There cam a strange wight to our town-en’,

And the fient a body did him ken;

He tirled na lang, but he glided ben

Wi’ a dreary, dreary hum.

His face did glare like the glow o’ the west,

When the drumlie cloud has it half o’ercast;

Or the struggling moon when she’s sair distrest.

O sirs! ’twas Aiken-drum.

I trow the bauldest stood aback,

Wi’ a gape and a glower till their lugs did crack,

As the shapeless phantom mum’ling spak –

‘Hae ye wark for Aiken-drum?’

O! had ye seen the bairns’ fright,

As they stared at this wild and unyirthly wight,

As he stauket in ’tween the dark and the light,

And graned out, ‘Aiken-drum!’

‘Sauf us!’ quoth Jock

‘d’ye see sic een;’

Cries Kate, ‘there’s a hole where a nose should hae been;

And the mouth’s like a gash which a horn had ri’en;

Wow! keep’s frae Aiken-drum!’

The black dog growling cowered his tail,

The lassie swarfed, loot fa’ the pail;

Rob’s lingle brak as he men’t the flail,

At the sight o’ Aiken-drum.

His matted head on his breast did rest,

A lang blue beard wan’ered down like a vest;

But the glare o’ his e’e nae bard hath exprest,

Nor the skimes o’ Aiken-drum.

Roun’ his hairy form there was naething seen,

But a philabeg o’ the rashes green,

And his knotted knees played ay knoit between:

What a sight was Aiken-drum!

On his wauchie arms three claws did meet,

As they trailed on the grun’ by his taeless feet;

E’en the auld gudeman himsel’ did sweat,

To look at Aiken-drum.

But he drew a score, himsel’ did sain,

The auld wife tried, but her tongue was gane;

While the young ane closer clasped her wean,

And turned frae Aiken-drum.

But the canny auld wife cam till her breath,

And she deemed the Bible might ward aff scaith,

Be it benshee, bogle, ghaist or wraith –

But it fear’t na Aiken-drum.

‘His presence protect us!’ quoth the auld gudeman;

‘What wad ye, where won ye

by sea or by lan’?

I conjure ye — speak — by the Beuk in my han’!’

What a grane ga’e Aiken-drum!

‘I lived in a lan’ where we saw nae sky,

I dwalt in a spot where a burn rins na by;

But I’se dwall now wi’ you, if ye like to try —

Hae ye wark for Aiken-drum?

‘I’ll shiel a’ your sheep i’ the mornin’ sune,

I’ll berry your crap by the light o’ the moon,

And baa the bairns wi’ an unken’d tune,

If ye’ll keep puir Aiken-drum.

‘I’ll loup the linn when ye canna wade,

I’ll kirn the kirn, and I’ll turn the bread;

And the wildest  fillie that ever ran rede

I’se tame’t,’ quoth Aiken-drum!

‘To wear the tod frae the flock on the fell —

To gather the dew frae the heather bell —

And to look at my face in your clear crystal well,

Might gie pleasure to Aiken-drum.

‘I’se seek nae guids, gear, bond, nor mark;

I use nae beddin’, shoon, nor sark;

But a cogfu’ o’ brose ’tween the light and dark,

Is the wage o’ Aiken-drum.’

Quoth the wylie auld wife,’The thing speaks weel;

Our workers are scant — we hae routh o’ meal;

Gif he’ll do as he says — be he man, be he de’il,

Wow! we’ll try this Aiken-drum.’

But the wenches skirled ‘he’s no be here!

His eldritch look gars us swarf wi’ fear,

And the fient a ane will the house come near,

If they think but o’ Aiken-drum.

‘For a foul and a stalwart ghaist is he,

Despair sits brooding aboon his e’e bree,

And unchancie to light o’ a maiden’s e’e,

Is the grim glower o’ Aiken-drum.’

‘Puir slipmalabors! Ye hae little wit;

Is’t na hallowmas now, and the crap out yet?’

Sae she silenced them a’ wi’ a stamp o’ her fit;

‘Sit yer wa’s down, Aiken-drum.’

Roun’ a’ that side what wark was dune,

By the streamer’s gleam, or the glance o’the moon;

A word, or a wish — and the Brownie cam sune,

Sae helpfu’ was Aiken-drum.

But he slade aye awa or the sun was up,

He ne’er could look straught on Macmillan’s cup;

They watched — but nane saw him his brose ever sup,

Nor a spune sought Aiken-drum.

On Blednoch banks, and on crystal Cree,

For mony a day a toiled wight was he;

While the bairns played harmless roun’ his knee,

Sae social was Aiken-drum.

But a new-made wife, fu’ o’ rippish freaks,

Fond o’ a’ things feat for the first five weeks,

Laid a mouldy pair o’ her ain man’s breeks

By the brose o’ Aiken-drum.

