of eyes—blue, brown, or green (the fairy colour)—the authentic
fairy wicket standing ajar: many a time must he hear the quaint old
formula, “I’m sure, if I’ve ever done anything to lead you to think,”
etc (runs it not so?), ere he shall realise that here is the gate upon
no magic pleasance but on a cheap suburban villa, banging behind the
wrathful rate-collector or hurled open to speed the pallid householder
to the Registrar’s Office. In still grosser habitations, too, they
lurk, do the People of Mischief, ready to frolic out on the
unsuspecting one: as in the case, which still haunts my memory, of a
certain bottle of an historic Château-Yquem, hued like Venetian glass,
odorous as a garden in June. Forth from out the faint perfume of this
haunted drink there danced a bevy from Old France, clad in the fashion
of Louis-Quinze, peach-coloured knots of ribbon bedizening apple-green
velvets, as they moved in stately wise among the roses of the old
garden, to the quaint music—Rameau, was it?—of a fairy _cornemuse,_
while fairy Watteaus, Fragonards, Lancrets, sat and painted them. Alas!
too shallow the bottle, too brief the brawls: not to be recalled by any
quantity of Green Chartreuse.