When larks 'gin fing,

Away we fling;

And babes new-borne fteal as we go,

An elfe in bed

We leave instead,

And wend us laughing, ho, ho, ho!

From hag-bred Merlins time have I

;

Thus nightly revell'd to and fro
And for my pranks men call me by
The name of Robin Good-fellow.
Fiends, ghosts, and sprites,
Who haunt the nightes,

The hags and goblins do me know;

And beldames old

My feates have told ;

So Vale, Vale; ho, ho, ho!

XXV.

THE FAIRY QUEEN.

We have here a short difplay of the popular belief concerning FAIRIES. It will afford entertainment to a contemplative mind to trace thefe whimsical opinions up to their origin. Whoever confiders, how early, how extenfively, and how uniformly they have prevailed in thefe nations, will not readily affent to the hypothefis of those, who fetch them from the caft fo late as the time of the Croisades. Whereas it is well known that our Saxon ancestors long before they left their German forefts, believed the existence of

a kind of diminutive demons, or middle species between men and fpirits, whom they called DUERGAR or DWARFS, and to whom they attributed many avonderful performances, far exceeding human art. Vid. Hervarer Saga Olaj Verelj. 1675. Hickes Thefaur. Sc.

This Song is given from an old black-letter copy.

O M E, follow, follow mee,

COM

Ye, fairye elves that bee
Come follow Mab your queene,

And trip it o'er the

greene:

Hand in hand we'll dance around,

;

Because this place is fairye ground.

When mortals are at reft,
And fnoring in their neft;
Unheard, and un-espy'd,

Through key-holes we do glide;
Over tables, ftooles, and fhelves,
We trip it with our fairye elves.

And, if the house be foull"
With platter, dish or bowl,
Up ftaires we nimbly creep,
And find the fluts asleep :

Then we pinch their armes and thighes;

None us heares, nor none efpies.

But if the house be swept,
And from uncleanness kept,
We praise the houfhold maid,
And duely she is paid :

5

10

15

20

Every

Tailes of wormes, and marrow of mice
Do make a dish, that's wonderous nice.

35

The grafhopper, gnat, and fly,

Serve for our minstrelsy,

Grace faid, we dance a while,

And fo the time beguile :

And if the moon doth hide her head,

The glow-worm lightes us home to bed.

O'er tops of dewy graffe

So nimbly we do paffe,

The young

and tender ftalk

Ne'er bends where we do walk ;

Yet in the morning may be feene

Where we the night before have beene.

45

XXVI. THE

XXVI.

THE FAIRIES FAREWELL.

This humorous old fong fell from the hand of the facetious bishop Corbet (probably in his youth), and is printed from his Poëtica Stromata, 1648, 12mo. (compared with the third edition of his poems, 1672.) It is there called, "A proper new Ballad, intituled, The Fairies Farewell, or "God-a-mercy Will, to be fung or whistled to the tune of "The Meddow brow, by the learned: by the unlearned, to "the tune of

Fortune.'

The departure of Fairies is here attributed to the abolition of monkery: Chaucer has, with equal humour, affigned a caufe the very reverse.

"In the old dayes of king Artour

(Of which the Britons Speken grete honour)
"All was this lond fulfilled of fayry;
"The elf-quene, with her jolly company,
"Daunfed full oft in many a grene mede.
"This was an old opinion as I rede:
"I fpeke of many hundred yere agoe:
"But now can no man fee no elfes moe:
"For now the grete charite, and prayeres
"Of Limitours, and other holy freres,
"That ferchen every lond, and every ftreme,
"As thick as motes in the funne beme,

Bleffing balles, chambers, kitchins, and bowres, "Cities, borowes, caftelles, and hie toures,

Thropes, and bernes, fhepens, and dairies ;
"This maketh that there ben now no fairies:
"For there as wont to walken was an elfe,
"There walketh now the Limitour himselfe,
"In undermeles and in morrownynges,
"And faieth his mattins and his holie thinges,

"As

"As he goeth in his limitacioune.

Wymen may now go safely up and doune,
"In every bush, and under every tree,
"There is none other incubus but he :
"And he ne will don hem no difhonour."

Wife of Bath's Tale. Dr. Richard Corbet, having been bishop of Oxford about three years, and afterwards as long Bp. of Norwich, died in 1635, Ætat. 52.

F

Arewell rewards and Fairies!

Good housewives now may say;

For now foule fluts in dairies,

Doe fare as well as they :

And though they fweepe their hearths no lefs.

Than mayds were wont to doe,

Yet who of late for cleaneliness

Finds fixe-pence in her shoe?

Lament, lament old Abbies,

The fairies loft command ;

They did but change priests babies,

But fome have chang'd your land:

And all your children ftoln from thence

Are now growne Puritanes,

Who live as changelings ever fince,

For love of your demaines.

At morning and at evening both
You merry were and glad,
So little care of fleepe and floth,
Thefe prettie ladies had.

P 2

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15

20

When