Let the learned decide, when they convene,

What spell was him and the breeks between;

For frae that day forth he was nae mair seen,

And sair missed was Aiken-drum.

He was heard by a herd gaun by the Thrieve,

Crying ‘Lang, lang now may I greet and grieve;

For alas! I hae gotten baith fee and leave,

O, luckless Aiken-drum!’

Awa! ye wrangling sceptic tribe,

Wi’ your pros and your cons wad ye decide

’Gainst the ’sponsible voice o’

a hale country-side

On the facts ’bout Aiken-drum?

Though the ‘Brownie o’ Blednoch’ lang be gane,

The mark o’ his feet’s left on mony a stane;

And mony a wife and mony a wean

Tell the feats o’ Aiken-drum.

E’en now, light loons that jibe and sneer

At spiritual guests and a’ sic gear,

At the Glashnoch mill hae swat wi’ fear,

And looked roun’ for Aiken-drum.

And guidly folks hae gotten a fright,

When the moon was set, and the stars gied nae light,

At the roaring linn in the howe o’ the night,

Wi’ sughs like Aiken-drum (Nicholson, 1897 76-82).

Version 1

Long, long ago, before threshing-machines were thought of, the farmer who resided at C , in going to his barn one day, was surprised at the extraordinary quantity of corn that had been threshed the previous night, as well as to discover the mysterious agency by which it was effected. His curiosity led him to inquire into the matter; so at night, when the moon was up, he crept stealthily to the barn-door, and looking through a chink, saw a little fellow, clad in a tattered suit of green, wielding the ‘dreshel’ (flail) with astonishing vigour, and beating the floor with blows so rapid that the eye could not follow the motion of the implement. The farmer slunk away unperceived, and went to bed, where he lay a long while awake, thinking in what way he could best show his gratitude to the piskie for such an important service. He came to the conclusion at length, that, as the little fellow’s clothes were getting very old and ragged, the gift of a new suit would be a proper way to lessen the obligation; and, accordingly, on the morrow he had a suit of green made, of what was supposed to be the proper, which he carfied early in the evening to the bam, and left for the piskie’s acceptance. At night the farmer stole to the door again to see how his gift was taken. He was just in time to see the elf put on the suit, which was no sooner accomplished than, looking down on himself admiringly, he sung: ‘Piskie fine, and piskie gay, Piskie now will fly away’ (Hunt 129).

Version 2

‘No doubt,’ said the tinner after a pause, ‘Piskey threshed the corn and did other odd jobs for the old man of Boslow, as long as he lived, and they said that after his death he worked some time for the old widow, till he took his departure from the place about three score years ago. Some say…’

‘Stop a minute, my son, I can tell ’e a story about that,’ said Capt Peter, taking the pipe from his mouth, and holding up his finger.

‘One night, when the hills were covered with snow and winter had come severely, the old widow of Boslow left in the barn for Piskey a larger bowl than usual of gerty milk (boiled milk, thickened with pillas, or oatmeal). Being clear moonlight she took a turn round the town-place, stopped at the barn-door, and looked in to see if Piskey were come to eat his supper while it was hot. The moonlight shone through a little window right on the barn-boards, and there, sitting an a sheaf of oats, she saw Piskey eating his gerty milk very hearty. He soon emptied his wooden bowl, and scraped it with the wooden spoon as clean as if it had been washed out. Having placed the ‘temberan dish and spoon’ in a corner, he stood up and patted and stroked his stomach, and smacked his lips in a way that was as much as to say, ‘that’s good of ’e old dear; see ef I don’t thresh well for ’e to-night.’ But when Piskey turned round, the old woman was sorry to see that he had nothing on but rags and a very little of them.’

‘How poor Piskey must suffer with the cold,’ she thought and said to herself, ‘to pass .great part of his time out among the rushes in the boggy moors or on the downs with this weather, his legs all naked, and a very holey breeches. I’ll pitch about it at once, and make the poor fellow a good warm suit of homespun. We all know ragged as Piskey es, he’s so proud that he won’t wear cast-off clothes, or else he should have some of my dear old man’s – the Lord rest him.’

‘No sooner thought than she begun; and, in a day or two, made a coat and breeches, knitted a pair of long sheep’s-black stockings, with garters, and a nightcap, knitted too.’

‘When night came the old woman placed Piskey’s new clothes, and a bowl of gerty milk on the barn-boards, where the moonlight would shine on them to show them best. A few minutes after leaving the bam she came back to the door, opened its upper part a little, and, looking in, saw Piskey standing up, eating his milk, and squinting at the clothes at the same time. Laying down his empty bowl he took the new breeches on the tip of his hand-staff, carried it to the window, and seeing what it was, put it on over his rags, dragged on the stockings, and gartered them, donned coat and cap, then jumped over the barn-boards, and capered round the barn, like a fellow light in the head, singing:

‘Piskey fine and Piskey gay,

Piskey now will run away.’

