Page:Curious myths of the Middle Ages (1876).djvu/437

 pposed, a revival of ancient paganism, which has long lain dormant among the English peasantry. A Wesleyan told me one day that he was sure his little servant-girl was going to die; for the night before, as he had lain awake, he had heard an angel piping to her in the adjoining room; the music was inexpressibly sweet, like the warbling of a flute. “And when t’aingels gang that road,” said the Yorkshire man, “they’re boun to tak bairns’ souls wi’ em.” I know several cases of Wesleyans declaring that they were going to die, because they had heard voices singing to them, which none but themselves had distinguished, telling them of the—

precisely as the piper of Hameln’s notes seemed to the lame lad to speak of a land— “Where flowers put forth a fairer hue, And every thing was strange and new.” And I have heard of a death being accounted for by a band of music playing in the neighbourhood. “When t’music was agaite, her soul was forced to be off.”

A hymn by the late Dr. Faber, now very popular, is unquestionably founded on this ancient