An example of power that some believe a fairy ring possesses! This
story was told by a schoolteacher who had worked on the island of Hoy in the
late 1920's:
"One day I went up to the top of the Ward
Hill with a girl
and her uncle and
grandparents. We came on a dark green
circle, and they
said it was a fairy ring. On
hearing this, the girl jumped into it, and
the grown-ups were greatly annoyed.
The girl died very early in life (possibly in childbirth).
Year afterwards I met the uncle in
Edinburgh and began to
speak about the
girl. 'Aye', he said, 'she jumped in the
fairy ring and
look what happened to her!'"
I did not take this picture.
A seventy-three year old man by the name of Neil Colton, who lived in Tamlach Townland, on the shores of Lough Derg, County Conegal, had a local reputaton for having see the "gentle folk". This is what he related to the interviewer:
'One day, just before sunset in midsummer, and I a boy then, my brother and cousin and myself were gathering bilberries up by the rocks at the back of here, when all at once we heard music. We hurried round the rocks,and there we were within a few hundred feet of six or eight of the gentle folk and they dancing. When they saw us, a little woman dressed all in red came running out from them towards us, and she struck my cousin across the face with what seemed to be a green rush. We ran for home as hard as we could, and when my cousin reached the house she fell dead. Father saddled a horse and went for Father Ryan. When Father Ryan arrived, he put a stole about his neck and began praying over my cousin and reading psalms and striking her with the stole; and in that way brought her back. He said if she had not caught hold of my brother, she would have been taken forever.'
The following testimony was written down, by the late Mr. John Nelson, of Ramsey, who has since 'passed out of our realm of life into the realm invisible'. "He was one of the few 'Manxmen' who knew the "Manx" language really well, and the ancient traditions which it has preserved both orally and in books. His kindly manner and with fervent loyalty toward all things Celtic", he gave the interviewer permission, in December 1909, to publish for the first time the interesting matter which follows:
'My grandfather, William Nelson, was coming home from the herring fishing late at night, on the road near Jurby, when he saw in a pea-field, across a hedge, a great crowd of little fellows in red coats dancing and making music. And as he looked, an old woman from among them came up to him and spat in his eyes, saying: "You'll never see us again"; and I am told that he was blind afterwards till the day of his death, for I often had to lead him around; but, of course, I am unable to say of my own knowledge that he became blind immediately after his strange experience, or if not until later in life; but as a young man he certainly had good sight, and it was believed that the fairies destroyed it.'
This testimony is from Mr. J. Morris Jones, M.A.(Oxen.), Professor of Welsh in the University College at Vangor, who lived in Llanfair. In speaking of the fairy-belief in Anglesey as he remembers it when he was a child:
'Tylwyth Teg'--'In most of the tales I heard repeated when I was a boy, I am quite certain the implication was that the tylwyth Teg were a kind of spirit race having human characteristics, who could at will, suddenly appear and suddenly disappear. They were generally supposed to live underground, and to come forth on moonlight nights, dressed in gaudy colours (chiefly red), to dance in circles in grassy fields. I cannot remember having heard changeling stories here in the Island: I think the Tylwyth Teg were generally looked upon as kind and good-natured, though revengeful if not well treated. And they were believed to have plenty of money at their command, which they could bestow on people whom they liked.'
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