‘And, sure enow, run away he did; for when he came round to the door opening into the mowhay he bolted out and took himself off without as much as saying, ‘I wish ’e well ’till I see again’ to the old woman, who stood outside the other door looking at Am.. Piskey never came back and the old woman of Boslow died that winter (Bottrell, II, 168-169).’

Version 3

The Pisky Thrasher. ‘On a farm near here, a pisky used to come at night to thrash the farmer’s corn. The farmer in payment once put down a new suit for him. When the pisky came and saw it, he put it on, and said:

Pisky fine and pisky gay,

Pisky now will fly away.

And they say he never returned.’ (Evans-Wentz, 1911, 172)

Editor’s Note: This story presents many problems as it arrived in Roby’s book by an extremely tortuous route. Note above Kay’s Farmhouse to which the legend may have become attached. 

Not far from the little snug smoky village of Blackley, there lies one of the most romantic of dells, rejoicing in a state of singular seclusion, and in the oddest of Lancashire names, to wit, the ‘Boggart-hole.’ Rich in every requisite for picturesque beauty and poetical association, it is impossible for me (who am neither a painter nor a poet) to describe this dell as it should be described; and I will therefore only beg of thee, gentle reader, who peradventure mayst not have lingered in this classical neighbourhood, to fancy a deep, deep dell, its steep sides fringed down with hazel and beech, and fern and thick undergrowth, and clothed at the bottom with the richest and greenest sward in the world. You descend, clinging to the trees, and scrambling as best you may, and now you stand on haunted ground! Tread softly, for this is the Boggart’s clough; and see in yonder dark corner, and beneath the projecting mossy stone, where that dusky sullen cave yawns before us, like a bit of Salvator’s best, there lurks the strange elf, the sly and mischievous Boggart. Bounce! I see him coming; oh no, it was only a hare bounding from her form; there it goes there!

I will tell you of some of the pranks of this very Boggart, and how he teased and tormented a good farmer’s family in a house hard by, and I assure you it was a very worthy old lady who told me the story. But first, suppose we leave the Boggart’s demesne, and pay a visit to the theatre of his strange doings.

You see that old farm-house about two fields distant, shaded by the sycamore-tree: that was the spot which the Boggart or Bar-gaist selected for his freaks; there he held his revels, perplexing honest George Cheetham for that was the farmer’s name scaring his maids, worrying his men, and frightening the poor children out of their seven senses, so that at last not even a mouse durst show himself indoors at the farm, as he valued his whiskers, five minutes after the clock had struck twelve.

It had long been remarked that whenever a merry tale was told on a winter’s evening a small shrill voice was heard above all the rest, like a baby’s penny trumpet, joining in with the laughter.

‘Weel laughed, Boggart, thou’rt a fine little tyke, I’se warrant, if one could but just catch glent on thee,’ said Robert, the youngest of the farmer’s sons, early one evening, a little before Christmas, for familiarity had made them somewhat bold with their invisible guest. Now, though more pleasant stories were told on that night beside the hearth than had been told there for the three preceding months, though the fire flickered brightly, though all the faces around it were full of mirth and happiness, and though everything, it might seem, was there which could make even a Boggart enjoy himself, yet the small shrill laugh was heard no more that night after little Bob’s remark.

Robert, who was a short stout fellow for his age, slept in the same bed with his elder brother John, who was reckoned an uncommonly fine and tall lad for his years. No sooner had they got fairly to sleep than they were roused by the small shrill voice in their room shouting out, ‘Little tyke, indeed! Little tyke thysel’. Ho, ho, ho! I’ll have my laugh now. Ho, ho, ho!’

The room was completely dark, and all in and about the house was so still that the sound scared them fearfully. The concluding screech made the place echo again; but this strange laughter was not necessary to prevent little Robert from further sleep, as he found himself one moment seized by the feet and pulled to the bottom of the bed, and the next moment dragged up again on his pillow. This was no sooner done, than by the same invisible power he was pulled down again, and then his head would be dragged back, and placed as high as his brother’s. ‘Short and long won’t match, short and long won’t match, ho, ho, ho !’ shouted the well-known voice of the Boggart, between each adjustment of little Robert with his tall brother, and thus were they both wearied for more than a hundred times; yet so great was their terror, that neither Robert nor his brother ‘Long John,’ as he ever afterwards was called dared to stir one inch; and you may well suppose how delighted they both were when the first grey light of the morning appeared. ‘We’st now ha’ some rest, happen’ said John, turning on his side in the expectation of a good nap, and covering himself up with the bed-clothes, which the pulling of Robert so often backwards and forwards had tumbled about sadly.

