When they succeeded in their felonious attempts, the elves left instead of the mother, and bearing her semblance, a stock of wood (_stoc maide_), and in place of the infant an old mannikin of their own race. The child grew up a peevish misshapen brat, ever crying and complaining. It was known, however, to be a changeling by the skilful in such matters, from the large quantities of water it drank—a tubful before morning, if left beside it—its large teeth, its inordinate appetite, its fondness for music and its powers of dancing, its unnatural precocity, or from some unguarded remark as to its own age. It is to the aged elf, left in the place of child or beast, that the name _sithbheire_ (pron. _sheevere_) is properly given, and as may well be supposed, to say of one who has an ancient manner or look, ‘he is but a sithbheire,’ or ‘he is only one that came from a brugh,’ is an expression of considerable contempt. When a person does a senseless action, it is said of him, that he has been ‘taken out of himself’ (_air a thoirt as_), that is, taken away by the Fairies. The changeling was converted into the stock of a tree by saying a powerful rhyme over him, or by sticking him with a knife. He could be driven away by running at him with a red-hot ploughshare; by getting between him and the bed and threatening him with a drawn sword; by leaving him out on the hillside, and paying no attention to his shrieking and screaming; by putting him sitting on a gridiron, or in a creel, with a fire below; by sprinkling him well out of the _maistir_ tub; or by dropping him into the river. There can be no doubt these modes of treatment would rid a house of any disagreeable visitor, at least of the human race. The story of the changeling, who was detected by means of egg-shells, seems in some form or other to be as widespread as the superstition itself. Empty egg-shells are ranged round the hearth, and the changeling, when he finds the house quiet and thinks himself unobserved, gets up from bed and examines them. Finding them empty, he is heard to remark sententiously, as he peers into each, “this is but a wind-bag (_chaneil a’ so ach balg fàs_); I am so many hundred years old, and I never saw the like of this.” DEFORMITIES. Many of the deformities in children are attributed to the Fairies. When a child is incautiously left alone by its mother, for however short a time, the Fairies may come and give its little legs such a twist as will leave it hopelessly lame ever after. To give them their due, however, they sometimes took care of children whom they found forgotten, and even of grown up people sleeping incautiously in dangerous places. NURSES.