A book such as this cannot pretend to do justice to the mine of folk-lore which even the most superficial acquaintance with the dialects opens up to any one who cares to delve therein. Here we meet with the outward and visible signs of old superstitions of mythical origin, popular beliefs, faith in charms, and quaint medical lore concerning all kinds of human ills, betokening a strange mixture of Christianity and creeds of heathen times, of pious faith and childlike dread of the unknown and mysterious still existing in the minds of our rural population. Very many of these old superstitious beliefs and practices are, as we should naturally expect, dead and gone, or traceable only in shadowy legend and story, the marvel is that so many are yet alive in spite of the spread of education. Indeed, superstition is by no means a monopoly of the uneducated or semi-educated mind, the only difference is that where the rustic gives free expression to his fears and fancies, we disguise ours from the public gaze under a cloak of mockery or of would-be science.

Among the outworn superstitions is the belief in all those imaginary beings that peopled the darkness of long ago. They have nearly all disappeared, except that the names of some of them have been added to the list of that hideous crew of fictitious personages invented to terrorize the young. They are chiefly monstrous animals, and goblins, some harmless, some terrific and of evil omen; the ghost, as the spirit of the departed, is a minor character on the stage. The dialect terms: fearing, frittening, summat, things, usually imply ghostly appearances of any shape, not specially human. The same may be said of the word know, e.g. The know of a dog, is the shape of a dog when the dog is not there. Ghostlin is a contemptuous term for an apparition, one which might be used by a person born on Christmas Day, for such are born ghost-free to the end of their lives. To come again is the common phrase for the supposed return of the dead, e.g. You remembers ’Arry Whitly as was cut t’pieces an the line? Well, he comes agen strong, in six pieces; or the dead man may be said to be troublesome, e.g. I can’t never bide in th’ouse—the poor old Harry’s that troublesome. Here and there some special ghost keeps its local habitation and name, as for instance, Spotloggin, the ghost of a murdered man which haunts a certain ditch near Evesham in Worcestershire. It appears after dark to any one who attempts to cross the ditch at a point where there is no hedge on the bank, and where according to tradition no hedge will grow, it being the precise spot where the murder took place. We may presume that few do venture to pass that way, and encounter the veritable ghost, for its identity is still a matter of question. Some who ignore the commonplace murder story, maintain that Spotloggin was ‘a lady of that name who used to patch her face, and was supposed to be very proud’. Speaking generally, however, I think it may be said that it is rather the educated mind which concerns itself with ghosts of this kind. A lady historian of Shropshire folk-lore tells us that her inquiries after ghost-stories had more than once been met by this answer from the country rustic: I dunna believe as there’s anythin’ in it, as the dead come back. If they bin gone to the good place they wouldna want to come back, and if they bin gone to the tother place they wouldna be let to.

The generic name for an apparition, whether ghost or hobgoblin, is boggart or boggard, cp. ‘a boggarde, spectrum’, Levins, Manip. 1570. Many an old Hall in Lancashire had its own private and particular boggart, as for instance, the Boggart of Clegg Hall, the Clayton Hall Boggart, the Clock House Boggart, &c. The Clock House Boggart was wont to stalk through the bedchambers at dead of night, and strip the bedclothes off the sleepers; or it would sit, a gigantic, white-robed figure, perched solemnly in a large yew-tree, beneath which tree it was ultimately laid by an assemblage of divines. The Clayton Hall Boggart was likewise notorious for its nightly pranks—snatching the clothes off beds, trailing heavy weights across floors, and the like—till at last it became so insufferable that steps had to be taken to lay it. One of the best ways of laying a boggart was to beguile it into consenting to keep away ‘while hollies are green’. The average boggart, being too dull-witted to perceive the true inwardness of the suggestion, easily fell into the trap, and was never able to appear again. Aw’m heere agen, like the Clegg Hall Boggart, is, or used to be, a popular saying commemorating one of these well-known ghosts. A horse that starts at any object in the hedge or road is said to take the boggart. In Cheshire the word denotes a scarecrow, a meaning familiarized to us by Caldecott’s illustrations to The Three Jovial Huntsmen:

Cp. ‘Like as a fray-boggarde in a garden off cucumbers kepeth nothinge, even so are their goddes of wod, of sylver and golde,’ Coverdale (1535), Baruch vi. 69. The most dramatic and awesome of all the boggarts is the north-country Barghest, a frightful goblin armed with teeth and claws, having eyes as big as saucers, and loaded with heavy chains, which rattle and clank, like Herne the Hunter who ‘shakes a chain in a most hideous and dreadful manner’, Merry Wives, IV. iv. 33. Sometimes the Barghest takes the shape of a large dog, donkey, pig, or calf; sometimes only its terrifying shrieks are heard, as it passes by at midnight, boding death to any one who happens to hear the sound. It has long been a prominent figure among apparitions, and various attempts have been made to account for its name. Some folklorists think that the word is a corruption of barn-ghaist [ghost], others suggest bier-ghaist, and others, with a sense of the picturesque, say it is bar-ghaist, because the spectre had a habit of sitting on the top rail of a gate or fence, waiting, ready to leap on to the shoulder of the belated wanderer. But whatever its origin, the name yet lives in proverbial sayings such as: to roar like a barghest (Dur.), and as a term of abuse (Yks. Not.), e.g. You noisy bargust, said to a child, or: Y’er allus i’ th’road, yer young bargest, ger out! Church-grim (Yks.) is a fixed inhabitant of the church by day and by night, and only ‘marauds about’ in dark stormy weather. It has been known to toll the death-bell at midnight, and at times a priest officiating at a burial would see it sitting at a window in the church-tower, when he would be able to tell by the creature’s aspect whether the soul of the departed was saved or lost. Clap-cans (Lan.) does nothing beyond making a noise as of beating on empty cans. Gally-trot (n.Cy. Suf.) is the name of an alarming apparition in the shape of a dog, and of the size of a bullock. It is white, and somewhat shadowy of outline, and it gives chase to any one who runs away from it in fear. The word is derived from gally, to frighten, scare, and may also be used as a common term for ghostly objects in general, though it sounds almost slangy, and one could fancy that in spectral circles it might be deemed an impertinence to speak—let us say—of the Barghest of York as a mere gally-trot. A guytrash (n.Cy. Yks.) is an evil cow whose appearance was formerly believed in as a sign of death. Jack-in-irons (Yks.) is a supernatural being of great stature, wearing clanking chains, who may at any moment spring out on a passer-by in the dark. Old Baker, Old Bendy, and Old Lob are just ordinary boggarts. Pad-foot is a terrible boggart with saucer-eyes, and dragging clanking chains; or it takes the form of a large sheep or dog walking beside you, making a soft noise—pad, pad, pad—with its feet. It always portends disaster. Old Shock (e.An.) is a mischievous goblin in the shape of a great dog or calf, haunting highways and footpaths after dark. Those who are so foolhardy as to encounter the beast are sure to be thrown down and severely bruised. Skriker (Yks. Lan.) is an apparition portending death. It wanders about in the woods by night uttering loud, piercing shrieks, its form being then invisible. At other times it takes visible shape as a large dog, with enormous feet and shaggy hair, and the usual saucer-eyes. When walking, its feet make a splashing noise, as of a person in old shoes walking in soft mud; hence it is also known by the name of Trash, for to trash signifies to walk wearily through wet and mire, and trashes are worn-out shoes.

Then there is the phantom horse under its various names: Aughisky (Irel.), the fairy water-horse that preys on cattle; Phooka (Irel.), the spectral horse which carries off belated travellers on its back; Neugle (Sh.I.), the water-kelpie which appears in the form of a sleek horse, and vanishes in a ‘blue lowe’, also known by the name of De Shoopiltie; Shagfoal (Lin. Nhp.), a hobgoblin in the shape of a small, rough horse, with eyes like tea-saucers; Tangie (Sh. & Or.I.), a sea-spirit which sometimes assumes the appearance of a horse, and at other times that of an old man. Taroo-ushtey (I.Ma.) is a fabulous water-bull.

The Gabriel Ratchets, Gabble Raches, or Gabriel’s Hounds (n.Cy. Yks. Lan. Stf. Der.) are spectre dogs whose yelping cry may be heard at dead of night, or in the early morning, what time the collier goes to his work in the pits, a warning of death to the hearer or to some one among his kinsfolk and acquaintance. Their leader Gabriel is condemned to follow his hounds at night, high in the upper air, till doomsday, for the sin of having hunted on Sunday. Wordsworth alludes to this superstition in one of his Sonnets:

By some the sound is believed to be the cry of the restless souls of children who have died unbaptized. As a matter of fact it is probably caused by flocks of wild geese or other fowl. The term is found as far back as 1483 in the Catholicon Anglicum: ‘Gabrielle rache, camalion,’ cp. ‘Ratche, hounde, ordorinsecus,’ Prompt. Parv., O.E. rÆcc, a dog that hunts by scent. In Cornwall a spectre huntsman and his pack of baying hounds are known as the Devil and his Dandy-dogs. Unlike the Gabriel Ratchets, which fly too high in the air to be visible to mortal eye, the Devil and his Dandy-dogs walk the earth, and may be seen as well as heard. They frequent bleak and dreary moors on tempestuous nights, and woe betide the unlucky wretch who chances to cross their path. A story is told of a poor herdsman who was journeying home across a moor, one windy night, when, above the noise of the storm, he heard behind him the howl of the yelping dogs, and the grim halloa of the hunter. Presently they had so gained on him, that, glancing back, he could see the terrible saucer-eyes, horns, and tail of the hunter, a black form, carrying a long hunting-pole, and the mass of dogs, each snorting fire and uttering frightful yelps. But just as they were about to spring upon him, by a happy inspiration he fell on his knees in prayer, and the foe was rendered powerless. The hell-hounds stood for a moment at bay, howling dismally, and then, led by their master, they drew off and disappeared. These phantom hounds, jet-black, and breathing flames are also known by the name of Heath-hounds; Yeth-hounds (Som. Dev. Cor.), and Wisht-hounds (Dev. Cor.).

To roar like Tregeagle is a Cornish phrase, whereby hangs a tale. One tradition tells that Tregeagle was a steward in the reign of James II, who made himself unpopular by his harshness to the tenantry, and another legend bases his claim to notoriety on his being a Cornish Bluebeard, who married several heiresses for their money, and afterwards murdered them. But whether for cruelty to tenants, or murder of wives, as a punishment for his sins his spirit was doomed to toil for ever at impossible tasks such as weaving sand, and emptying perennial pools with a cockle-shell. When the Devil is so minded he amuses himself by hunting this miserable ghost over the moor with his hell-hounds, at which time Tregeagle is heard to roar and howl in so dreadful a manner that his name has passed into a proverb.

