Traditions, Superstitions and Folk-lore Part 16

Oft have I heard my honoured mother say, How she has listened to the Gabriel hounds-- Those strange unearthly and mysterious sounds, Which on the ear through murkiest darkness fell; And how, entranced by superst.i.tions spell, The trembling villager not seldom heard, In the quaint noise of the nocturnal bird Of death premonished, some sick neighbour's knell.

I, too, remember once at midnight dark, How these sky-yelpers startled me and stirred My fancy so, I could have then averred A mimic pack of beagles low did bark.

Nor wondered I that rustic fear should trace A spectral huntsman doomed to that long moonless chase.

In cla.s.sic mythology this wild hunt myth is parallelled by the career of Orion, the "mighty hunter, the cloud raging in wild freedom over hills and dales." Seeking to make the beautiful Aero his bride, he is blinded by her father, who caught him asleep. After recovering his sight by a journey towards the rising sun, he vainly endeavours to seize upon and punish his enemy. In his wanderings he meets with and is beloved by Artemis (Diana), one of the dawn-G.o.ddesses. The Rev. G. W. c.o.x says, "It is but the story of the beautiful cloud left in darkness when the sun goes down, but recovering its brilliance when he rises again in the east." After his death, being so nearly akin to the powers of light, Asklepios "seeks to raise him from the dead, and thus brings on his own doom from the thunderbolts of Zeus--a myth which points to the blotting out of the sun from the sky by the thundercloud, just as he was rekindling the faded vapours which lie motionless on the horizon."

Orion's hound afterwards became the dog-star, Sirius. Hence our name dog days for parching weather.

This chasing of the white doe or the white hart by the spectre huntsman has a.s.sumed various forms. According to Aristotle a white hart was killed by Agathocles, king of Sicily, which a thousand years beforehand had been consecrated to Diana by Diomedes. Alexander the Great is said by Pliny to have caught a white stag, placed a collar of gold about its neck, and afterwards set it free. Succeeding heroes have, in after days, been announced as the capturers of this famous white hart. Julius Caesar took the place of Alexander, and Charlemagne caught a white hart at both Magdebourg, and in the Holstein woods. In 1172, William the Lion is reported to have accomplished a similar feat, according to a Latin inscription on the walls of Lubeck Cathedral. Tradition says the white hart has been caught on Rothwell Hay Common, in Yorks.h.i.+re, and in Windsor Forest.

Dean Stanley, in his "Historic Memorials of Westminster Abbey," informs us that the great northern entrance of that truly historic pile was erected in the reign of Richard II., and that once "it contained his well-known badge of the White Hart, which still remains, in colossal proportions, on the fragile part.i.tion which shuts off the Muniment Room from the southern triforium of the Nave." It appears that the badge was first adopted in honour of his mother, Joan, the Fair Maid of Kent, at a tournament in 1396. It had, however, direct reference to the tradition which a.s.serted that the famous white hart of Caesar had been caught at Besastine, near Bagshot, in Windsor Forest. Its ident.i.ty was said to have been proved by a collar of gold about its neck, which bore the following inscription:--"_Nemo me tangat: Caesaris sum._" The badge was so popular amongst the friends of Richard, that Bolingbroke, when Henry IV., had much difficulty in suppressing it. Its frequent adoption as an inn sign is likewise attributed to this circ.u.mstance.

In early Greek art, the deities of the morning, Athena, Apollo and Artemis, are commonly, if not invariably, a.s.sociated with a fawn with a gleam of light on its breast. The hart in these legends appears to typify the dawn, and, in conjunction with some other elements of the myth, implies the daily sequence of light and darkness.

