When Tom came home from labour,

Or Cifs to milking rose,

Then merrily went their tabour,
And nimbly went their toes.

Witness thofe rings and roundelayes
Of theirs, which yet remaine;
Were footed in queene Maries dayes
On many a graffy playne.
But fince of late Elizabeth

And later James came in;

They never danc'd on any heath,
As when the time hath bin.

By which wee note the fairies
Were of the old profeffion :
Their fongs were Ave Maries,

Their dances were proceffion.
But now, alas! they all are dead,

Or gone beyond the feas,

Or farther for religion fled,

Or else they take their ease.

A tell-tale in their company
They never could endure;
And whofo kept not fecretly

Their mirth, was punish'd fure:

It was a juft and christian deed

To pinch fuch blacke and blue:

O how the common-welth doth need

Such juftices, as you!

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30

35

40

45

Now

An hundred of their merry pranks

By one that I could name

Are kept in store; con twenty thanks

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55

To William Churne of Staffordshire
Give laud and praises due,
Who every meale can mend your
With tales both old and true:

To William all give audience,
And pray yee for his noddle:

For all the fairies evidence

Were loft, if it were addle.

cheare

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**After thefe SONGS on the FAIRIES, the Reader may be curious to fee the manner in which they were formerly in voked and bound to human fervice. In Afbmole's Collection of MSS. at Oxford [Num. 8259. 1406. 2.], are the papers of fome Alchymift, which contain a variety of Incantations and Forms of Conjuring both FAIRIES, WITCHES, and DEMONS, principally, as it should feem, to afft him in his Great Work of tranfmuting Metals. Moft of them are too impious to be reprinted: but the two following may be very innocently laughed at.

Whoever looks into Ben Jonson's ALCHYMIST, will find that thefe impoftors, among their other Secrets, affected to have a power over FAIRIES: and that they were com monly expected to be seen in a chriftal glass appears from

P 3

that

that extraordinary book, "The Relation of Dr. John Dee's "actions with Spirits, 1659," folio.

" AN EXCELLENT WAY to gett a FAYRIE. (For myself I call MARGARETT BARRANCE; but this will obteine any one that is not allready bownd.)

"FIRST, gett a broad fquare chriftall or Venice glaffe, in length and breadth 3 inches. Then lay that glaffe or chriftall in the bloud of a white henne, 3 Wednes dayes, or 3 Fridayes. Then take it out, and wash it with holy aq. and fumigate it. Then take 3 bazle flicks, or wands of an yeare groth: pill them fayre and white; and make them' foe longe, as you write the SPIRITTS name, or FAYRIES name, which you call, 3 times on every flicke being made flatt on one fide. Then bury them under Jome hill, whereas you fuppofe FAYRIES haunt, the Wednefday before you call her: and the Friday followinge take them uppe, and call her at 8 or 3 or 10 of the clocke, which be good planetts and houres for that turne: but when you cal, be in cleane life, and turne thy face towards the caft. And when you have her, bind her to that flone or glaffe."

"AN UNGUENT to annoynt under the Eyelids, and upon the Eyelids eveninge and morninge: but especially when you call; or find your fight not perfect.

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6

"B. A pint of fallet-oyle, and put it into a viall glaffe: but first wash it with rofe-water, and marygoldwater; the flowers to be gathered towards the east. Wash it till the oyle come white; then put it into the glaffe, ut fupra: and then put thereto the budds of holyhocke, the flowers of marygold, the flowers or toppes of wild thime, the budds of young hazle: and the thime must be gathered neare the fide of a bill where FAYRIES ufe to be: and take the graffe of a fayrie throne, there. All thefe put into the cyle, into the glaffe: and fet it to diffolve 3 dayes in the Junne, and then keep it for thy ufe; ut Supra."

3

After

After this Receipt for the Unguent follows a Form of Incantation, wherein the Alchymift conjures a Fairy, named ELABY GATHON, to appear to him in that Chryftal Glass, meekly and mildly; to refolve him truly in all manner of queftions; and to be obedient to all his commands, under pain of Damnation, &c.

One of the vulgar opinions about Fairies is, that they cannot be feen by human eyes, without a particular charm exerted in favour of the perfon who is to fee them: and that they ftrike with blindness fuch as having the gift of feeing them, take notice of them mal-a-propos.

As for the Hazle Sticks mentioned above, they were to be probably of that fpecies called the WITCH HAZLE; which received its name from this manner of applying it in in

cantations.

THE END OF BOOK THE SECOND.

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密

THE BIRTH OF ST. GEORGE.

The incidents in this, and the other ballad of ST. GEORGE AND THE DRAGON, are chiefly taken from the old ftorybook of the Seven Champions of Christendome; which, tho' now the play-thing of children, was once in high repute. Bp. Hall in his Satires, published in 1597, ranks

"St. George's forell, and his cross of blood," among the most popular flories of his time: and an ingenious critic thinks that Spencer himself did not difdain to borrow bints from it; tho' I much doubt whether this popular romance were written fo early as the Faery Queen.

The author of this book of the Seven Champions was one Richard Johnson, who lived in the reigns of Elizabeth * Mr. Warton. Vid. Obfervations on the Fairy Queen, 2 vol. 1762, 12mo. paffim.

and