‘Rest!’ said the same voice that had plagued them through the night, ‘rest! what is rest? Boggart knows no rest.’ ‘Plague tak’ thee for a Boggart!’ said the farmer next morning, on hearing the strange story from his children: ‘Plague tak’ thee! Can thee not let the poor things be quiet? But I’ll be up with thee, my gentleman: so tak’ th’ chamber an’ be hang’d to thee, if thou wilt. Jack and little Robert shall sleep o’er the cart-house, and Boggart may rest or wriggle as he likes when he is by himself’.

The move was accordingly made, and the bed of the brothers transferred to their new sleeping-room over the cart-house, where they remained for some time undisturbed; but his Boggartship having now fairly become the possessor of a room at the farm, it would appear, considered himself in the light of a privileged inmate, and not, as hitherto, an occasional visitor, who merely joined in the general expression of merriment. Familiarity, they say, breeds contempt; and now the children’s bread and butter would be snatched away, or their porringers of bread and milk would be dashed to the ground by an unseen hand; or if the younger ones were left alone but for a few minutes, they were sure to be found screaming with terror on the return of their nurse. Sometimes, however, he would behave himself kindly. The cream was then churned, and the pans and kettles scoured without hands. There was one circumstance which was remarkable; the stairs ascended from the kitchen, a partition of boards covered the ends of the steps, and formed a closet beneath the staircase. From one of the boards of this partition a large round knot was accidentally displaced; and one day the youngest of the children, while playing with the shoe-horn, stuck it into this knot-hole. Whether or not the aperture had been formed by the Boggart as a peep-hole to watch the motions of the family, I cannot pretend to say. Some thought it was, for it was called the Boggart’s peep-hole; but others said that they had remembered it long before the shrill laugh of the Boggart was heard in the house. However this may have been, it is certain that the horn was ejected with surprising precision at the head of whoever put it there; and either in mirth or in anger the horn was darted forth with great velocity, and struck the poor child over the ear.

There are few matters upon which parents feel more acutely than that of the maltreatment of their offspring; but time, that great soother of all things, at length familiarised this dangerous occurrence to every one at the farm, and that which at the first was regarded with the utmost terror, became a kind of amuse ment with the more thoughtless and daring of the family. Often was the horn slipped slyly into the hole, and in return it never failed to be flung at the head of some one, but most commonly at the person who placed it there. They were used to call this pastime, in the provincial dialect, ‘laking wi’ t’ Boggart;’ that is, playing with the Boggart. An old tailor, whom I but faintly remember, used to say that the horn was often ‘pitched’ at his head, and at the head of his apprentice, whilst seated here on the kitchen table, when they went their rounds to work, as is customary with country tailors. At length the goblin, not contented with flinging the horn, returned to his night persecutions. Heavy steps, as of a person in wooden clogs, were at first heard clattering down-stairs in the dead hour of darkness; then the pewter and earthern dishes appeared to be dashed on the kitchen-floor; though in the morning all remained uninjured on their respective shelves. The children generally were marked out as objects of dislike by their unearthly tormentor. The curtains of their beds would be violently pulled to and fro, then a heavy weight, as of a human being, would press them nearly to suffocation, from which it was impossible to escape. The night, instead of being the time for repose, was disturbed with screams and dreadful noises, and thus was the whole house alarmed night after night. Things could not long continue in this fashion; the farmer and his good dame resolved to leave a place where they could no longer expect rest or comfort: and George Cheetham was actually following with his wife and family the last load of furniture, when they were met by a neighbouring farmer, named John Marshall.

‘Well, Georgey, and soa you’re leaving th’ owd house at last?’ said Marshall. ‘Heigh, Johnny, ma lad, I; m in a manner forced to ’t, thou sees,’ replied the other; ‘for that wearyfu’ Boggart torments us soa, we can neither rest neet nor day for’t. It seems loike to have a malice again’t young ans, an’ it ommost kills my poor dame here at thoughts on’t, and soa thou sees we’re forc’d to flitt like.’

He had got thus far in his complaint, when, behold, a shrill voice from a deep upright churn, the topmost utensil on the cart, called out ‘Ay, ay, neighbour, we’re flitting, you see.’ ‘Od rot thee!’ exclaimed George: ‘if I’d known thou’d been flitting too I wadn’t ha’ stirred a peg. Nay, nay, it’s to no use, Mally,’ he continued, turning to his wife, ‘we may as weel turn back again to th’ owd house as be tormented in another not so convenient.’

