"The fair folk" were
most covetous of new-born children and their mothers. Till the mothers were
"sained" and churched, and the children were baptized, the most strict watch
and ward had to be kept over them to keep them from being stolen. Every seven
years they had to pay "the teind to hell," and to save them from paying this
tribute with one of themselves they were ever on the alert to get hold of
human infants.
There came a wind oot o' the north,
A sharp wind and a snell;
And
a dead sleep came over me,
And frae my horse I fell;
The Queen of Fairies she was there,
And took me to hersel.
And never would I tire, Janet,
In fairyland to dwell,
But aye, at every seven years
They
pay the teind to hell;
And though the Queen macks much o' me
I fear 'twill be mysel.
Sometimes they succeeded
in carrying off an unbaptized infant, and for it they left one of their own.
The one left by them soon began to "dwine," and to fret and cry night and
day. At times the child has been saved from them as they were carrying it
through the dog-hole. A fisherman had a fine thriving baby. One day what looked
like a beggar woman entered the house. She went to the cradle in which the
baby was lying, and handled it under pretence of admiring it. From that day
the child did nothing but fret and cry and waste away. This had gone on for
some months, when one day a beggar man entered asking alms. As he was getting
his alms his eye lighted upon the infant in the cradle. After looking on it
for some time he said, "That's nae a bairn; that's an image; the bairn's been
stoun." He immediately set to work to bring back the child. He heaped up a
large fire on the hearth, and ordered a black hen to be brought to him. When
the fire was blazing at its full strength, he took the hen and held her over
the fire as near it as possible, so as not to kill her. The bird struggled
for a little, then escaped from the man's grasp, and flew out by the "lum."
The child was restored, and throve every day afterwards.Another. A strong
healthy boy in the parish of Tyrie began to "dwine." The real baby had been
stolen. A wise woman gave the means of bringing him back. His clothes were
to be taken to a south-running well, washed, laid out to dry beside the well,
and most carefully watched. This was done for some time, but no one came to
take them away. The next thing to be done was to take the child himself and
lay him between two furrows in a cornfield. This was carried out, and the
child throve daily afterwards. All this was annoying to the "fair folk," and
rather than submit to such annoyance they restored the child, and took back
their own one. One day a fisherwoman with her baby was left a-bed alone, when
in came a little man dressed in green. He proceeded at once to lay hold of
the baby. The woman knew at once who the little man was and what he intended
to do. She uttered the prayer, "God be atween you an me." Out rushed the fairy
in a moment, and the woman and her baby were left without further molestation.
Source: Walter Gregor,
Notes on the Folk-Lore of the North-East of Scotland, (London: Folk-Lore
Society, 1881), p. 60-62.