"The moment any one saw them, and took notice of them, they were struck blind of an eye. They lived under ground, and generally came out of a mole-hill.
"They had fine music always among themselves, and danced in a moonshiny night around, or in a ring, as one may see at this day upon every common in England, where mushrooms grow.
"When the master and mistress were laid on their pillows, the men and maids, if they had a game at romp, and blundered upstairs, or jumbled a chair, the next morning every one would swear it was the fairies, and that they heard them stamping up and down stairs all night, crying 'Water's locked! Water's locked!' when there was not water in every pail in the kitchen."
To come to the present times. There is no stronger proof of the neglect of what Mr Thoms has very happily designated "Folk-lore" in this country, than the fact of there having been no account given anywhere of the Pixies or Pisgies[347] of Devonshire and Cornwall, till within these last few years. In the year 1836, Mrs. Bray, a lady well known as the author of several novels, and wife of a clergyman at Tavistock, published, in a series of letters to Robert Southey, interesting descriptions of the part of Devonshire bordering on the Tamar and the Tavy. In this work there is given an account of the Pixies, from which we derive the following information:
According to the Devon peasant, the Pixies are the souls of infants who died before they were baptised. They are of small dimensions, generally handsome in their form. Their attire is always green. Dancing is their chief amusement, which they perform to the music of the cricket, the grasshopper, and the frog,—always at night; and thus they form the fairy-rings. The Pixy-house is usually in a rock. By moon-light, on the moor, or under the dark shade of rocks, the Pixy-monarch, Mrs. Bray says, holds his court, where, like Titania, he gives his subjects their several charges. Some are sent to the mines, where they will kindly lead the miner to the richest lode, or maliciously, by noises imitating the stroke of the hammer, and by false fires, draw him on to where the worst ore in the mine lies, and then laugh at his disappointment. Others are sent
To make the maids their sluttery rue,
By pinching them both black and blue.
On this account, says Mrs. Bray, "the good dames in this part of the world are very particular in sweeping their houses before they go to bed; and they will frequently place a basin of water beside the chimney-nook, to accommodate the Pixies, who are great lovers of water; and sometimes they requite the good deed by dropping a piece of money into the basin. A young woman of our town, who declared she had received the reward of sixpence for a like service, told the circumstance to her gossips; but no sixpence ever came again, and it was generally believed that the Pixies had taken offence by her chattering, as they do not like to have their deeds, good or evil, talked over by mortal tongues."
The office of some is to steal children; of others, to lead travellers astray, as Will-o'-the-wisps, or to Pixy-lead them, as it is termed. Some will make confusion in a house by blowing out the candle, or kissing the maids "with a smack, as they 'shriek Who's this?' as the old poet writes, till their grandams come in and lecture them for allowing unseemly freedoms with their bachelors." Others will make noises in walls, to frighten people. In short, everything that is done elsewhere by fairies, boggarts, or other like beings, is done in Devon by the Pixies.
It is said that they will sometimes aid their favourites in spinning their flax. "I have heard a story about an old woman in this town," says Mrs. Bray, "who suspected she received assistance of the above nature; and one evening, coming suddenly into the room, she spied a ragged little creature, who jumped out of the door. She thought she would try still further to win the services of her elfin friend, and so bought some smart new clothes, as big as those made for a doll. These pretty things she placed by the side of her wheel. The Pixy returned, and put them on; when, clapping her tiny hands, she was heard to exclaim—
Pixy fine, Pixy gay,
Pixy now will run away;