The Seven Whistlers are mysterious birds, the sound of whose cry is a sign of some great calamity. Miners have been known to refuse to go down the pits the day after hearing it, believing that some accident would befall them if they did so. The superstitions concerning the Seven Whistlers vary in different parts of the country, from Lancashire to Essex and Kent. Wordsworth records of his ancient Dalesman:

In parts of Shropshire and Worcestershire they were, according to the legend, seven birds, six of whom fly about continually looking for the seventh, and when they find him, the world will come to an end. The idea of the wailing of unseen birds sent by Providence as a direct warning of approaching danger belongs more particularly to colliery districts, though it is not confined to them. Just as behind the stories told of the Gabriel Ratchets is the natural cry of migrating wild geese, so the voice of the Seven Whistlers can be traced to passing flocks of widgeon, curlews, or plovers. Indeed, the name is actually given in some places to these birds: I knows what makes the noise; it’s them long-billed curlews; but I never likes to hear them (Ken.).

The boggarts who are named in those awful threats by means of which the young are quelled into obedience to authority seem wellnigh innumerable. They include monsters of every sort and description, from the plain unadorned bogie—e.g. If tha doesna leave off skrikin’, I’ll fetch a black bogy to thee—to the highly dramatic figure of the skeleton that haunted the wicked murderer, crying, Oi want my booans, Oi want my booans! Pictures such as this, when presented to the vivid imagination of children, doubtless gain rather than lose in lurid colouring and terrifying shape, and one shudders to think of the effect they must produce on impressionable minds, though in the majority of cases, no doubt, familiarity breeds a wholesome contempt. Amongst these imaginary monsters are: the Black man (Sc. Lei. War. Oxf. Sus. Som. Dev.); Black Parr (Nhp.); the Bo-chap (n.Yks.); the Bo-lo (Nhb.); the Bodach (Sc.), e.g. In ye binna quayet the bodach ill cum doon the lum [chimney] an’ tak ye; Bugabo (Sc. Irel. Midl.), Bugan (I.Ma. Chs. Shr.). The simple form Bug, a bogie, is apparently obsolete, remaining only in the phrase to take bug (Midl.), to take fright. Dr. Johnson has: ‘Bug. Bugbear.... A frightful object; a walking spectre, imagined to be seen; generally now used for a false terrour to frighten babes.’ Jack-up-the-orchard (Shr.), e.g. If yo’ dunna tak’ car’ I’ll shewn yo’ Jack-up-the-orchut’; Knocky-boh (n.Yks.), a bogie who taps behind the wainscot to frighten children; Mumpoker (I.W.), e.g. I’ll zend the mumpoker ater ye; Old Scrat (n.Cy. dials.), e.g. By goy! but auld Scratty’ll git thi if thoo doesn’t come in; Pokey-hokey (e.An.); Punky (w.Yks.); Tankerabogus, or Tantarabobus (Som. Dev.), e.g. Now, Polly, yÜ’ve abin a bad, naughty maid, and ef yÜ be sich a wicked cheel again, I’ll zend vur tankerabogus tÜ come and car yÜ away tÜ ’is pittee-awl [pit-hole]; Tod-lowrie (n.Cy.), e.g. Here’s Tod-lowrie coming! In Scotland the word is a name for the fox. Tom Dockin (Yks.), a bogie having iron teeth, with which he devours bad children; Tom-poker (e.An.), a bogie who inhabits dark closets, holes under stairs, unoccupied cock-lofts, &c. Churn-milk Peg (w.Yks.) and Melsh Dick (n.Cy.) are wood-demons supposed to protect soft, unripe nuts from being gathered by naughty children, the former being wont to beguile her leisure by smoking a pipe. The Gooseberry-wife (I.W.), in the guise of a large furry caterpillar, takes charge of the green gooseberries, e.g. If ye goos out in the gearden, the gooseberry-wife’ll be sure to ketch ye; while in the orchards is Awd Goggie (e.Yks.), guarding the unripe apples. Grindylow, Jenny Green-teeth, and Nelly Long-arms (Yks. Lan. Chs. Der. Shr.) are the various names of a nymph or water-demon who is said to lurk at the bottom of deep pits, ponds, and wells. When children approach too near to the edge of her domain, she will stretch out her long, sinewy arms, seize them, and drag them under the water, holding them there till they are drowned. Her presence is indicated by a green scum on the surface of the water. If there is no pond or deep water for her near by, she has been supposed to take up a temporary lodging in the tops of trees, where after nightfall she may be heard moaning, in a voice like the sighing of the night-wind through the branches of trees. In some parts of the country, instead of Jenny Green-teeth, the boggart of the ponds is a masculine water-demon called Rawhead (Yks. Lan. Lin. War. e.An.), Tommy Rawhead (w.Yks.), Bloody-bones (Lan.), or Rawhead and Bloody-bones, e.g. Keep away from the marl-pit or rawhead and bloody-bones will have you. This personage is often mentioned in our earlier literature. Dr. Johnson has: ‘Rawhead.... The name of a spectre, mentioned to fright children,’ followed by quotations from Dryden and Locke.