They did return; but the Boggart, having from the occurrence ascertained the insecurity of his tenure, became less outrageous, and was never more guilty of disturbing, in any extraordinary degree, the quiet of the family  (Roby 1872, I, 375-384)

I began [to collect fairy-lore] at Trefriw in Nant Conwy, where I came across an old man, born and bred there, called Morris Hughes. He appears to be about seventy years of age: he formerly worked as a slater, but now he lives at ILanrwst, and tries to earn a livelihood by angling. He told me that fairies came a long while ago to Cowlyd Farm, near Cowlyd Lake, with a baby to dress, and asked to be admitted into the house, saying that they would pay well for it. Their request was granted, and they used to leave money behind them. One day the servant girl accidentally found they had also left some stuff they were in the habit of using in washing their children. She examined it, and, one of her eyes happening to itch, she rubbed it with the finger that had touched the stuff; so when she went to ILanrwst Fair she saw the same fairy folks there stealing cakes from a standing, and asked them why they did that. They inquired with what eye she saw them: she put her hand to the eye, and one of the fairies quickly rubbed it, so that she never saw any more of them. They were also very fond of bringing their children to be dressed in the houses between Trefriw and ILanrwst; and on the flat land bordering on the Conwy they used to dance, frolic, and sing every moonlight night. Evan Thomas of Sgubor Gerrig used to have money from them. He has been dead, Morris Hughes said, over sixty years: he had on his land a sort of cowhouse where the fairies had shelter, and hence the pay (Rhys 1901, I, 197-198).

Once upon a time, and a very good time it was, though it wasn’t in my time, nor in your time, nor any one else’s time, there was a young lad of eighteen or so named Tom Tiver working on the Hall Farm. One Sunday he was walking across the west field,’t was a beautiful July night, warm and still and the air was full of little sounds as though the trees and grass were chattering to themselves. And all at once there came a bit ahead of him the pitifullest greetings ever he heard, sob, sobbing, like a bairn spent with fear, and nigh heartbroken; breaking off into a moan and then rising again in a long whimpering wailing that made him feel sick to hark to it. He began to look everywhere for the poor creature. ‘It must be Sally Bratton’s child,’ he thought to himself, ‘she was always a flighty thing, and never looked after it. Like as not, she’s flaunting about the lanes, and has clean forgot the babby.’ But though he looked and looked, he could see nought. And presently the whimpering got louder and stronger in the quietness, and he thought he could make out words of some sort. He hearkened with all his ears, and the sorry thing was saying words all mixed up with sobbing: ‘Ooh! the stone, the great big stone! ooh! the stones on top!’

Naturally he wondered where the stone might be, and he looked again, and there by the hedge bottom was a great flat stone, nigh buried in the mools, and hid in the cotted grass and weeds. One of the stones was called the ‘Strangers’ Table’. However, down he fell on his knee-bones by that stone, and hearkened again. Clearer than ever, but tired and spent with greeting came the little sobbing voice: ‘Ooh! ooh! the stone, the stone on top.’ He was gey, and mis-liking to meddle with the thing, but he couldn’t stand the whimpering babby, and he tore like mad at the stone, till he felt it lifting from the mools, and all at once it came with a sough out o’ the damp earth and the tangled grass and growing things. And there in the hole lay a tiddy thing on its back, blinking up at the moon and at him. ’T was no bigger than a year-old baby, but it had long cotted hair and beard, twisted round and round its body so that you couldn’t see its clothes; and the hair was all yaller and shining and silky, like a bairn’s; but the face of it was old and as if ’t were hundreds of years since ’t was young and smooth. Just a heap of wrinkles, and two bright black eyne in the midst, set in a lot of shining yaller hair; and the skin was the colour of the fresh turned earth in the spring – brown as brown could be, and its bare hands and feet were brown like the face of it. The greeting had stopped, but the tears were standing on its cheek, and the tiddy thing looked mazed like in the moonshine and the night air.

The creature’s eyne got used like to the moonlight, and presently he looked up in Tom’s face as bold as ever was: ‘Tom,’ says he, ‘thou ’rt a good lad!’ as cool as thou can think, says he, ‘Tom, thou ’rt a good lad!’ and his voice was soft and high and piping like a little bird twittering.

Tom touched his hat, and began to think what he ought to say. ‘Houts!’ says the thing again, ‘thou needn’t be feared o’ me; thou ’st done me a better turn than thou know’st, my lad, and I’ll do as much for thee.’ Tom couldn’t speak yet, but he thought, ‘Lord! for sure ’t is a bogle!’

‘No!’ says he as quick as quick, ‘I am no bogle, but ye’d best not ask me what I be; anyways I be a good friend o’ thine.’ Tom’s very knee-bones struck, for certainly an ordinary body couldn’t have known what he’d been thinking to himself, but he looked so kind like, and spoke so fair, that he made bold to get out, a bit quavery like:

‘Might I be axing to know your honour’s name?’