The spectre huntsman, so very popular in Scandinavian and German tradition, is the Teutonic deity Odin or Woden, from whence our Wednesday. Woden is claimed by the early Angle and Saxon kings of the heptarchy as their common ancestor. This G.o.d had many names, each descriptive of some special quality or attribute. Amongst others he was styled Wunsch, from which we have the Anglo-Saxon wisk, and the modern English wish, in the sense in which it is used in the divining or wish-rod (German wunschelruthe). In Devons.h.i.+re the term "wishtness" is still retained, and is employed to designate "all unearthly creatures and their doings." Indra and Rudra are regarded as the Aryan prototypes of Odin. Some of their chief characteristics are retained in the doings of the "wild huntsman" and his followers that form the _dramatis personae_ of the "furious host." Kelly describes the first phase of this legend as follows:

"Mounted on his white or dappled grey steed, the wild huntsman may always be recognised by his broad-brimmed hat, and his wide mantle, from which he is surnamed Hakelbarend or Hakelberg, an old word signifying mantle-wearer. The hooting owl, Tutursel, flies before him, and ravens, birds peculiarly sacred to Woden, accompany the chase. Whoever sees it approach must fall flat on the ground, or shelter himself under any odd number of boards, nine or eleven, otherwise he will be borne away through the air and set down hundreds of miles away from home, among people who speak a strange tongue. It is still more dangerous to look out of the window when Odin is sweeping by. The rash man is struck dead, or at least gets a box on the ear that makes his head swell as big as a bucket, and leaves a fiery mark on his cheek. In some instances the offender has been struck blind or mad. There are certain places where Woden is accustomed to feed his horse or let it graze, and in those places the wind is always blowing. He has also a preference for certain tracks, over which he hunts again and again at fixed seasons, from which circ.u.mstance districts and villages in the old Saxon land received the name of Woden's way. Houses and barns in which there are two or three doors opposite each other are very liable to be made thoroughfares by the wild hunt."

Mr. Baring-Gould, in his "Iceland, its Scenes and Sagas," describes this superst.i.tion, as he heard it from his guide Jon, who related it to him under the t.i.tle of the "yule host." He says,--"Odin, or Wodin, is the wild huntsman who nightly tears on his white horse over the German and Norwegian forests and moor-sweeps, with his legion of h.e.l.l-hounds. Some luckless woodcutter, on a still night, is returning through the pine woods; the air is sweet-scented with matchless pine fragrance. Overhead the sky is covered with grey vapour, but a mist is on all the land; not a sound among the fir tops; and the man starts at the click of a falling cone. Suddenly his ear catches a distant wail; a moan rolls through the interlacing branches; nearer and nearer comes the sound. There is the winding of a long horn waxing louder and louder, the baying of hounds, the rattle of hoofs and paws on the pine tree tops. A blast of wind rolls along, the firs bend as withes, and the woodcutter sees the wild huntsman and his rout reeling by in frantic haste.... The wild huntsman chases the wood spirits, and he is to be seen at c.o.c.k-crow returning with the little Dryads hanging to his saddle-bow by their yellow locks."

The personification of the strife of the elements in stormy weather is here very apparent. As the name of Odin or other of his special appellations became lost or corrupted, mysterious personages, or heroes of another and more mortal stamp, became confounded with the spectre huntsman. Herod, the murderer of the Jewish children, is evidently referred to by the French peasants of Perigord, when they speak of "La cha.s.se Herode." This seems to have resulted from the corruption of Hrodso (the renowned), one of the t.i.tles applied to Odin.

At Blois, the wild hunt is called the "cha.s.se Maccabei," from the following supposed reference to it in the Bible:--"Then it happened that through all the city, for the s.p.a.ce almost of forty days, there were seen hors.e.m.e.n running in the air, in cloth of gold, and armed with lances like a band of soldiers. And troops of hors.e.m.e.n in array, encountering and running one against another, with shaking of s.h.i.+elds and mult.i.tudes of pikes, and drawing of swords, and casting of darts, and glittering of golden ornaments and harness of all sorts. Wherefore every man prayed that that apparition might turn to good." (II.

Maccabeus, v. 2 to 4.)