Bucca, Gathorns, Knockers, Nicker, Nuggies, and Spriggans are individual and collective appellations for the sprites that haunt the tin-mines of Cornwall. They hardly belong to the boggart tribe of spectres whose business it is to terrify mortals with gruesome sounds and horrid shapes. They are for the most part a harmless folk, occupied in mining on their own account, out of sight of the human miners. These latter, however, take pains not to annoy the goblin workers; whistling and swearing, for instance, are held to be obnoxious to mine-spirits, and must therefore be avoided. Once upon a time there was a miner called Barker, who was foolhardy enough to say he did not believe there were any Knockers. In revenge for this insult, a crowd of Knockers waylaid him, and pelted him with their tools, causing him a lifelong injury, whence grew up the proverb: As stiff as Barker’s knee. Bucca is an Old Cornish word for hobgoblin. Nicker is the same word as Old English nicor, a hippopotamus, a water-monster, in which latter sense it is found in the dialect of the Shetland Islands. This water-goblin is probably the original of Nickerbore (Yks.), of whom it is related that he sat on the wrong side of a branch which overhung a stream, to saw it off, and in consequence fell into the water. Tell Nickybore, don’t tell me, is equivalent to: Tell that to your grandmother. The Knockers know where to find the most productive lodes, and sometimes they reward an industrious miner by pointing out to him where he might take a good tribute pitch. They are generally heard working deep underground, but at no great distance, for the rolling of barrows, the stroke of pickaxes, and the fall of earth and stones are distinctly heard, and sometimes voices seem to mingle with these sounds. Some say that these phantom toilers are the souls of the Jews who formerly worked the Cornish tin-mines, and who, for their wicked practices as tinners, have never been allowed to rest; others suppose them to be the ghosts of the Jews that crucified Jesus, who were sent as slaves by the Roman Emperor to work the tin-mines. The association of the mine-spirits with the Jews is based on the historical fact that after the Conquest, the tin-mines of Cornwall and Devon were farmed by Jews, as is proved by charters granted by several kings of England, more especially by King John, and further corroborated by the existence of such terms as: Jews’ bowels, small pieces of smelted tin found in old smelting works; Jews’ houses, very old smelting places; Jews’ leavings, mine refuse; Jews’ pieces, very ancient blocks of tin.

The dialect terms denoting the ignis fatuus, or Will-o’-the-wisp, are some masculine and some feminine names; or again, they may denote an unpersonified apparition—e.g. corp-candle, corpse-candle (Sc. Lan. Lin.); dead[death]-candle (Sc.)—regarded as an omen of death. Among these names are: Billy-wi’-t’wisp (w.Yks.); Hobbledy’s-lantern (War. Wor. Glo.); Hob-lantern, Hobby-lantern (Wor. Hrt. e.An. Hmp. Wil. w.Cy.); Jack-a-lantern (in gen. dial. use), cp. ‘Jack with a Lantern,’ Johnson, Dict.; Jenny-burnt-tail (Nhp. Oxf.); Jenny-wi’-t’-lantren (Nhb. n.Yks.); Joan-in-the-wad, or Joan-the-wad [bundle of straw] (Som. Cor.); Kit-in-the-candlestick (Hmp.); Kitty-candlestick (Wil.); Kitty-wi’-the-wisp (Nhb.); the Lantern-man (e.An.); Peg-a-lantern (Lan.); Peggy-lantern (Lin.); Pinket (Wor.). This lantern-bearing sprite haunts bogs and swampy meadows, where it gambols and dances by itself, or:

Some people have connected herewith the Led-will superstition formerly current in East Anglia, explaining the phrase as meaning led-by-will, i.e. by Will-o’-the-wisp. Led-will is defined as an influence under which the victims, though perfectly sane and sober, lose themselves on well-known paths. It causes farmers to walk round and round their own familiar fields for hours without finding the exit, and to make short circular tours in their gigs, returning to the point whence they started. Persons under this influence must always travel in circles, and the only way of escape is to turn some article of their clothing. The most probable meaning of the term is led astray, will representing O.N. villr, bewildered, erring, astray, cp. ‘Ðo fleg agar fro sarray [Sarai], ... In Ðe diserd [desert] wil and weri,’ Gen. & Exod., c. 1250.

