As a rule, although the fairies are regarded as "fallen angels," they are said to be kind to the poor, and to possess many good qualities. "It was better for the land before they went away" is an expression I have heard more than once. The belief in the fairy changeling has, however, led to many acts of cruelty. We know of the terrible cases which occurred in the South of Ireland some years ago, and I met with the same superstition in the North. I was told a man believed his sick wife was not herself, but a fairy who had been substituted for her. Fortunately the poor woman was in hospital, so no harm could come to her.
Much of primitive belief has gathered round the fairy—we have the fairy well and the fairy thorn. It is said that fairies can make themselves so small that they can creep through keyholes, and they are generally invisible to ordinary mortals. They can shoot their arrows at cattle and human beings, and by their magic powers bring disease on both. They seldom, however, partake of the nature of ghosts, and I do not think belief in fairies is connected with ancestral worship.
Sometimes I have been asked if the people did not invent these stories to please me. The best answer to this question is to be found in the diverse localities from which the same tale comes. I have heard of the making of heather ale by the Danes, and the tragic fate of the father and son, the last of this race, in Down, Antrim, Londonderry, and Kerry. The same story is told in many parts of Scotland, although there it is the Picts who make the heather ale. I have been told of the woman attending the fairy-man's wife, acquiring the power of seeing the fairies, and subsequently having her eye put out, in Donegal and Derry, and variants of the story come to us from Wales and the Holy Land.
I am aware that I labour under a disadvantage in not being an Irish scholar, but most of those in Down, Antrim, and Derry from whom I heard the tales spoke only English, and in Donegal the peasants who related the stories knew both languages well, and I believe gave me a faithful version of their Irish tales.
Some of these essays appeared in the Antiquary, others were read to the Archæological Section of the Belfast Naturalists' Field Club, but are now published for the first time in extenso. All have been revised, and additional notes introduced. To these chapters on folklore I have added an article on the Rev. William Hamilton, who, in his "Letters on the North-East Coast of Antrim," written towards the close of the eighteenth century, gives an account of the geology, antiquities, and customs of the country.
The plan of the souterrain at Ballymagreehan Fort, Co. Down, was kindly drawn for me by Mr. Arthur Birch. I am much indebted to the Council of the Royal Anthropological Institute for their kindness in allowing me to reproduce the plan of the souterrain at Knockdhu from Mrs. Hobson's paper, "Some Ulster Souterrains," published in the Journal of the Institute, vol. xxxix., January to June, 1909. My best thanks are also due to Mrs. Hobson for allowing me to make use of her photograph of the entrance to this souterrain. The other illustrations are from photographs by Mr. Robert Welch, M.R.I.A., who has done so much to make the scenery, geology, and antiquities of the North of Ireland better known to the English public.
Belfast,
August, 1913.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] See "Ardtole Souterrain, Co. Down," by F. J. Bigger and W. J. Fennell in Ulster Journal of Archæology, 1898-99, pp. 146, 147.
[2] I am much indebted to Mr. S. D. Lytle of that town for kind permission to reproduce this view.