‘H’m,’ says he, pulling his beard, ‘as for that’ and he thought a bit ‘ay so,’ he went on at last, ‘Yallery Brown thou mayst call me, Yallery Brown, ’t is my nature seest thou, and as for a name ’t will do as any other. Yallery Brown, Tom, Yallery Brown’s thy friend, my lad.’

‘Thankee, master,’ says Tom, quite meek like.

‘And now,’ he says, ‘I’m in a hurry to-night, but tell me quick, what’ll I do for thee? Wilt have a wife? I can give thee the finest lass in the town. Wilt be rich? I’ll give thee gold as much as thou can carry. Or wilt have help wi’ thy work? Only say the word.’

Tom scratched his head. ‘Well, as for a wife, I have no hankering after such; they’re but bothersome bodies, and I have women folk at home as ’ll mend my clouts; and for gold that’s as may be, but for work, there, I can’t abide work, and if thou ‘lt give me a helpin’ hand in it I’ll thank…’

‘Stop,’ says he, quick as lightning, ‘I’ll help thee and welcome, but if ever thou sayest that to me, if ever thou thankest me, see’st thou, thou’lt never see me more. Mind that now; I want no thanks, I’ll have no thanks’, and he stampt his tiddy foot on the earth and looked as wicked as a raging bull.

‘Mind that now, great lump that thou be,’ he went on, calming down a bit, ‘and if ever thou need’st help, or get’st into trouble, call on me and just say, ‘Yallery Brown, come from the mools, I want thee!’ and I’ll be wi’ thee at once; and now,’ says he, picking a dandelion puff, ‘good-night to thee,’ and he blowed it up, and it all came into Tom’s eyne and ears. Soon as Tom could see again the tiddy creature was gone, and but for the stone on end and the hole at his feet, he’d have thought he’d been dreaming.

Well, Tom went home and to bed; and by the morning he’d nigh forgot all about it. But when he went to the work, there was none to do! All was done already, the horses seen to, the stables cleaned out, everything in its proper place, and he’d nothing to do but sit with his hands in his pockets. And so it went on day after day, all the work done by Yallery Brown, and better done, too, than he could have done it himself. And if the master gave him more work, he sat down, and the work did itself, the singeing irons, or the broom, or what not, set to, and with ne’er a hand put to it would get through in no time. For he never saw Yallery Brown in daylight; only in the darklins he saw him hopping about, like a Will-o-th’-wyke without his lanthorn.

At first ’t was mighty fine for Tom; he’d nought to do and good pay for it; but by-and-by things began to grow vicey-varsy. If the work was done for Tom, ’t was undone for the other lads; if his buckets were filled, theirs were upset; if his tools were sharpened, theirs were blunted and spoiled; if his horses were clean as daisies, theirs were splashed with muck, and so on; day in and day out, ’t was the same. And the lads saw Yallery Brown flitting about o’ nights, and they saw the things working without hands o’ days, and they saw that Tom’s work was done for him, and theirs undone for them; and naturally they begun to look shy on him, and they wouldn’t speak or come nigh him, and they carried tales to the master and so things went from bad to worse.

For Tom could do nothing himself; the brooms wouldn’t stay in his hand, the plough ran away from him, the hoe kept out of his grip. He thought that he’d do his own work after all, so that Yallery Brown would leave him and his neighbours alone. But he couldn’t, true as death he couldn’t. He could only sit by and look on, and have the cold shoulder turned on him, while the unnatural thing was meddling with the others, and working for him.

At last, things got so bad that the master gave Tom the sack, and if he hadn’t, all the rest of the lads would have sacked him, for they swore they’d not stay on the same garth with Tom. Well, naturally Tom felt bad, ’t was a very good place, and good pay too; and he was fair mad with Yallery Brown, as ’d got him into such a trouble. So Tom shook his fist in the air and called out as loud as he could, ‘Yallery Brown, come from the mools; thou scamp, I want thee!’

You’ll scarce believe it, but he’d hardly brought out the words but he felt something tweaking his leg behind, while he jumped with the smart of it; and soon as he looked down, there was the tiddy thing, with his shining hair, and wrinkled face, and wicked glinting black eyne.

Tom was in a fine rage, and he would have liked to have kicked him, but ’t was no good, there wasn’t enough of it to get his boot against; but he said, ‘Look here, master, I’ll thank thee to leave me alone after this, dost hear? I want none of thy help, and I’ll have nought more to do with thee, see now.’

The horrid thing broke into a screeching laugh, and pointed its brown finger at Tom. ‘Ho, ho, Tom!’ says he. ‘Thou ’st thanked me, my lad, and I told thee not, I told thee not!’