The ‘drudging goblin’, who threshes the corn and does the domestic work whilst the farmer and his household are asleep, was known in the dialects as: Billy-blin (Sc.); Boman (Sh. & Or.I.); Brownie (Sc. Nhb. n.Yks. Cor.); Dobbs, or Master Dobbs (Sus.); Grogan (Irel.); Hob, and Hob-thrush, or Hob-thrust (n.Cy. dials.), cp. ‘Our own rustical superstition of hobthrushes, fairies, goblins, and witches,’ Steele, Guardian, 1713; the Leprachaun (Irel.), the fairy shoemaker; Robin-round-cap (e.Yks.). This benevolent and humble sprite, though very useful when properly treated, would disappear, or become openly mischievous, if annoyed. Chief among the things whereat he would take offence is the offering of recompense for his labours. A hob-thrust, who used to wear an old tattered hat when at work, found a new one put for him in his accustomed haunt, whereupon he straightway departed, crying: New hat, new hood, hobthrush’ll do no more good. If the farmer or any of his servants had spoken disrespectfully of the hobthrush, they would presently find cream-pans smashed to atoms, horses and cattle turned loose and driven into the woods, and the housewife’s churning would produce no butter. Sometimes the Hob or Dobby (Yks. Lan.) is famous only for whimsical pranks of this nature. The popular story of the goblin who was so troublesome that the farmer and his family packed up their goods and quitted the house, only to find that they were carrying the goblin too amongst the household stuff, is also told of the north-country Hob. I see you are flitting, said the neighbour, met by the way, Ay, we’s flitting, came the voice of Hob from out of the churn. Weel, an’ thou’s ganning teea, Ah’ll just awa’ back agen, rejoined the farmer. A certain Yorkshire Hob, who had his dwelling in a cave, was noted for curing children of the whooping-cough, when thus invoked by those who took them to his abode: Hob-hole Hob! Mah bairn’s getten t’kin’-cough: Tak’ ’t off! Tak’ ’t off! Though nowadays these sprites are dead and forgotten, we occasionally find a trace of them preserved in a common phrase or proverbial saying, for instance: Master Dobbs has been helping you (Sus.), an expression used to a person who has done more work than was expected. When a man boasts of being a good workman, as of the great number of things which he can make in a day, some one will say: Ah, tha can mak’ em faster nor Hob-thrust can throw shoes out o’ t’window (w.Yks.).

Billy-winker (e.Lan.) is the mythical sprite that closes the eyes of children at bedtime; the Dunnie (Nhb.) is a mischievous goblin related to the Brownies; Peg o’ Nell (Yks. Lan.) is the sprite of the River Ribble, as Peg Powler (Dur.) is of the River Tees, with her green tresses, and her insatiable desire for human life. When foam floats on the surface of the water it is Peg Powler’s cream, or Peg Powler’s suds. Red-cap, or Red-capie-dossie (Sc. Lan.) is an elf supposed to haunt old castles and ruins. When a person runs away from his work, people say such a one has seen Red-cap. The Red-man (Nhp.) is an elf of solitary habits residing in caves, old wells, &c. Thrummy-cap (n.Cy. Nhb.) was a well-known local sprite who haunted the cellarage of old mansions. He was supposed to wear a cap or bonnet made of thrums or weavers’ ends. Wryneck (Lan.) is one of those imaginary beings reputed to surpass the Devil: He caps Wryneck, and Wryneck caps the Dule.

To trace all the references to the Devil, to tabulate all the dialect sayings, and superstitions, and local legends relating to him, and to see through these the various forms he takes in the popular mind—whether beast with horns and hoofs, fiend, or giant—would be a literary task in itself, and would fill a large volume. We can only here point out a few of the many tracks wherein these allusions lie. Obviously ‘the very old un’ is the original of most of the bogies represented as waiting to carry off naughty children—Old Scratt, Tantarabobus, and the rest which we have enumerated above. Among dialect plant-names there are over fifty beginning with Devil-, not counting those bearing one of his proper names, such as: Old Lad’s corn (Shr.), the greater stitchwort; Owd Lad pea-cods (w.Yks.), the fruit of the laburnum; Satan’s cherries (n.Yks.), the deadly nightshade. It will be seen from the following examples that the plants associated with the Devil all possess some objectionable quality; either they are weeds obnoxious to the farmer, or they are inherently unpleasant to smell or taste, or simply ugly to behold: Devil’s bit, or Devil’s bit scabis (Sc. Yks. Lin. War. Wor. Shr. sw.Cy.), the blue scabious, perpetuates a very old superstition, cp. ‘It is commonly called Divels bit, of the root (as it seemeth) that is bitten off: for the superstitious people hold opinion, that the diuell for enuie that he beareth to mankinde, bit it off, because it would be otherwise good for many vses,’ Gerarde, Herb. ed. 1633, cp. ‘Mors du diable, fore-bit, or devels-bit (an herb),’ Cotgrave. The same plant is also known as Devil’s button (Cor.), if picked, the Devil is said to appear at your bedside in the night; Devil’s churnstaff (Irel. Shr.), the sun-spurge, probably owes its name to the acrid milky juice contained in its stems; Devil’s claws (Hmp. I.W.), the common crowfoot; Devil’s fingers (Nhp.), the catkins of the black poplar, to pick them up is considered unlucky; Devil’s garter (Wxf.), the great bindweed; Devil on all sides (w.Yks.), Devil on both sides (Dur. War. Bck.), the common crowfoot, so called from the hooks which surround the seeds and cause some difficulty in separating them from the grains of corn; Devil’s posy (Shr.), the broad-leaved garlic; Devil’s root (Ken.), the lesser broom-rape, very destructive to clover; Devil’s snuff-box (n. s. and sw. dials.), the puff-ball, from the snuff-like powder with which the fungus is charged in its mature state, and to which very baneful properties are popularly attributed; Devil’s stinkpot (Yks.), the stink-horn. In like manner birds and insects are assigned to the Devil, for example: Devil’s bird (Sc. Shr.), the magpie, believed to have a drop of the Devil’s blood in its tongue; also applied to the yellow-hammer (n.Cy.), commonly believed to drink a drop, some say three drops, of the Devil’s blood every May morning; Devil’s coach-horse (Irel. Lin. Lei. Nhp. Wor. Shr. Ken. Dev. Cor.), the rove-beetle, or common black cocktail, considered a harbinger of ill-luck; Devil’s darning-needle (Lan.), the dragon-fly; Devil’s finger-ring (Nhp.),—golden ring (Ess. Dev.),—ring (Brks. Hrf. Wil.), the caterpillar of the great tiger-moth, concerning which a current belief in Berkshire is that if you touch it, it will curl round your finger and suck your blood; Devil’s pig (Oxf.), the woodlouse; Devil’s screamer (ne.Yks.),—screecher (Hrf. Glo.),—shrieker (w.Yks.),—squeaker (Lan.), the common swift, so named on account of its long squeaks. No doubt its black colour, and impetuous flight, tend to give it an uncanny appearance.

