Jack-o'-lantern is called in Yorkshire Peggy-wi'-t'-wisp; consequently the treacherous, misleading character is there attributed to a sprite of that sex which has misled man from the first moment she appeared on earth—who never rested till she had led him out of the terrestrial paradise into one of her own making.
I was talking about this one evening in a little tavern, over the fire, to a Cornishman, when he laughed and volunteered a song. It was one, he said, that was employed as a test to see whether a man were sober enough to be able to repeat the numbers correctly that followed at the close of each stanza.[24]
"As I trudged on at ten at night
My way to fair York city,
I saw before a lantern light
Borne by a damsel pretty.
I her accos't, 'My way I've lost,
Your lantern let me carry!
Then through the land, both hand in hand,
We'll travel. Prithee tarry.'
20, 18, 16, 14, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2,
19, 17, 15, 13, 11, 9, 7, 5, 3, 1.
"She tripp'd along, so nimble she,
The lantern still a-swinging,
And 'Follow, follow, follow me!'
Continually was singing.
'Thy footsteps stay!' She answered, 'Nay!'
'Your name? You take my fancy.'
She laughing said, nor turn'd her head,
'I'm only Northern Nancy.'
20, 18, 16, etc.
"She sped along, I in the lurch,
A lost and panting stranger,
Till, lo! I found me at the Church,
She'd led me out of danger.
'Ring up the clerk,' she said; 'yet hark!
Methinks here comes the pass'n;
He'll make us one, then thou art done;
He'll thee securely fasten.'
20, 18, 16, etc.
"'Man is a lost and vagrant clown
That should at once be pounded,'
She said, and laid the matter down
With arguments well grounded.
For years a score, and even more,
I've lain in wedlock's fetter,
Faith! she was right; here, tied up tight,
I could not have fared better.
20, 18, 16, etc."
An industry on Dartmoor that has become completely extinct is the collection of lichen from the rocks for the use of the dyers. There exists in MS. an interesting book by a Dr. Tripe, of Ashburton, recording what he saw and did each day, at the close of last century. He says that he observed women scraping off the lichen from the rocks near the Drewsteignton cromlech. This they sold to the dyers, who dried it, reduced it to powder, and treated it with a solution of tin in aqua fortis and another ingredient, when a most vivid scarlet dye was produced. The lichen is called botanically Lichinoides saxatile. Other lichens were employed to give purple and yellow colours. The cudbear and crab's-eye lichens (Lecanora tartarea and Lecanora parella) gave a dye of a royal purple, and the two species called Parmelia saxatilis and Parmelia omphalodes gave a yellowish brown. Moss also was employed for the purpose; the Hypnum cupressiforme yielded a rich reddish brown.
"Lichens and mosses," says Mr. Parfitt, "are the pioneers of the vegetable kingdom in attacking the hard and almost impenetrable rocks, and so preparing the way for the more noble plants—the trees and shrubs—by gradual disintegration, and by adding their own dead bodies to the soil, enrich it for the food of others."[25]