In Brittany and Picardy the peasants, in the midst of sudden storms or whirlwinds, which throw down trees and steeples, are still in the habit of crossing themselves, and exclaiming "_C'est le juif errant qui pa.s.se_." This evidently demonstrates that the legendary story of the Wandering Jew, the spectre hunt of Odin, and the superst.i.tions a.s.sociated with the seven whistlers, have been confounded or "dovetailed," as it were, one into the other. Indeed, in its combined form, remnants may yet be found in Lancas.h.i.+re. Mr. James Pearson, in a contribution to "Notes and Queries," of September 30th, 1871, testifies to this in the following terms:--

"THE SEVEN WHISTLERS.--One evening a few years ago, when crossing one of our Lancas.h.i.+re moors, in company with an intelligent old man, we were suddenly startled by the whistling overhead of a covey of plovers. My companion remarked that when a boy the old people considered such a circ.u.mstance a bad omen, 'as the person who heard _the Wandering Jews_,'

as he called the plovers, 'was sure to be overtaken with some ill luck.'

On questioning my friend on the name given to the birds, he said, 'There is a tradition that they contain the souls of those Jews who a.s.sisted at the crucifixion, and in consequence were doomed to float in the air for ever.' When we arrived at the foot of the moor, a coach, by which I had hoped to complete my journey, had already left its station, thereby causing me to finish the distance on foot. The old man reminded me of the omen."

Another writer, "A. S.," in "Notes and Queries," October 21, 1871, says:--"During a thunderstorm which pa.s.sed over this district"

(Kettering, in Yorks.h.i.+re), "on the evening of September 6, on which occasion the lightning was very vivid, an unusual spectacle was witnessed; immense flocks of birds were flying about, uttering doleful affrighted cries, as they pa.s.sed over the locality, and for hours they kept up a continual whistling like that made by sea birds. There must have been great numbers of them, as they were also observed at the same time, as we learn by the public prints, in the counties of Northampton, Leicester, and Lincoln. The nest day, as my servant was driving me to a neighbouring village, this phenomenon of the flight of birds became the subject of conversation, and on asking him what birds he thought they were he told me they were what were called _The Seven Whistlers_, and that whenever they were heard it was considered a sign of some great calamity, and that the last time he heard them was the night before the great Hartley colliery explosion; he had also been told by soldiers that if they heard them they always expected a great slaughter would take place soon. Curiously enough, on taking up the newspaper the following morning, I saw headed in large letters--'Terrible Colliery Explosion at Wigan,' etc., etc. This I thought would confirm my man's belief in 'the Seven Whistlers.'"

I have heard it seriously a.s.serted in discussion by geologists and mining engineers, that a low state of the barometer generally, if not invariably, accompanies a certain cla.s.s of accidents in coal pits.

Perhaps this peculiar atmospheric condition may explain the coincidences referred to.

Another contributor of the same date, "Viator," gives the following Eastern ill.u.s.tration of this superst.i.tion,--"It strikes me as curious that Mr. Pearson should hear on a Lancas.h.i.+re moor a tradition or superst.i.tion so similar to that which I have heard on the Bosphorus with reference to certain flocks of birds, about the size of a thrush, which fly up and down the channel, and are never seen to rest on the land or water. I was informed by the man who rowed the _caique_ that they were the souls of the d.a.m.ned, and condemned to perpetual motion."

There is a legend of Odin wandering over the earth, accompanied by his two ravens, one of which represented Thought and the other Memory. Mr.

Princeps had a picture in the Royal Academy Exhibition in 1871, ill.u.s.trating this tradition.

The last time the Wandering Jew is said to have appeared _in propria persona_ was in the year 1604, when he was believed to have been seen three times in France. As his appearance was invariably accompanied with violent and destructive tempests, the peasantry concluded that his mode of locomotion was of a supernatural character, and that the fierce blasts of the storm-G.o.d (or fiend) hurled him from place to place. Since the French visits referred to, it seems that the Wandering Jew's advent has not been able to gain much credence. Several times, however, attempts in this direction have been made. Referring to the subject, Brand says:--"I remember to have seen one of these imposters some years ago in the north of England, who made a very hermit-like appearance, and went up and down the streets of Newcastle with a long train of boys at his heels, muttering, 'Poor John alone, alone!' I thought he p.r.o.nounced his name in a manner singularly plaintive." In a note Brand adds that "Poor John alone" is "otherwise 'Poor Jew alone.'" He mentions a portrait of this man, painted for Sir William Musgrave, Bart., which was inscribed "Poor Joe alone!" which corresponds with the name of a then recent pretender of this cla.s.s, as recorded by Matthew Paris, on the authority of an Armenian archbishop, who, in 1228, visited the monastery at St. Albans.