The deil gang wi’ ye, an’ saxpence, an’ ye’ll nether want money nor company, is an Irish saying. What comes over the devil’s back goes under his belly (Yks. Chs. Lin.) is a proverbial saying used in speaking of ill-gotten gains. Much cry and little wool, as the devil said when he shore the sow, is a Shropshire version of a familiar phrase. He likes him as the devil likes holy water (w.Yks.) is equivalent to: he hates him mortally. To say of a woman: shay’s as nassty as a devil unknobbed (Lei.), implies that she is as dangerously spiteful as a devil with no knobs on his horns.

The conception of the Devil as a giant capable of prodigious muscular feats, but so dull of intellect that he is easily outwitted by the simplest rustic, may be traced in the Devil’s Spadeful legend that clings to certain isolated hills in different parts of the country. The Devil’s Spadeful near Bewdley in Worcestershire is a sort of moated mound, easily seen from the Bewdley-Kidderminster loop railway. Tradition tells that the Devil was approaching Bewdley carrying a spadeful of earth, with which he intended to dam up the Severn just below the town, and so destroy it and all the inhabitants by a flood. At the point where the mound now stands he met a cobbler, laden with a sack of old boots and shoes which he was taking home to mend. The Devil had lost his way, and was feeling weary under his burden, so he asked the cobbler how far he must yet travel before reaching Bewdley. ‘I cannot say how far it is,’ replied the cobbler, ‘I only know that I have worn out all these boots and shoes on the road since I started.’ Whereupon the Devil relinquished his project in despair, and threw down his spadeful on the spot. Another version of the story adds that the cobbler himself was buried under the mound. The present mound could quite well suffice for a tumulus, but as a dam for the Severn it would seem inadequate. The same story belongs also to the Wrekin. The Devil, having a spite against the Mayor and all his people, wished to submerge the town of Shrewsbury. After throwing down his load, which formed the Wrekin, the Devil scraped his boots on his spade, and the mud which he scraped off was such a pile that it made the little Ercall hill by the Wrekin’s side. Silbury Hill near Devizes is said to possess a version of this legend.

There are in various places isolated heaps of stones associated with the Devil, and called Devil’s Lapfuls. One such heap exists in the parish of Winsford in Somerset. It is a large scattered heap chiefly of quartz boulders on the brow of a hill, and no stones of the like formation are to be found anywhere near. It is said that the Devil meant to build a bridge over the Barle, close by, with these stones, which he had brought from a long distance, when his apron-string broke, and the stones fell where they now are, and whence they cannot be removed. Not to be altogether deterred from his purpose, the Devil afterwards built the bridge called Tarr-steps with the great slabs of slaty rock found on the spot. Not far from the village of Stanton Harcourt near Oxford are three large stones known as the Devil’s Quoits. According to local tradition, the Devil played here with a beggar for his soul, and won by throwing these huge boulders.

A legend which connects the Devil with the building of a church may be found all over England in varying forms. The site of the church having been selected, stones were brought thither, and the work begun, but each night the Devil came and carried the stones away, laying them down on the spot where the church now stands. The workmen, tired of labouring in vain, gave up the original site, and adopted that chosen by the Devil, and thenceforth the building went on unmolested. In Shropshire the site which cannot be built upon is always at the top of a hill, but this is not invariably the case elsewhere.

It is difficult to classify all the supernatural beings known to dialect lore, otherwise than very roughly, for even a cursory glance at the whole mass of superstitions and fancies regarding them shows that there is great confusion of idea between fairies and witches, bogies and goblins. Sometimes it is the fairies who terrify the stabled horses at night, sometimes it is a witch; here the benevolent Hob has been at work, and there his doings are ascribed to a pixy. The following may, however, rank as Fairies: the Derricks (Dev.), a species of dwarfish fairies, of somewhat evil nature; Nanny Button-cap (w.Yks.), of whom the children sing:

Fenodyree, or Phynnodderee (I.Ma.), a fallen fairy, who was banished from fairyland for having paid his addresses to a Manx maiden, and for deserting the fairy court during the harvest moon to dance with her in the Glen of Rushen. Stories are told of the great strength of Fenodyree. On one occasion, when he was cutting grass, harrow-pins were placed in the meadow to annoy him, but he cut them through without effort, merely remarking: ‘Hard stalks, hard stalks.’ Gancanagh (Irel.), who appears in lonesome valleys, and makes love to milkmaids. Collective names are: the Fair Folk, or Gueede Neighbours (ne.Sc.), polite phrases used to avoid mentioning the name Fairies, which they were supposed to dislike; the Gentle People, or Gentry (Irel.), to whom old hawthorn trees growing singly were sacred. An old man who ventured to cut down one such tree was shortly afterwards stricken with rheumatic fever, and the circumstance was declared to be a judgment of the gentry upon him. Henkies (Sh. & Or.I.), so called because they were supposed to henk or limp when they danced, Henkie knowes are the knolls round which these trolls or fairies used to gambol at night; the Hill Folk (Sh.I. Lan.); the Piskies, or Pixies (Sc. n. s. and sw.Cy.), believed in some districts (Dev. Cor.) to be the souls of unbaptized children which have become sprites; the Small Folk, or Small People (Cor.), supposed to have dwindled in size, and turned into muryans [ants], wherefore it is deemed unlucky to destroy a colony of ants. Popular etymology has made out of the common double plural form fairyses, a singular Pharisee (War. Wor. e.An.), which among children gives rise to endless mistakes between the fairies of the story-books and the Pharisees of the Bible.

