Error's chains : $b How forged and broken : A comparative history of the national, social and religious errors that mankind has fallen into and practised from the creation down to the present time.Dobbins, Frank S. (Frank Stockton)
Religion
Error's chains : $b How forged and broken : A comparative history of the national, social and religious errors that mankind has fallen into and practised from the creation down to the present time.
Dobbins, Frank S. (Frank Stockton)
Idols and images -- Worship; Mythology; Religions
The Nixes, or Water-people, inhabit lakes and rivers. The man is like
any other man, only he has green teeth. He also wears a green hat. The
female Nixes appear like beautiful maidens. On fine sunny days they may
be seen sitting on the banks, or on the branches of the trees, combing
their long golden locks. When any person is shortly to be drowned the
Nixes may be previously seen dancing on the surface of the water. They
inhabit a beautiful region below the water, whither they sometimes
convey mortals. A girl from a village near Leipsic, as the story goes,
was at one time at service in the house of a Nix. She reported that
everything there was very good; all she had to complain of was that she
was obliged to eat her food without salt. The female Nixes frequently
go to the market to buy meat; they are always dressed with extreme
neatness, only a corner of the apron or some other part of their
clothes is wet. The man also occasionally goes to market. They are fond
of carrying off women, of whom they make wives. From the many tales
of the Nixes we select the following, which are fair specimens of the
whole.
THE PEASANT AND THE WATERMAN.
A Waterman, or Nix, once lived on good terms with a peasant who dwelt
near his lake. He often visited him, and at last begged that the
peasant would make a visit to his house under the water. The peasant
consented, and went down with him. There was everything down under the
water as in a stately palace on the land--halls, chambers and cabinets,
with costly furniture of every description. The Waterman led his guest
over the whole, and showed him everything that was in it. They came at
length to a little chamber, where were standing several new pots turned
upside down. The peasant asked what was in them. “They contain,” was
the reply, “the souls of drowned people, which I put under the pots
and keep them close, so that they cannot get away.” The peasant made
no remark, and he came up again on the land. But for a long time the
affair of the souls continued to give him great trouble, and he watched
to find when the Waterman should be from home. When this occurred, as
he had marked the right way down, he descended into the water-house,
and, having made out the little chamber, he turned up all the pots one
after another, and immediately the souls of the drowned people ascended
out of the water and recovered their liberty.
THE WONDERFUL LITTLE POUCH.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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