The earlier G.o.ds of the heathens were supposed, notwithstanding their immortality, to be occasionally subjected to a kind of temporary death.

Baldr, the bright day-G.o.d, was slain by a stroke of a mistletoe branch, wielded by the hand of the blind Hodr; the Python overcame Apollo; and such is sometimes the strange inconsistency of early traditions and their after development, that the grave of Zeus was a sacred spot to the Ancient Greeks. The spectre huntsman appears to have been subjected to some such death, or protracted trance, periodically.

Odin rode on his dappled grey steed only in rough weather. His mortal enemy seems to have been the wild boar. This animal is also a favourite mythic form of expression in Merlin's famous prophesy. The Germans have a legend that in the form of Hackelberg, or the mantle-wearer, on one occasion he was heard to inquire for the "stumpy tail" that he knew from a vision was destined to overcome him. At a great hunt he killed the animal, and fancied that he had practically given the lie to his dream of the previous night. In his triumph he kicked the slain brute contemptuously; but the tusk of the dead animal (an Aryan personification of the lightning) piercing his leg, inflicted a wound, from the effects of which he died, or, in other words, fell into a deep trance. This evidently represents the season of calm weather, during which the spectre huntsman and his howling pack rest from their labours.

This wild boar legend has near mythological affinity to the Greek one, respecting Adonis, who, whilst hunting, was mortally wounded in the thigh by a wild boar. The waters of the river Adonis a.s.sume, at a certain season of the year, a deep red hue, which was said to be caused by the blood of Adonis. Modern investigation has attributed this phenomenon to periodical heavy rains, which bring large quant.i.ties of red earth into the river. In Syria, Thammuz, an older prototype or counterpart of Adonis, was wors.h.i.+pped, which wors.h.i.+p was denounced by Ezekiel, six centuries before Christ, as amongst the abominations of Judah. Milton, in "Paradise Lost," says:--

Thammuz came next behind, Whose annual wound in Lebanon allur'd The Syrian damsels to lament his fate In amorous ditties all a summer's day, While smooth Adonis from his native rock Ran purple to the sea, supposed with blood Of Thammuz yearly wounded.

Adonis alternately abode with Aphrodite in heaven and Persephone in h.e.l.l. This has been held to be "typical of the burial of seed, which, in due season, rises above the ground for the propagation of its species,"

or of the "annual pa.s.sage of the sun from the northern to the southern hemisphere."

Odin was surnamed the lord of the gallows, or the G.o.d of the hanged, because human sacrifices were offered to him in this fas.h.i.+on, and because he had hanged himself for nine days on the mighty tree Yggdrasil. Hence the superst.i.tion in Germany, and not unknown in England, that the act of committing suicide by hanging creates a storm.

The temporary death, or state of coma, of these weather-G.o.ds is very significant. When Indra or Odin hurled his spear, the weapon, with most commendable loyalty, as a rule, returned to the hand of its proprietor.

Thor's hammer or lightning club, was, generally, equally accommodating.

But at the conclusion of the autumnal storms, the implement remained buried in the earth, where, like some animals, it may be said to have hybernated. It was not until the return of spring that the potent weapon was restored to the grasp of the thundering deity.

The a.n.a.logy of the weapons of these G.o.ds to the lightning is forcibly ill.u.s.trated by the Scandinavian legend, which a.s.serts that Odin lent his spear in the form of a reed to King Erich in order to ensure him the victory in a battle against Styrbjorn. The reed, in its flight, a.s.sumed the form of a spear, and _struck with blindness_ the whole of the opposing army.