The associating of the fairies with certain plants and fungi leads to the formation of very picturesque plant-names, for example: Fairy’s-bath, or Fairies’ bath (Sus. Hmp.), the fungus Jew’s ears, or blood-cups; Fairy-butter (n.Cy. e.An. Hmp.), a species of fungus, of yellowish colour and gelatinous consistence, found growing upon rotten wood. The fairies are supposed to amuse themselves at night by flinging their butter so as to make it adhere to gates and doors. It is thought very lucky to find it inside a house. Fairy-bell (Irel.), Fairy-fingers (Dur. Cum. n.Yks.), Fairy-glove (Irel. Dor.), Fairies’-petticoats (Chs.), Fairy-thimbles (Cmb. Nrf. Ess.), the foxglove; Fairies’-table (n.Wal.), the common mushroom; Fairy-cheeses (Yks.), the dwarf mallow; Pixy-glove (Dev.), a thistle; Pixy (Dev.), the greater stitchwort, concerning which children say that if you gather the flowers you will be pixy-led; Pixy-pear (Hmp. Dev.), the hip, the fruit of the dog-rose, or (Dor. Som.) the haw, the fruit of the hawthorn; Pixy-stool (Sc. Hmp. Som. Dev. Cor.), a toadstool or mushroom. To pixy (w.Som.), or to go pixy-wording, is to glean stray apples in an orchard after the trees have been stripped. Fossil echini turned up by the plough, or found on the sea-shore are termed Fairy-loaves, or Pharisee-loaves (Glo. e.An.). There is a saying in Norfolk: If you keep a fairy-loaf you will never want bread. The ‘green sour ringlets’ ‘whereof the ewe not bites’ are still known as Fairy-rings (in gen. dial. use), or Pixy-rings (Som. Dev.). It is thought safer to walk round them rather than across. Old legends say that by running round a fairy-ring nine times on the first night of the full moon, sounds of mirth and revelry may be heard from the subterranean abode of the elves, who make this their dancing-green; or again, that on peaceful nights faint echoes of music, and the pattering of tiny feet, may be wafted down from the hill-sides. It is said that the fairies were wont of old to wash their clothes in Claymore Well (Yks.), and mangle them with the bittle and pin. The bittle is a heavy wooden battledore; the pin is the roller; the linen is wound round the latter, and then rolled backwards and forwards on the table by pressure on the battledore. The strokes of the bittles on fairy washing-nights could be heard a mile away. The following story of a fairy in the capacity of the benevolent sprite used to be told in one of the southern counties of England. Once upon a time there was a young woman who married a thresher. Soon he turned out to be a hopeless drunkard; his work was neglected, and starvation stared them in the face. So the woman dressed herself in her husband’s clothes, and went to the barn to do the threshing whilst he slept off the effects of his drunkenness. On the morning of the second day she found her pile of threshed corn double what she had left there overnight, and this increase was repeated for three or four nights in succession. She determined to watch one night and discover who was her unknown helper. Presently she beheld a little pixy come into the barn, and set to work vigorously to thresh the corn, and as he swung his flail he sang:

Out of pity and gratitude, the woman next day made him a tiny suit of clothes, and hung them up behind the barn door beside his flail. At night when the pixy returned to work, he saw the clothes, and put them on at once. Then, surveying himself with satisfaction, he sang:

With that he disappeared, and never came back any more.

Dr. Johnson defines ‘Fairy’ thus: ‘A kind of fabled beings supposed to appear in a diminutive human form, and to dance in the meadows, and reward cleanliness in houses.’ The reward was bestowed in the form of a coin secretly placed in the shoe of the industrious servant, an ancient belief which was, we are told, long kept alive by mistresses, who would slip the expected coin into its place to encourage their servants to industry. But the fairies did not everywhere possess only this blameless reputation. Mischievous fairies were dreaded by the farmer’s wife lest they should get into the dairy and spoil the cream. To keep them away, every one who entered the dairy must stir up the cream with the mundle (Wor.). A tangled knot in a horse’s mane was proof of their having been in the stable, for this was the pixy-seat (Dev.). A trace of what Dr. Johnson calls ‘an odd superstitious opinion, that the fairies steal away children, and put others that are ugly and stupid in their places’, remains in the dialect saying: Bless th’ bairn, he must hev been chaanged (Lin.), used when a child, generally good-tempered, becomes suddenly irritable without any obvious reason. Country folk in Cornwall used to put a prayer-book under a child’s pillow as a charm to keep away the pixies. The still prevailing superstition that it is unlucky for a woman after child-birth to go into anybody’s house—some say even to cross her own threshold—before she goes to be churched, is no doubt a remnant of the old belief that the mother until kirk’t was not safe from the power of the fairies. People suddenly seized with rheumatism, lumbago, paralysis, or fits were supposed to have been shot at by malicious fairies, and when a prehistoric arrow-head of flint or stone was picked up, it was alleged to be the fairy weapon, the awf-shot or fairy-dart. A hole in a deal board occasioned by the dropping out of a shrunken knot, was regarded as the path of a fairy shaft, and called an awf-bore. In Northumberland and Cumberland a sudden attack of illness or disease is still spoken of as a shot, e.g. a shot of rheumatics. The phrase Plaze God and the pigs (w.Som.) is probably a reminiscence of the days when the pigseys or pixies were regarded as powers which had to be reckoned with in ordinary daily life. To laugh like a pixy (Dev. Cor.) is to laugh heartily, like the merry elves of yore when they danced in the meadows by moonlight.

