Fairies
A species of supernatural beings, and one of the most beautiful and important of mythological conceptions.
The belief in fairies is very ancient and widespread, and the same ideas concerning them are to be found among rude and uncultivated races as in the poesy of more civilised peoples. Of British fairies there are several distinct kinds, and these differ considerably in their characteristics. In Ireland, where the belief is strongest, the fairies are called "good people," and are of a benevolent but capricious and mischievous disposition. The pixies of England are very similar. The industrious domestic spirit known as Puck, or Robin Goodfellow, is of the fairy kind; so also are the brownies of Scotland. It is supposed that the hard work of the latter has given them the swarthiness from which they take their name, the other being called fairies from their fairness. 66
Scottish fairy mythology resembles that of Ireland, though of a more sombre cast. In Highland Scotland fairies are called dasine sithe or men of peace," and it is believed that every year the devil carries off a tenth part of them. They steal human children, and leave in their places fairy changelings, fretful, wizened, unchildish things. Flint arrow-heads are believed, both in Ireland and Scotland, to be fairy weapons, and the water in which they are dipped is a cure for many ills. Fairy music may often be heard in certain spots, and like the fairies themselves it is of exquisite beauty. As in the myth of Persephone, mortals who eat or drink in fairyland are doomed to remain there for ever. If a fairy marry with a human being, there is generally some condition imposed on the latter which, being broken, leads to his undoing. Many fairy legends are found all over Europe, varying a little with the locality but identical in their essential points. The conception of fairies is probably animistic. (See Animism.) Fairfax, Edward: An English poet of the sixteenth century, author of a work on Demonology, wherein he treats somewhat credulously of sorcery. Falconet, Noel: A physician who died in 1734. Among his works was one entitled Letters and Remarks on the so-called Potable Gold.