The peculiar form of this weapon of the G.o.ds has undergone many changes in mythical lore. It is the sword of Roland, "Durandal," which Mr. c.o.x says "is manifestly the sword of Chrysaor." It is that of Theseus and that of Sigurd. It is Arthur's famous sword "Excalibur," as well as the one which no one could draw from the iron anvil sheath, embedded in stone, but himself. It is Odin's sword, "Gram," stuck in the roof tree of Volsung's hall. Mr. c.o.x says:--"Like all other sons of Helios, Arthur has his enemies, and King Rience demands as a sign of homage the beard of Arthur, which gleams with the splendour of the golden locks or rays of Phoibos Akersekomes. The demand is refused, but in the mediaeval romance there is room for others who reflect the glory of Arthur, while his own splendour is for a time obscured. At Camelot they see a maiden with a sword attached to her body, which Arthur himself cannot draw. In the Knight Balin, who draws it, and who 'because he was poorly arrayed put him not far in the press,' we see not merely the humble Arthur, who gives his sword to Sir Kay, but Odysseus, who in his beggar's dress shrinks from the brilliant throng that crowds his ancestral hall."

Campbell, in his "Tales of the West Highlands," says:--"The Manx hero, Olave, of Norway, had a sword with a Celtic name, Macabuin." It reappears in many of the fairy tales. In some popular stories it becomes an ordinary cudgel, with magical properties, leaps of its own accord out of the lad's bag who owned it, and severely punishes the rascally innkeeper who stole the buck-goat that spat gold, the hen that laid the golden eggs, and a table that covered itself with a sumptuous repast, without human aid. The stick, like Indra's spear, returned to its owner's hand on the completion of the innkeeper's castigation. Different versions of the legend are found in Yorks.h.i.+re, Germany, and various other parts of Europe. Kelly says:--"The table, in this story, is the all-nouris.h.i.+ng cloud. The buck-goat is another emblem of the clouds, and the gold it spits is the golden light of the sun that streams through the fleecy covering of the sky. The hen's golden egg is the sun itself.

The demon of darkness has stolen these things; the cloud gives no rain, but hangs dusky in the sky, veiling the light of the sun. Then the lightning spear of the ancient storm-G.o.d, Odin, leaps out from the bag that concealed it (the cloud again), the robber falls, the rain patters down, the sun s.h.i.+nes once more." In other words we have the Sanscrit Vritra, the dragon, or "dark thief," stealing the herds of Indra, and hiding them in the cave of the Panis (the dark cloud), and the weapon of the lightning-G.o.d effecting their liberation.

It is said that, in the "elevated and inland region of Arya, the winter was a rigorous season of seven months' duration, and it has been suggested that the dormant condition of the lightning, or the sun-G.o.d's weapon, is symbolical of the fact." Lyell and others contend that geological evidence indicates that the winters were long and severe during the period when the makers of the "palaeoliths," or rude flint implements, which have recently attracted so much attention, lived on the banks of the Somme, near Amiens and Abbeville, and in other localities in England and Northern Europe. These implements are believed to furnish the most reliable evidence of the earliest existence of man yet discovered. If such was the condition of the country on the arrival of the Aryan emigrants, four different cla.s.ses of facts--mythological, philological, geological, and archaeological--seem to be in perfect harmony with each other.

Kelly says, "in some places local tradition makes Hackelberg a mere man; in others an enormous giant. At Rocklum, near Wolfenb.u.t.tel, the existence of a group of hills is accounted for by saying that they are composed of the gravel which Hackelberg once threw out of his shoe as he pa.s.sed that way with the wild hunt." Similar traditions are not unknown in Lancas.h.i.+re and other parts of Britain. It is stated in Knight's "Old England" that "there were formerly three huge upright stones near Kennet, not far from Abury, the country people called them from time immemorial, 'The Devil's Coits.' They could be playthings, it might readily be imagined, for no other busy idler. But the good folks of Somersets.h.i.+re, by a sort of refinement of such hacknied traditions, hold that a great stone, near Stanton Drew, now called '_Hackell's Coit_,'

and which formerly weighed thirty tons, was thrown from a hill about a mile off, by a mortal champion, Sir Jno. Hautville."