The belief in witches as active personalities belongs, together with the belief in fairies, to bygone generations, but its traces are with us still. On the one hand there are the old words and phrases, the husks of a once living seed, and on the other hand is the vague superstitious dread of an evil influence which is none the less real and potent because people have ceased to ascribe the dreaded ill-luck to witchcraft and the evil eye. Among the plants associated with witches are: Witch-bells (n.Cy.), the corn blue-bottle; Witch’s-milk (Lan.), the common mare’s-tail; Witch’s-needles (Nhb.), the shepherd’s needle; Witch’s-knot (Wm.), a bundle of matted twigs which forms on the branches of birches and thorns. The fungus which we have already noticed under the name Fairy-butter, is also known as Witch’s-butter (Nhp. w.Cy.); and the purple foxglove is sometimes called Witch’s-thimble (Sc. Nhb.). When horses break out into a sweat in the stable, they are said to have been hag-rided (Som.); and the tangled locks in their manes are the Witch’s-stirrups (Shr.). In parts of Surrey and Sussex a Fairy-ring is called a Hag-track. The shoulder-bones of a sheep are termed Hag-bones (Som.), because formerly witches were believed to ride on them, and consequently it was necessary to burn them. The ancient belief that the shells of eggs used by the household were appropriated by the witches for boats is still regarded in practice, the spoon must be thrust through the bottom, or the shell crushed to pieces before it is thrown away, cp. Sir Thomas Browne and his annotators: ‘To break the egg-shell after the meat is out, we are taught in our childhood, and practise it all our lives; which nevertheless is but a superstitious relique, according to the judgment of Pliny ...; and the intent hereof was to prevent witchcraft.’ ‘To keep the fairies out, as they say in Cumberland,’ Note (Jeff.); ‘Least they perchance might use them for boates (as they thought) to sayle in by night,’ Note (Wr.), Vulgar Errors, Book V, Chap. XXIII.

As ill as a witch (Chs.) is a phrase meaning very ill. As fause [false, i.e. cunning] as a Pendle witch (Lan.) is a saying which keeps on record the traditional association of Pendle Forest with witches. It was there that the old custom called Lating [seeking] the Witches used to be observed on All-hallows Eve, the night when the witches were said to meet in the Forest. Lighted candles were carried about the hills from eleven to twelve o’clock. If the witches failed to extinguish a light, the bearer was safe from their power for the season, but if the light went out, it portended evil. Persons or things under the supposed influence of witchcraft or the evil eye, were formerly said to be blinked (Sc. Irel. Chs. Shr. e.An.), a word which still remains in e.Anglia in the sense of soured, spoiled, used of beer. The very common word wisht (w. and sw. Cy.), meaning unlucky, uncanny, also physically weak, sickly, haggard, is no doubt originally wished, i.e. ill-wished, or bewitched. The terms overlooked (Sc. Irel. Yks. War. Shr. e.An. sw.Cy.), overseen (Hrf. Glo.), overshadowed (Dev.) were certainly used in their original sense of bewitched as late as the last two decades of the nineteenth century, cp. ‘The last witness said deceased had been “overshadowed” by some-one,’ n.Dev. Herald, June25, 1896. A writer in to-day’s Times, Feb.21, 1912, regards the belief in this form of witchcraft as still current: ‘We still hear of people in remote villages who complain of being overlooked, and who actually pine away under the belief that a spell has been cast upon them.’

A White Witch was a person, either man or woman, who was supposed to possess the power of removing the spell, and of inflicting punishment on the individual by whose malice the evil had been wrought. In return for pecuniary considerations, the white witch dispensed oracular wisdom, and remedies in the form of charms. As recently as the year 1890 a man who called himself ‘the White Witch of Exeter’ was convicted on a charge of obtaining money by means of palmistry. Mrs. Sarah Hewitt in her book on Devonshire customs and folk-lore—Nummits and Crummits—writes: ‘In cases of sickness, distress, or adversity, persons at the present time (A.D. 1898) make long expensive journeys to consult the white witch, and to gain relief by his (or her) aid.’ The miscellaneous articles and medicaments advocated by the white witch we shall notice later when we come to consider charms and cures. Meanwhile let us first look at some of the many ways in which the old fear of mysterious evil still shows itself, that fear which in spite of our advances in education and civilization still makes men regard trivial happenings with superstitious awe, and see omens of death and ill-luck in the commonest things.