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Article THE FAIRY FAMILY. ← Page 7 of 13 →
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The Fairy Family.
The Avhite are of innocent and friendly disposition , engaged in summer-time in out-door revelry , sometimes taking the form of cloves or butterflies ; but during the Avinter in the Avorking of gold and silver . The broAvn Dwarfs are cheerful , but rather inclined to trickery , and wear brown caps Avith silver bells , which render them ini'isible to all except those similarl
y equipped . They plague lazy servants by nightmares , or by biting and scratching them ; or lead people astray into bogs and marshes . The black are very hideous ; they are extremely skilful armourers , ancl wonderfully expert at giA'ing inflexible hardness to steel . They delight in all kinds of evil-doing ; ancl at their midnight meetings , hoAvling ancl screeching take the
place of nimble dancing and delightful music . The DAvarfs of Iceland adopt the habitations and clothing of men , and are remarkably clean ancl precise in their habits ; they are always dressed in red . The Germans have been prolific in dwarfs , of whose revelry among the recesses of the Hartz Mountains endless legends are given . They have also a Avood-spirit , termed Scrat or Schretel , from whence Ave get our nickname of " Old Scratch . " In South Germany , a race of little beings called Wichtlein are said to
haunt the mines , in the likeness of old men with ample beards , provided with lanterns , mallets , and hammers . They are only injurious when ill used or ill spoken of by the workmen . The death of a miner is always foretold by three knocks . They are called by the Bohemians " little house-smiths , " and pretend by a great deal of knocking to be A'ery hard at work . Other
species of dwarfs , as the Avood and moss-people , are Avell known in Germany . Their arch-enemy is the Wild Huntsman , Avho rides SAvift and terrible , though unseen , through the air . There are also the Wild Women , AA'I IO dwell on the great moor near Saltzburg , and who are said to assemble at devotion during the dead of night , in the precincts of the cathedral .
The SAVISS DAvarfs exhibit in their nature the simplicity and integrity Avhich characterize the country ; they are chiefly occupied in tending cattle , and in the native tongue are knoAvn as Hardmcindlene . We have now enumerated the chief varieties of the dwarfish tribe , Avhose peculiarities , ' combined with those of the Eastern PeriWe formed the staple ingredients of our
, native Fairy or Elf . The foregoing descriptions , though perhaps tedious , are necessary to illustrate the relation and connection which our own elfin mythology has Avith that of other European nations . The Gotho-German element of English myth was obtained through the Picts and Scots , while the Eastern fables were
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The Fairy Family.
The Avhite are of innocent and friendly disposition , engaged in summer-time in out-door revelry , sometimes taking the form of cloves or butterflies ; but during the Avinter in the Avorking of gold and silver . The broAvn Dwarfs are cheerful , but rather inclined to trickery , and wear brown caps Avith silver bells , which render them ini'isible to all except those similarl
y equipped . They plague lazy servants by nightmares , or by biting and scratching them ; or lead people astray into bogs and marshes . The black are very hideous ; they are extremely skilful armourers , ancl wonderfully expert at giA'ing inflexible hardness to steel . They delight in all kinds of evil-doing ; ancl at their midnight meetings , hoAvling ancl screeching take the
place of nimble dancing and delightful music . The DAvarfs of Iceland adopt the habitations and clothing of men , and are remarkably clean ancl precise in their habits ; they are always dressed in red . The Germans have been prolific in dwarfs , of whose revelry among the recesses of the Hartz Mountains endless legends are given . They have also a Avood-spirit , termed Scrat or Schretel , from whence Ave get our nickname of " Old Scratch . " In South Germany , a race of little beings called Wichtlein are said to
haunt the mines , in the likeness of old men with ample beards , provided with lanterns , mallets , and hammers . They are only injurious when ill used or ill spoken of by the workmen . The death of a miner is always foretold by three knocks . They are called by the Bohemians " little house-smiths , " and pretend by a great deal of knocking to be A'ery hard at work . Other
species of dwarfs , as the Avood and moss-people , are Avell known in Germany . Their arch-enemy is the Wild Huntsman , Avho rides SAvift and terrible , though unseen , through the air . There are also the Wild Women , AA'I IO dwell on the great moor near Saltzburg , and who are said to assemble at devotion during the dead of night , in the precincts of the cathedral .
The SAVISS DAvarfs exhibit in their nature the simplicity and integrity Avhich characterize the country ; they are chiefly occupied in tending cattle , and in the native tongue are knoAvn as Hardmcindlene . We have now enumerated the chief varieties of the dwarfish tribe , Avhose peculiarities , ' combined with those of the Eastern PeriWe formed the staple ingredients of our
, native Fairy or Elf . The foregoing descriptions , though perhaps tedious , are necessary to illustrate the relation and connection which our own elfin mythology has Avith that of other European nations . The Gotho-German element of English myth was obtained through the Picts and Scots , while the Eastern fables were