Dr. J. Collingwood Bruce, in his "Wallet-Book of the Roman Wall,"

relates the following Northumberland tradition:--"To the north of Sewings.h.i.+elds, two strata of sandstone crop out to the day; the highest points of each ledge are called the King and Queen's-crag, from the following legend. King Arthur, seated on the furthest rock, was talking with his queen, who, meanwhile, was engaged in arranging her 'back-hair.' Some expression of the queen's having offended his majesty, he seized a rock which lay near him, and, with an exertion of strength for which the Picts were proverbial, he threw it at her, a distance of about a quarter of a mile! The queen, with great dexterity, caught it upon her comb, and thus warded off the blow; the stone fell between them, where it lies to this very day, with the marks of the comb upon it, to attest the truth of the story. It probably weighs about twenty tons."[29]

This method of accounting for the deposition of the large boulders and other erratic rocks of the glacial drift period of modern geology is common in Lancas.h.i.+re and the North of England. Odin, or Hackelberg, is, of course, in these legends, converted into the devil, as in Kennet. He is supposed to have built a bridge over the Kent, a little above Kendal, and another over the Lune, at Kirkby Lonsdale; and it is said that in leaping from the hills on the Yorks.h.i.+re side of the valley into Lancas.h.i.+re, his ap.r.o.n string broke, and a large ma.s.s of scattered rocks which lie in the valley fell to the earth in consequence. The present writer was once shown, near Hutton Roof, a hollow in the mountain limestone of which the hill is formed, which he was seriously told had been named, from time immemorial, the "Devil's Footprint," and was still held to be irrefragable evidence of the truth of the legend referred to.

The hole in the rock did certainly bear some slight resemblance to the impression of a cow's hoof on some plastic substance; but it in reality is an ordinary limestone cavity, of a somewhat unusual form.

The removing of stones in the night by the devil on the occasion of the building of churches appears to have some remote connection with the ancient superst.i.tion now under consideration. Lancas.h.i.+re has many such stories. The wild boar, or demon pig, played some such pranks at Winwick. A rude sculpture, "resembling a hog fastened to a block by the collar," has been found amongst the carved stones which decorated the ancient church. In this, Mr. E. Baines says, "superst.i.tion sees the resemblance of a monster in former ages, which prowled over the neighbourhood, inflicting injury on man and beast, and which could only be restrained by the subduing power of the sacred edifice." Mr. T. T.

Wilkinson says "The Goblin Builders" are "said to have removed the foundations of Rochdale Church from the banks of the river Roach up to their present elevated position. Samlesbury Church near Preston, possesses a similar tradition. The demon pig not only determined the site of St. Oswald's Church at Winwick, but gave a name to the parish.[30] The parochial church at Burnley, it is said, was originally intended to be built on the site of the old Saxon cross, in G.o.dly-lane; but, however much the masons might have built during the day, both the stones and the scaffolding were invariably found where the church now stands, on their coming to work next morning. The local legend states that on this occasion also, the goblin took the form of a _pig_, and a rude sculpture of such an animal, on the south side of the steeple, lends its aid to perpetuate and confirm the story."

Miss Farington, in her paper on Leyland Church, read before the Lancas.h.i.+re and Ches.h.i.+re Historic Society, refers to several carved stones which decorated the ancient structure, and amongst others to what was termed the "cat stone." She says--"To this relic appends the usual story of the stones being removed by night (in this case from Whittle to Leyland), and the devil, in the form of a _cat_, throttling a person who was bold enough to watch." This tradition I have often heard spoken of myself by the inhabitants of the neighbourhood.

The cat, as I have shown in a previous chapter, like the boar, was an Aryan personification of storm and tempest.

When the Hackelberg-Odin was killed by the boar's tusk, in accordance with his last request, he was interred at the spot to which his favourite steed unguided bore him. He is believed to have been buried in the "enchanted or cloud mountain," which the superst.i.tious, however, still insist upon finding on the earth. He is supposed to lie in a secluded spot on some lone moorland side, the way to which no curious enquirer ever trod a second time. Hence the many traditions of heroes slumbering in caves, awaiting the signal for future battle, and their triumph over the enchantment that has held them for ages spell-bound.