‘I don’t want thy help, I tell thee,’ Tom yelled at him ‘I only want never to see thee again, and to have nought more to do with ’ee, thou can go.’

The thing only laughed and screeched and mocked, as long as Tom went on swearing, but so soon as his breath gave out:

‘Tom, my lad,’ he said with a grin, ‘I’ll tell ’ee summat, Tom. True’s true I’ll never help thee again, and call as thou wilt, thou ’lt never see me after to-day; but I never said that I’d leave thee alone, Tom, and I never will, my lad! I was nice and safe under the stone, Tom, and could do no harm; but thou let me out thyself, and thou can’t put me back again! I would have been thy friend and worked for thee if thou had been wise; but since thou bee’st no more than a born fool I’ll give ’ee no more than a born fool’s luck; and when all goes vicey-varsy, and everything agee, thou ’lt mind that it’s Yallery Brown’s doing though m’appen thou doesn’t see him. Mark my words, will ’ee?’

And he began to sing, dancing round Tom, like a bairn with his yellow hair, but looking older than ever with his grinning wrinkled bit of a face:

‘Work as thou will
Thou ’lt never do well;
Work as thou mayst
Thou ’lt never gain grist;
For harm and mischance and Yallery Brown
Thou ’st let out thyself from under the stone.’

Tom could never rightly mind what he said next. ’T was all cussing and calling down misfortune on him; but he was so mazed in fright that he could only stand there shaking all over, and staring down at the horrid thing; and if he’d gone on long, Tom would have tumbled down in a fit. But by-and-by, his yaller shining hair rose up in the air, and wrapt itself round him till he looked for all the world like a great dandelion puff; and it floated away on the wind over the wall and out o’ sight, with a parting skirl of wicked voice and sneering laugh.

And did it come true, sayst thou? My word! But it did, sure as death! He worked here and he worked there, and turned his hand to this and to that, but it always went agee, and ’t was all Yallery Brown’s doing. And the children died, and the crops rotted – the beasts never fatted, and nothing ever did well with him; and till he was dead and buried, and m’appen even afterwards, there was no end to Yallery Brown’s spite at him; day in and day out he used to hear him saying:

‘Work as thou wilt
Thou ‘lt never do well;
Work as thou mayst
Thou ‘lt never gain grist;
For harm and mischance and Yallery Brown
Thou ‘st let out thyself from under the stone.’

There was a farmer, and he had three cows, fine fat beauties they were. One was called Facey, the other Diamond, and the third Beauty. One morning he went into his cowshed, and there he found Facey so thin that the wind would have blown her away. Her skin hung loose about her, all her flesh was gone, and she stared out of her great eyes as though she’d seen a ghost. And what was more, the fireplace in the kitchen was one great pile of wood-ash. Well, he was bothered with it; he could not see how all this had come about.

Next morning his wife went out to the shed, and see! Diamond was for all the world as wisht a looking creature as Facey, nothing but a bag of bones, all the flesh gone, and half a rick of wood was gone too; but the fireplace was piled up three feet high with white wood-ashes. The farmer determined to watch the third night. So he hid in a closet which opened out of the parlour, and he left the door just ajar, that he might see what passed.

Tick, tick, went the clock, and the farmer was nearly tired of waiting; he had to bite his little finger to keep himself awake, when suddenly the door of his house flew open, and in rushed maybe a thousand pixies, laughing and dancing and dragging at Beauty’s halter till they had brought the cow into the middle of the room. The farmer really thought he should have died with fright, and so perhaps he would had not curiosity kept him alive.

Tick, tick, went the clock, but he did not hear it now. He was too intent staring at the pixies and his last beautiful cow. He saw them throw her down, fall on her, and kill her; then with their knives they ripped her open, and flayed her as clean as a whistle. Then out ran some of the little people and brought in firewood and made a roaring blaze on the hearth, and there they cooked the flesh of the cow, they baked and they boiled, they stewed and they fried.

‘Take care,’ cried one, who seemed to be the king, ‘let no bone be broken.’

Well, when they had all eaten, and had devoured every scrap of beef on the cow, they began playing games with the bones, tossing them one to another. One little leg-bone fell close to the closet door, and the farmer was so afraid lest the pixies should come there and find him in their search for the bone, that he put out his hand and drew it in to him. Then he saw the king stand on the table and say, ‘Gather the bones!’

Round and round flew the imps, picking up the bones. ‘Arrange them,’ said the king; and they placed them all in their proper positions in the hide of the cow. Then they folded the skin over them, and the king struck the heap of bone and skin with his rod. Whisht! Up sprang the cow and lowed dismally. It was alive again. But, alas, as the pixies dragged it back to its stall, it halted in the off forefoot, for a bone was missing.

