And the
thing I was spoiling for was a tune out of the pipes or the fiddle.
Then they brought a fairy-man to look at me, and he said it was a
fairy and not Rickard at all that was in it, and I couldn't be telling
you all the bad names he put on me and the things he said about me.
And he said: 'Leave a pair of bagpipes near him, and maybe he'll play
them. You know well Rickard never could play at all, and so if he
plays them we'll know that it's not Rickard, but a fairy changeling,
and then we'll know what to do.'"
Just here I must stop Naggeneen in his story for a minute, to tell you
that when people in Ireland speak of a "fairy-man" they do not mean a
man fairy. They mean a man who knows all about fairies. The fairy-men
know all that the fairies can do, and they know the charms against
them and the ways to cure a sickness that the fairies have brought
upon anyone, and the ways to keep them from stealing the cream from
the milk and the milk from the cow. So the people have great respect
for a fairy-man or a fairy-woman, and they often send to one of them
for help, when they think that the fairies may have done them a
mischief.
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