Frederic Barbarossa--he of the red beard like Odin--is yet believed by the German peasantry to rest in a cavern, surrounded by his knights, in the Kyffhauser mountain, "leaning his head upon his arm, at a table through which his beard has grown, or around which, according to other accounts, it has grown twice. When it has thrice encircled the table he will awake up to battle. The cavern glitters with gold and jewels, and is as bright as the sunniest day. Thousands of horses stand at mangers filled with thorn bushes instead of hay, and make a prodigious noise as they stamp on the ground and rattle their chains. The old Kaiser sometimes wakes up for a moment and speaks to his visitors. He once asked a herdsman who had found his way into the Kyffhauser, 'Are the ravens [Odin's birds] still flying about the mountain?' The man replied that they were. 'Then,' said Barbarossa, 'I must sleep a hundred years longer.'" From many details in this superst.i.tion, Mannhardt clearly identifies Frederic and his companions with Odin and his wild host.

Similar stories are told of the Emperor Henry the Fowler, who is said to be entranced in the Sudemerberg, near Goslar. Charlemagne and his enchanted army are believed to slumber in several different localities.

In Britain, Armorica, Normandy, and other places, the caverned hero, who has superseded Odin, is the renowned Arthur, who is expected yet to reappear, and restore the glory of the ancient British race. Grimm shows that the mediaeval Germans believed that "Arthur, too, the vanished King, whose return is expected by the Britons, and who rides at the head of the nightly host, is said to dwell with his men at arms in a mountain; Felicia, Sybilla's daughter, and the G.o.ddess Juno, live with him, and the whole army are well provided with food, drink, horses, and clothes."

It appears that the earliest poetical writer in the English vernacular, at the commencement of the thirteenth century, Layamon, in his "Brut or Chronicle of Britain, a Poetical Semi-Saxon Paraphrase of the Brut of Wace," first engrafted this legend on the Arthurian romances. According to him, Arthur, when dying, addressed Constantine, his successor, as follows:--"I will fare to Avalun to the fairest of all maidens, to Argante, the Queen, an elf most fair, and she shall make my wounds all sound; make me all whole with healing draughts. And afterwards I will come again to my kingdom and dwell with the Britons with mickle joy."

Layamon further adds:--"Even with the words there approached from the sea a little short boat floating with the waves, and two women therein wondrously formed; and they took Arthur anon, and bare him quickly, and laid him softly down, and forth they gan depart. Then was it accomplished that Merlin whilom said, that mickle care should come of Arthur's departure. The Britons believe yet that he is alive and dwelleth in Avalun with the fairest of all elves, and the Britons even yet expect when Arthur shall return." Amongst the Welsh bards, after the appearance of Geoffrey's History, fairy land was designated "Ynys yr Avallon," or the "Island of the Apple Trees."

Sir Walter Scott, in his "Demonology and Witchcraft," relates a tradition, in which he makes Thomas the Rhymer the hero, but this Kelly contends is a blunder, and cites the following pa.s.sage, quoted by Sir Walter himself, from Leyden's "Scenes of Infancy," in proof of his view that the caverned warriors referred to were King Arthur's Knights:--

Say who is he with summons loud and long Shall bid the charmed sleep of ages fly, Roll the long sound through Eildon's caverns vast, While each dark warrior kindles at the blast; The horn, the falchion grasp with mighty hand, And peal proud Arthur's march from Fairy land?

Sir Walter Scott's version of the legend is as follows:--"A daring horse-jockey sold a black horse to a man of venerable and antique appearance, who appointed the remarkable hillock upon Eildon Hills, called the Lucken Hare, as the place where, at twelve o'clock at night he should receive the price. He came, his money was paid in ancient coin, and he was invited by his customer to view his residence. The trader in horses followed his guide in the deepest astonishment through several long ranges of stalls, in each of which a horse stood motionless, while an armed warrior lay equally still at the charger's feet. 'All these men,' said the wizard in a whisper, 'will awaken at the battle of Sheriffmoor.' At the extremity of this extraordinary depot hung a sword and a horn, which the prophet pointed out to the horse dealer as containing the means of dissolving the spell. The man, in confusion, took the horn and attempted to wind it. The horses instantly started in their stalls, stamped, and shook their bridles, the men arose and clashed their armour, and the mortal, terrified at the tumult he had excited, dropped the horn from his hand. A voice like that of a giant, louder even than the tumult around, p.r.o.nounced these words:--