MY FAIRY TALE.

Observer, 21 December 1893, Page 23

MY FAIRY TALE.

So we all thought. Then we had a succession of stories, good, bad, and indifferent ; some rather ludicrous, others intensely morbid, my own contribution being the relation of an incident of fairy lore told me in childhood's years by an aged relative of my mother's who believed thoroughly in the existence of "the good little people" when he was a lad working upon his father's farm in a country district of the North of Ireland. There were mounds of earth in the district called "Danish raths," and in these the fairies were supposed to make their homes. In the dead of night they were believed to wander forth and disport themselves in farmers' kitchens when the family were wrapped in sleep. The house of a certain Tom Dunlop, celebrated throughout the countryside for his qualifications as a fiddler, was especially favoured by them. One night Tom awoke, perceived light proceeding from the kitchen and heard the sounds of revelry therein. Being an inquisitive as well as a jovial, frolicsome man, he crept cautiously out of bed, peered into the kitchen, and saw a company of the " little people" footing it right bravely to a country dance. They were keeping excellent time although they had no music, and therefore Tom quietly secured his fiddle and struck up the air of a well-known country dance. Instantly he was felled to the floor with a tremendous blow on his back, the lights as suddenly went out, and the fairies vanished never to return. But Tom remained a cripple for life.