_The Fairies' Revenge._--William Oates now happened to come into the
workshop, and being as much interested in the subject under discussion
as ourselves, offered various stories, of which the following is a
type:--'A man named Watterson, who used often to see the fairies in his
house at Colby playing in the moonlight, on one occasion heard them
coming just as he was going to bed. So he went out to the spring to get
fresh water for them; and coming into the house put the can down on the
floor, saying, "Now, little beggars, drink away." And at that (an insult
to the fairies) the water was suddenly thrown upon him.'
A VICAR'S TESTIMONY
When I called on the Rev. J. M. Spicer, vicar of Malew parish, at his
home near Castletown, he told me this very curious story:--
_The Taking of Mrs. K----._--'The belief in fairies is quite a living
thing here yet. For example, old Mrs. K----, about a year ago, told me
that on one occasion, when her daughter had been in Castletown during
the day, she went out to the road at nightfall to see if her daughter
was yet in sight, whereupon a whole crowd of fairies suddenly
surrounded her, and began taking her off toward South Barrule Mountain;
and, she added, "I couldn't get away from _them_ until I had called my
son."'
A CANON'S TESTIMONY
I am greatly indebted to the Rev. Canon Kewley, of Arbory, for the
valuable testimony which follows, and especially for his kindness in
allowing me to record what is one of the clearest examples of a
collective hallucination I have heard about as occurring in the
fairy-haunted regions of Celtic countries:--
_A Collective Hallucination._--'A good many things can be explained as
natural phenomena, but there are some things which I think cannot be.
For example, my sister and myself and our coachman, and apparently the
horse, saw the same phenomenon at the same moment: one evening we were
driving along an avenue in this parish when the avenue seemed to be
blocked by a great crowd of people, like a funeral procession; and the
crowd was so dense that we could not see through it. The throng was
about thirty to forty yards away. When we approached, it melted away,
and no person was anywhere in sight.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account