The Fiddler and the Fairy.
A fiddler having agreed with a person, who was a stranger, for so much money, to play to some company he should bring him to, all the twelve days of Christmas, and received earnest for it, saw his new master vanish into the earth the moment he had made the bargain. Nothing could be more terrified than was the poor fiddler. He found he had entered himself into the Devil's service, and looked on himself as already damned; but having recourse to a clergyman, he received some hope. He ordered him, however, as he had taken earnest, to go when he should be called, but that whatever tunes should be called for, to play none but psalms. On the day appointed the same person appeared, with whom he went, but with what inward reluctance it is easy to guess; and punctually obeying the minister's directions, the company to whom he played were so angry, that they all vanished at once, leaving him at the top of a high hill, and so bruised and hurt, though he was not sensible when or from what hand he received the blows, that he got not home without the utmost difficulty.
The Phynnodderee.
The Phynnodderee, or Hairy-one, is a Manks spirit of the same kind with the Brownie or the Kobold. He is said to have been a fairy who was expelled from the fairy society. The cause was, he courted a pretty Manks maid who lived in a bower beneath the blue tree of Glen Aldyn, and therefore was absent from the Fairy court during the Re-hollys vooar yn ouyr, or harvest-moon, being engaged dancing in the merry glen of Rushen. He is condemned to remain in the Isle of Man till doomsday, in a wild form, covered with long shaggy hair, whence his name.
He is very kind and obliging to the people, sometimes driving home the sheep, or cutting and gathering the hay, if he sees a storm coming on. On one of these occasions, a farmer having expressed his displeasure with him for not having cut the grass close enough to the ground, he let him cut it himself the next year; but he went after him stubbing up the roots so fast, that it was with difficulty that the farmer could escape having his legs cut off. For several years no one would venture to mow that meadow; at length a soldier undertook it, and by beginning in the centre of the field, and cutting round, as if on the edge of a circle, keeping one eye on the scythe, and looking out for the Phynnodderee with the other, he succeeded in cutting the grass in safety.
A gentleman having resolved to build a large house on his property, at a place called Sholt-e-will, near the foot of Snafield mountain, caused the stones to be quarried on the beach. There was one large block of white stone which he was very anxious to have, but all the men in the parish could not move it. To their surprise, the Phynnodderee in the course of one night conveyed all the stones that had been quarried, the great white one included, up to the proposed site, and the white stone is there still to be seen. The gentleman, to reward the Phynnodderee, caused some clothes to be left for him in one of his usual haunts. When he saw them, he lifted them up one by one, saying in Manks:
Bayrm da'n choine, dy doogh da'n choine,
Cooat da'n dreeym, dy doogh da'n dreeym,
Breechyn da'n toyn, dy doogh da'n toyn,
Agh my she lhiat ooiley, shoh cha nee lhiat Glen reagh Rushen.
Cap for the head, alas, poor head!
Coat for the back, alas, poor back!
Breeches for the breech, alas, poor breech!
If these be all thine, thine cannot be the merry glen of Rushen.
And he departed with a melancholy wail, and has never been seen since. The old people say, "There has not been a merry world since he lost his ground."[456]