‘The cock crew,
Away they flew’

and the farmer crept trembling to bed.

There was once an old woman, who earned a poor living by going errands and such like, for the farmers’ wives round about the village where she lived. It wasn’t much she earned by it; but with a plate of meat at one house, and a cup of tea at another, she made shift to get on somehow, and always looked as cheerful as if she hadn’t a want in the world.

Well, one summer evening as she was trotting away homewards, she came upon a big black pot lying at the side of the road.

‘Now that,’ said she, stopping to look at it, ‘would be just the very thing for me if I had anything to put into it! But who can have left it here?’ and she looked round about, as if the person it belonged to must be not far off. But she could see no one.

‘Maybe it’ll have a hole in it,’ she said thoughtfully.

‘Ay, that’ll be how they’ve left it lying, hinny. But then it’d do fine to put a flower in for the window. I’m thinking I’ll just take it home, anyways.’ And she bent her stiff old back, and lifted the lid to look inside.

‘Mercy me!’ she cried, and jumped back to the other side of the road, ‘if it is fit brim full o’ gold PIECES!!’

For a while she could do nothing but walk round and round her treasure, admiring the yellow gold and wondering at her good luck, and saying to herself about every two minutes, ‘Well, I do be feeling rich and grand!’ But presently she began to think how she could best take it home with her; and she couldn’t see any other way than by fastening one end of her shawl to it, and so dragging it after her along the road.

‘It’ll certainly be soon dark,’ she said to herself, ‘and folk’ll not see what I’m bringing home with me, and so I’ll have all the night to myself to think what I’ll do with it. I could buy a grand house and all, and live like the Queen herself, and not do a stroke of work all day, but just sit by the fire with a cup of tea; or maybe I’ll give it to the priest to keep for me, and get a piece as I’m wanting; or maybe I’ll just bury it in a hole at the garden-foot, and put a bit on the chimney, between the chiney teapot and the spoons, for ornament like. Ah! I feel so grand, I don’t know myself rightly!’

And by this time, being already rather tired with dragging such a heavy weight after her, she stopped to rest for a minute, turning to make sure that her treasure was safe. But when she looked at it, it wasn’t a pot of gold at all, but a great lump of shining silver! She stared at it, and rubbed her eyes and stared at it again; but she couldn’t make it look like anything but a great lump of silver. ‘I’d have sworn it was a pot of gold,’ she said at last, ‘but I reckon I must have been dreaming. Ay, now, that’s a change for the better; it’ll be far less trouble to look after, and none so easy stolen; yon gold pieces would have been a sight of bother to keep ’em safe. Ay, I’m well quit of them; and with my bonny lump I’m as rich as rich—!’

And she set off homewards again, cheerfully planning all the grand things she was going to do with her money. It wasn’t very long, however, before she got tired again and stopped once more to rest for a minute or two.

Again she turned to look at her treasure, and as soon as she set eyes on it she cried out in astonishment. ‘Oh, my!’ said she, ‘now it’s a lump o’ iron! Well, that beats all, and it’s just real convenient! I can sell it as easy as easy, and get a lot o’ penny pieces for it. Ay, hinny, an’ it’s much handier than a lot o’ yer gold and silver as ’d have kept me from sleeping o’ nights thinking the neighbours were robbing me – an’ it’s a real good thing to have by you in a house, ye niver can tell what ye mightn’t use it for, an’ it’ll sell, ay, for a real lot. Rich? I’ll be just rolling!’

And on she trotted again chuckling to herself on her good luck, till presently she glanced over her shoulder, ‘just to make sure it was there still,’ as she said to herself.

‘Eh, my!’ she cried as soon as she saw it, ‘if it hasn’t gone and turned itself into a great stone this time! Now, how could it have known that I was just terrible wanting something to hold my door open with? Ay, if that isn’t a good change! Hinny, it’s a fine thing to have such good luck.’ And, all in a hurry to see how the stone would look in its corner by her door, she trotted off down the hill, and stopped at the foot, beside her own little gate.

When she had unlatched it, she turned to unfasten her shawl from the stone, which this time seemed to lie unchanged and peaceably on the path beside her, There was still plenty of light, and she could see the stone quite plainly as she bent her stiff back over it, to untie the shawl end; when, all of a sudden, it seemed to give a jump and a squeal, and grew in a moment as big as a great horse; then it threw down four lanky legs, and shook out two long ears, flourished a tail, and went off kicking its feet into the and laughing like a naughty mocking boy. The old woman stared after it, till it was fairly out of sight.

‘WELL!’ she said at last, ‘I do be the luckiest body hereabouts! Fancy me seeing the Hedley Kow all to myself, and making so free with it too! I can tell you, I do feel that GRAND…’ And she went into her cottage, and sat down by the fire to think over her good luck.