THE ELIZABETHAN FAIRIES

APPEARANCE AND CHARACTERISTICS 99
There is no persuading them but that these huntings are frequent
in the Island, and that these little gentry being too proud to ride
on Manx horses, which they might find in the field, make use of
the English and Irish ones, which are brought over and kept by
gentlemen. They say that nothing is more common, than to find
these poor beasts in a morning, all over in a sweat and foam, and
tired almost to death, when their owners have believed they have
never been out of the stable. A gentleman of Ballafletcher assured
me he had three or four of his best horses killed with these noc-
turnal journeys.150
Who wished to see the fairies riding or dancing or to
hear their songs, must be out of doors. With the excep-
tion of the water fairies, they held their revels and made
their visible appearances in the forests and meadows and
on the small green hillocks of a summer England. At
no time had they any relish for the houses of mortals,
and only entered them on the pressure of important busi-
ness after their human inmates were asleep, or made their
way inside through force of great necessity to steal hu-
man children :
They live in wilds and forests, and on mountains, and shun
great cities because of the wickedness acted therein.lsl
They danced their " ringlets "
. . . on hill, in dale, forest or mead,
By paved fountain, or by rushy brook,
Or on the beached margent of the sea,152
for their " nature is to make strange Apparitions on the
Earth in Meddows, or on Mountains." 153
They were particularly associated with forests, and
160 Waldron, Isle of Man, pp. 33-34.
Ibid., p. 27.
*52 M. N. D., 11, 2.
153 Dis. conc. D. M S., p. 510.