Rustic Speech and Folk-Lore

by Elizabeth Mary Wright

To bogs and mires, and oft through pond or pool,

There swallow’d up and lost, from succour far.

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.

Hobgoblins

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.

References to the Devil in Plant-names

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.

Prodigious Feats of the Devil