Dame Ellis, lifting the creature from the ashes' heap, said to Jenny, "I believe that thou wert either drunk or in a waking dream when passing round the hill, and that this child, used so ill, is as truly thine as any thou hast born. Now take it home, wash it well, feed it regular, and don't thee leave it all day lying in its cradle; and, if thee canst not make it thrive, send for Dr. Madron."
Jenny and the other women at first refused to comply with Dame Ellis's advice; told her that she knew next to nothing about such matters, and related many things to prove that the creature was no mortal's child, till the lady tired with their stories, turned to go in, saying to Jenny,
"My husband shall come out and talk to thee; peradventure he may convince thee of thy error."
Squire Ellis and his wife being quakers—a sect then but little known in the West—they were thought by Brea women, and many others, to be no better than unbelieving Pagans, "who haven't the grace," said they, "to know anything about such creatures as spriggans, piskies, knackers (knockers of the mines) and other small folks, good or bad, that haunt our carns, moors, and mines; who can vanish or make themselves visible when and how they please, as all more enlightened folks know."
They well knew, however, what concerned them more—that Squire Ellis was their landlord, and that, quiet and quaker-like as he and his wife were in their talk, and demure in their looks, they were not to be trifled with; and that their will was law for all living on their estate unless they could contrive to deceive them.
Squire Ellis came down and, finding that Jenny (with her bantling and all the others) were gone into a house, where he heard them loudly talking, he had nothing to say to them; perhaps, he kept an eye on their proceedings.
Brea women, in spite of "unbelieving quakers," as they called Squire Ellis and his wife, among themselves—determined to have their own way—waited till all was dark in the great house; then Jenny, with the bantling or spriggan, and another woman, who was very knowing about changelings, passed quietly up Brea town-place, and under a stile on the Church-way path crossing a field from Brea lane, they left the creature (then asleep) that had been such a plague to them.
Jenny returned to Brea Vean, and there stayed till morning. Being fatigued and worried she overslept herself, for it was nearly daybreak when she awoke and hurried away, between hopes and fears, to the stile; and there, sure enough, she found her own "dear cheeld," sleeping on some dry straw. The infant was as clean, from head to foot, as water could make it, and wrapped up in a piece of old gay-flowered chintz; which small folks often covet and steal from furze-bushes, when it is placed there in the sun to dry.
Jenny nursed her recovered child with great care, but there was always something queer about it, as there always is about one that has been in the fairies' power—if only for a few days. It was constantly ailing and complaining, and, as soon as it was able to toddle, it would wander far away to all sorts of out-of-the-way places. The good lady of Brea often came to see it and brought it many nice things that its mother couldn't afford to buy, and when he was about nine years of age Squire Ellis took the changeling (as he was always called) into his service, but he was found to be such a poor simple innocent that he could never be trusted to work in the fields alone, much less with cattle; as a whim would take him, every now and then, to leave his work and wander away over hills and moors for days together. Yet he was found useful for attending to rearing cattle and sheep—then kept in great numbers on the unenclosed grounds of Brea. He was so careful of his master's flock in lambing time that there was seldom any lost. Forsaken or weakly lambs were often given to him by the neighbours, and he contrived to rear them so well that, in a few years, he had a good flock of his own that Squire Ellis and everyone else allowed him to pasture wherever he and his sheep choose to wander—everybody knew the poor changeling and made him welcome. When he grew to man's estate, however, he became subject to fits, and had to remain at home with his mother great part of his time.
Yet, when the fits were over, nothing could restrain his propensity for wandering, and his sheep, goats, and even calves, always followed, and seemed equally to enjoy their rambles. He often talked to himself, and many believed that he was then holding converse with some of the fairy tribe, only visible to him, who enticed him to ramble among the carns, hills, and moors—their usual haunts.