Page:Notes on the folk-lore of the northern counties of England and the borders.djvu/287

 Rh The river Tees has its sprite, called Peg Powler, a sort of Lorelei, with green tresses, and an insatiable desire for human life, as has the Jenny Greenteeth of Lancashire streams. Both are said to lure people to their subaqueous haunts, and then drown or devour them. The foam or froth, which is often seen floating on the higher portion of the Tees in large masses, is called “Peg Powler’s suds;” the finer less sponge-like froth is called “Peg Powler’s cream.” Mr. Denham tells us that children are still warned from playing on the banks of the river, especially on Sundays, by threats that Peg Powler will drag them into the water; and he pleads guilty to having experienced great terror whenever, as a boy, he found himself alone by the haunted stream. The river Skerne too has a goblin or sprite, but of what character I have not learned. That of the Kibble is a Peg too, Peg o’ Nell. A spring in the grounds of Waddow bears her name, and is graced by a stone image, now headless, which is said to represent her.

Tradition avers that in days of old Peg o’ Nell was a servant at Waddow Hall. Before starting one morning to fetch water from the well, the girl offended her mistress the lady of Waddow, who thereupon expressed a wish that she might fall and break her neck. It was winter, and the ground was coated with ice. Peggy fell, and the malediction was fulfilled. But she had her revenge. Waddow Hall now became possessed of an evil genius. When the chickens were stolen, the cow died, the sheep strayed, or the children fell sick, all was due to Peg o’ Nell. And further she was inexorable in demanding every seven years a life to be quenched in the waters of the Kibble. When “Peg’s night,” the closing night of the period, came round, unless a bird, a cat, or a dog was drowned in the stream, some human being was certain to fall a victim there. Accordingly on one anniversary of the fatal evening a young man rode down to an adjoining inn on the way from Waddington to Clitheroe. No bridge then spanned the river at Brangerley; passengers crossed it at the ford, but it was so swollen on this occasion as to be unsafe. The young man was told of this, but he said he had business at Clitheroe, and must go on. The host and hostess tried hard to