The fairy changeling belief also exists in some districts of Argyll, and a fairy boy dwelt long in a small farm-house in Glencoe, now unoccupied.
They carry off children, leaving changeling substitutes, transport men and women into fairyland, and are generally the causes of all mysterious phenomena.
He lay, with his arm under his head, apparently in sweet sleep, but the poor changeling of Brea was dead.
When the chimney and house are full of smoke as one can bear, throw the changeling on the hearth-stone; go out of the house; turn three times round; when one enters the right cheeld will be restored.
Oberon was perfectly justified in wishing to get the changeling from his wife, and shows himself worthy of becoming a mortal for insisting on his rights as a husband.
Curious metal from meteors that failed in the sky; Earth-born the tireless is stretched by the water, quite weary, Close to this ununderstandable changeling that's I.
Once he dreamt that it had come true and woke up in a cold panic, for in his dream she had been a silly, flaxen Clara, with the gold gone out of her hair and platitudes falling insipidly from her changeling tongue.
The icicles were short upon the roofs and the changeling city swooned.
Oh, yes, and unless people are careful they will steal young babies from the cradles and leave changeling elves in their places.
How does one know whether one is one's self or a changeling elf?
In Ireland a plan for reclaiming the child carried away by the Fairies was to take the Fairy's changeling and place it on the top of a dunghill, and then to chant certain invocatory lines beseeching the Fairies to restore the stolen child.
I will now relate a tale somewhat resembling those already given, but in this latter case, the supposed changeling became the mainstay of his family.
Love had not returned to his old place, and never, never would, but the changeling was gone, and the house was swept and garnished.
Before she had dared the ordeal of confession this feeling of hatred, this perverse and ugly changeling that had brooded in her heart, had seemed too strong, too deeply seated to be moved.
I do but beg a little changeling boy To be my henchman.
When I had at my pleasure taunted her, And she in mild terms begg'd my patience, I then did ask of her her changeling child; Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent To bear him to my bower in fairy land.
The cause of this unhappy disagreement was Titania's refusing to give Oberon a little changeling boy, whose mother had been Titania's friend; and upon her death the fairy queen stole the child from its nurse, and brought him up in the woods.
When Oberon had teased her for some time, he again demanded the changeling boy; which she, ashamed of being discovered by her lord with her new favorite, did not dare to refuse him.
Then the neighbours began to have their doubts whether he was a Changeling after all; for the Fairies are faithful, and who ever heard of a Changeling being left blind and penniless?
Old Mike Lonergan took to drink, and spent every evening at the Shebeen--small blame to him--for how could a man be expected to stay at home with a Changeling sitting in a corner and staring at him?
Many advised her to roast the Changeling on the turf-fire, but the White Witch of Moher said it would be safer to leave him alone.
The cases we have yet to deal with, except the first, exhibit a different and much more humane treatment of the changeling than the foregoing.
The changeling began to scream, but the mother was prevented by a man who had been a witness to the transaction from picking it up; and when the fairy found that no notice was taken the true child was brought back.
The changeling left in its place was found in the bed; and this he kept too, defying the efforts of the underground folk to regain it.
In Normandy the changeling declares: "I have seen the Forest of Ardennes burnt seven times, but I never saw so many pots boil.
In the north of Germany one is advised not to touch the changeling with the hands, but to overturn the cradle so that the child falls on the floor.
But a changeling was to be known in other ways than by his physical defects; under careful management he might be led to betray himself in speech or action.
In the Nithsdale story which I have already cited, the servant girl at midnight covers up the chimney and every other inlet, makes the embers glowing hot, and undressing the changeling tosses it on them.
This is hardly a changeling story, as no attempt was made to foist a false child on the parent.
The problem set before the heroes of many folk-tales is to compel laughter, but that does not seem to be intended in these changeling stories.
Another woman in a Danish tale engaged to drive a changeling out of the house he troubled; and this is how she set about it.
The changeling fashioned out of a broom in the Lithuanian story already cited, was disposed of, by the parish priest's advice, by hewing its head off.
The same writer gives a similar account of the changeling mentioned above, p.
Let us suppose that a fairy has placed her changeling into the cradle of a mortal: that into the cradle she drops all manner of fairy gifts which are not bestowed on mere mortals; but that one mortal attribute she forgets.
The changeling grows up; she charms those around her: they humour, and pet, and spoil her.
A smart angry discussion took place between Oberon and Titania as to which of them was to have the little changeling boy.
A neighbour, named John Gow, had a changeling left in his house in place of a beautiful infant, belonging to him, stolen by the fairies.
The supposed changeling is often severely beaten with juniper rods and the scourging attended with incantations, so as to compel the wicked fairies to reclaim their deformed bantling and restore the stolen child.
It was Ennius, who in this poem for the first time introduced into literature that changeling compound of epos and of history, which from that time up to the present day haunts it like a ghost, unable either to live or to die.
In the depths of the man's changeling and feckless soul is a principle which has carried him untarnished through many a wild adventure.
The cause of this unhappy disagreement was Titania's refusing to give Oberon a little changeling boy, whose mother had been Titania's friend: and upon her death the fairy queen stole the child from its nurse, and brought him up in the woods.
Illustration: Betsy Held the Skipper by His Coat-tails.
Then there was Freddie Firefly, who was the brightest youngster on the farm--at least after dark, when his light flashed across the meadow.
He did not wring his hands, as do Those witless men who dare To try to rear the changeling Hope In the cave of black Despair: He only looked upon the sun, And drank the morning air.
