“Swart faëry of the mine.”
“Simple foolish men imagine, I know not howe, that there be certayne
elves or fairies of the earth, and tell many straunge and marvellous
tales of them, which they have heard of their grandmothers and mothers,
howe they have appeared unto those of the house, have done service,
have rocked the cradell, and (which is a signe of good luck) do
continually tarry in the house.”—(_Of ghostes_, etc., p. 49.)
Mallet, though without citing any authority, says, “after all, the
notion is not everywhere exploded that there are in the bowels of the
earth, fairies, or a kind of dwarfish and tiny beings of human shape,
and remarkable for their riches, their activity, and malevolence. In
many countries of the north, the people are still firmly persuaded of
their existence. In Ireland, at this day, the good folk show the very
rocks and hills in which they maintain that there are swarms of these
small subterraneous men, of the most tiny size, but the most delicate
figures.”—(_Northern Antiquities_, etc., ii. 47.)
There is not a more generally received opinion throughout the
principality of Wales than that of the existence of fairies. Amongst
the commonalty it is, indeed, universal, and by no means unfrequently
credited by the second ranks.
Fairies are said, at a distant period, “to have frequented Bussers–hill
in St. Mary’s island, but their nightly pranks, aërial gambols, and
cockle–shell abodes, are now quite unknown.”—(Heath’s _Account of the
Islands of Scilly_, p. 129.)
“Evil spirits, called fairies, are frequently seen in several of the
isles [of Orkney], dancing and making merry, and sometimes seen in
armour.”—(Brand’s _Description of Orkney_, Edin., 1703, p. 61.)