Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review Volumes 32 and 33.djvu/362

 .54 Asimis in Tegulis.

fear and hate it.^ Hence we not infrequently (apart from changelings) find a mischievous fairy or an avenging devil coming down chimney, sometimes a fairy bride vanishing up it.'^

It is worth mentioning in this context that there was in Lewis a tooth reputed to be that of a fairy dog, which if dropped down a chimney had the property of setting the house on fire (vol. xi. p, 450).

[c] Witches and the Roof. I have already mentioned a witch sitting on the ridge-pole engaged in her nefarious works. No one, I hope, needs to be reminded of the route followed by the witches in the Ingoldsby Legends (The Witches' Frolic). Here are a few more examples. An Irish witch, having stolen the butter, was attacked by a counter-charm, consisting of nine irons in the fire. This at once brought her to the house ; unable to get in at the closed door or windows she next tried the roof ; and it was not till she discovered that this entrance was closed against her, that she brought the butter to the window and capitulated.^ A similar counter-charm in Suffolk produced " a loud shrike, a roarin' up the chimbly." ■* A more respectable practitioner of magic, the Alaskan sorcerer, often enters by the rdlok or smokehole of the kdsgi (communal house), instead of the regular doorway.^ The modern Welsh peasant would therefore seem to be well advised when he puts a scythe-blade up chimney, thus confronting the intruders with the dreaded iron ; the more so, as this is one of the traditional customs for which a

1 Rouse in vol. x. p. 175 ; Lawson, Modern Greek Folklore, p. 194 ff. ; Abbott, Macedonian Folklore, p. 74.

2 Folk-Lore Journal, vol. vi. p. ii6 (Dorset) ; F. S. Krauss, Slavische Forschungen, p. 78; Strausz, op. cit. p. 130; cf. Lane, Mod. Egypt, p. 231 (" Everyman ").

3 Vol. iv. p. 181. ■* Vol. vi. pp. 118-119.

1 91 3 (Dept. of Mines, Geological Survey, Memoir 45).
 * Hawkes, The " Inviting-In " Feast of the Alaskan Eskimo, Ottawa,