Meanwhile the eighty-seven tales (representing some hundred and twenty variants) in my two volumes must represent the English folk-tale as far as my diligence has been able to preserve it at this end of the nineteenth century. There is every indication that they form but a scanty survival of the whole
Once upon a time when pigs spoke rhyme,
And monkeys chewed tobacco,
And hens took snuff to make them tough,
And ducks went quack, quack, quack Oh!
on which I have variants not so refined. Some stories start off without any preliminary formula, or with a simple “Well, there was once a ——”. A Scotch formula reported by Mrs. Balfour runs, “Once on a time when a’ muckle folk were wee and a’ lees were true,” while Mr. Lang gives us “There was a king and a queen as mony ane’s been, few have we seen and as few may we see.” Endings of stories are even less varied. “So they married and lived happy ever afterwards,” comes from folk-tales, not from novels. “All went well that didn’t go ill,” is a somewhat cynical formula given by Mrs. Balfour, while the Scotch have “they lived happy and died happy, and never drank out of a dry cappie.”
In the course of the tale the chief thing to be noticed is the occurrence of rhymes in the prose narrative, tending to give the appearance of a
cante-fable
But their very familiarity and colloquialism make them remarkably effective with English-speaking little ones. The rhythmical phrases stick in their memories; they can remember the exact phraseology of the English tales much better, I find, than that of the Grimms’ tales, or even of the Celtic stories. They certainly have the quality of coming home to English children. Perhaps this may be partly due to the fact that a larger proportion of the tales are of native manufacture. If the researches contained in my Notes are to be trusted only i.-ix., xi., xvii., xxii., xxv., xxvi., xxvii., xliv., l., liv., lv., lviii., lxi., lxii., lxv., lxvii., lxxviii., lxxxiv., lxxxvii. were imported; nearly all the remaining sixty are home produce, and have their roots in the hearts of the English people which naturally respond to them.
In the following Notes, I have continued my practice of giving (1)
Transactions
Remarks
Restitution of Decayed Intelligence
n.
, 158), though there are touches which seem to me to come from Howell (see my note
Deutsche Sagen
a la
Folk-Lore
The Sea Piece, published by Dr. Kirkpatrick in 1750, as showing that a similar legend was told of the Cave Hill, Belfast.
Here, as Tradition’s hoary legend tells,
A blinking Piper once with magic Spells
And strains beyond a vulgar Bagpipe’s sounds
Gathered the dancing Country wide around.
When hither as he drew the tripping Rear
(Dreadful to think and difficult to swear!)
The gaping Mountain yawned from side to side,
A hideous Cavern, darksome, deep, and wide;
In skipt th’ exulting Demon, piping loud,
With passive joy succeeded by the Crowd.
* * * * * * *
There firm and instant closed the greedy Womb,
Where wide-born Thousands met a common Tomb.
Der historische Kern
Urkundenbuch
e.g.
, 1891, p. 185, refers to the legend, but evidently bases his reference on Elder, and so with all the modern references I have seen. Now Elder himself quotes Verstegan in his comments on the legend, pp. 168-9 and note, and it is impossible to avoid conjecturing that he adapted Verstegan to the locality. Newtown, when Hassel visited it in 1790, had only six or seven houses (
temp.
Ingoldsby Legends
There still remains the curious parallel from Belfast to which Mrs. Gutch has drawn attention. Magic pipers are not unknown to English folk-lore, as in the Percy ballad of
Rattenfanger
XLV. HEREAFTERTHIS
English Fairy Tales
The earlier part of the tale has resemblance with “Lazy Jack” (No. xxvii), the European variants of which are given by M. Cosquin,
l.c.
Merry Games
motif
Scenes from my Childhood
Monthly Chronicle of North Country Folk-Lore
Book of Noodles
Orient und Occident
Celtic Fairy Tales, No. v.). The fact of Continental parallels disposes of the possibility of its being a merely local legend. The fairies might appear to be in a somewhat novel guise here as something to be afraid of. But this is the usual attitude of the folk towards the “Good People,” as indeed their euphemistic name really implies.