The Dark Side of Faery

Stolen In Her Sleep

Selina Fenech

The Fairies

William Allingham

1824-1889

Up the airy mountain,

Down the rushy glen,

We daren't go a-hunting

For fear of little men;

Wee folk, good folk,

Trooping all together;

Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl's feather!

Down along the rocky shore

Some make their home,

They live on crispy pancakes

Of yellow tide-foam;

Some in the reeds

Of the black mountain lake,

With frogs for their watch-dogs

All night awake.

High on the hill-top

The old King sits;

He is now so old and gray

 He's nigh lost his wits.

With a bridge of white mist

Columbkill he crosses,

On his stately journeys

From Slieveleague to Rossess;

Or going up with music

On  cold starry nights,

To sup with the Queen

Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget

For seven years long;

When she came down again

Her friends were all gone.

They took her lightly back,

Between the night and morrow,

They thought that she was fast asleep,

But she was dead with sorrow.

They have kept her ever since

Deep within the lake,

On a bed of flag-leaves,

Watching till she wake.

By the craggy hill-side,

Through the mosses bare,

They have planted thorn-trees

For pleasure here and there.

Is any man so daring

As dig them up in spite,

He shall find their sharpest thorns

In his bed at night.

Up the airy mountain,

Down the rushy glen,

We daren't go a-hunting

For fear of little men;

Wee folk, good folk,

Trooping all together;

Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl's feather!

This poem can be found in Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry by W.B. Yeats.

In it you find ghost stories, faery abduction stories and tales of merrows and changelings, all with a dark twist. These tales and many others have brought me to the conclusion that the Land of Faery and the Land of the Dead are related. You can download this book for free on your Kindle. You won't be sorry.