Page:Book Of Halloween(1919).djvu/125

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IN WALES
103

man who lay down to sleep inside a fairy ring, a circle of greener grass where the fairies danced by night. The fairies carried him away and kept him seven years, and after he had been rescued from them he would neither eat nor speak.

In the sea was the Otherworld, a

"Green fairy island reposing

In sunlight and beauty on ocean's calm breast."
Parry: Welsh Melodies.

This was the abode of the Druids, and hence of all supernatural beings, who were

"Something betwixt heaven and hell,
Something that neither stood nor fell."
Scott: The Monastery.

As in other countries the fairies or pixies are to be met at crossroads, where happenings, such as funerals, may be witnessed weeks before they really occur.

At the Hallow Eve supper parsnips and cakes are eaten, and nuts and apples roasted. A " puzzling jug " holds the ale. In the rim