'And oftentimes will start—For overhead are sweepingGabriel's Hounds.'Mr. Philip Gilbert Hamerton, in a poem dated 1849, in hisIsles of Loch Awe and other Poems, which he has kindly given me permission to quote here, says of them,—'Faintly sounds the airy note,And the deepest bay from the staghound's throat,Like the yelp of a cur, on the air doth float,And hardly heard is the wild halloo.'and—'They fly on the blast of the forestThat whistles round the withered tree,But where they go we may not go,Nor see them as they fly.'Mr. Hamerton, however, goes beyond the Lancashire peasant, at any rate so far as I have been able to ascertain, for I never met any one in the hill country or on the moorlands of the North who fancied that the throng included anything butRatchets,i.e.dogs, for the poet goes on to sing—'Hark! 'tis the goblin of the woodRushing down the dark hill-side,With steeds that neigh and hounds that bay.'Mr. Henderson has recorded that, about Leeds, the flight is supposed to be that of 'the souls of unbaptized children doomed to flit restlessly above their parents' abode.' In Germany, certainly the Wild Hunt or Furious Host is accompanied by unbaptized children, and it has been recorded that a woman, about the year 1800, died of grief upon learning that the Furious Host had passed over the village where her still-born child haddied just before. Mr. Kelly (Indo-European Tradition) very ably and poetically resolves all the various superstitions of this Wild Hunt into figurative descriptions of natural phenomena, but Mr. Yarrell, the distinguished naturalist, reduces the cries of the Gabriel Hounds into the whistling of the Bean Goose,Anser Segetum, as the flocks are flying southward in the night, migrating from Scandinavia.In Wales 'The Whistlers,' the cry of the golden-plover, is considered an omen of death, but it seems to be a quite distinct superstition from that of theCwn Annwn, or Dogs of Hell, which latter is a Wild Hunt.I have heard the weird cry of the Gabriel Ratchets at night in several of the northern countries, and in the loneliness and gloom of early winter in the heart of the hills, or upon a wild bleak moorland, it was difficult to overcome a sudden feeling of dread when the yelps rang forth, even with Mr. Yarrell's scientific explanation fresh in my mind.To sketch the ramifications of the superstition of the Wild Hunt, however, would require a volume, so numerous and various are they.34.In the old witch-mania records it is not unusual to find a cock sacrificed to the Evil One, and Satan's dislike of cock-crow has become proverbial. Brand has pointed out that the Christian poet Prudentius (fourth century) mentions that antipathy as a tradition of common belief. In an old German story Satan builds a house for a peasant who agrees to pay his soul for the work. A condition is made, however, that this house must be completed before cock-crow, and the wily peasant, just before the last tile is put on the roof, imitates the bird of morn, upon which all the cocks in the locality crow, and Satan, baffled, flees.The Evil One's appearance in the form of a cat, a goat, a pig, an old woman, a black dog, a stylish gentleman, and the conventional shape, with hoof and horns, have been testified to, and Calmet (Traité sur les apparitions des Esprits et sur les Vampires, 1751) alludes to his taking the shape of a raven, but I have not met with any record of his appearance as a cock. In this case, however, that was insisted upon, although it was suggested that it might have been some other fowl.EDINBURGH: T. AND A. CONSTABLE,PRINTERS TO THE QUEEN, AND TO THE UNIVERSITY.
'And oftentimes will start—For overhead are sweepingGabriel's Hounds.'
'And oftentimes will start—For overhead are sweepingGabriel's Hounds.'
Mr. Philip Gilbert Hamerton, in a poem dated 1849, in hisIsles of Loch Awe and other Poems, which he has kindly given me permission to quote here, says of them,—
'Faintly sounds the airy note,And the deepest bay from the staghound's throat,Like the yelp of a cur, on the air doth float,And hardly heard is the wild halloo.'
'Faintly sounds the airy note,And the deepest bay from the staghound's throat,Like the yelp of a cur, on the air doth float,And hardly heard is the wild halloo.'
and—
'They fly on the blast of the forestThat whistles round the withered tree,But where they go we may not go,Nor see them as they fly.'
'They fly on the blast of the forestThat whistles round the withered tree,But where they go we may not go,Nor see them as they fly.'
Mr. Hamerton, however, goes beyond the Lancashire peasant, at any rate so far as I have been able to ascertain, for I never met any one in the hill country or on the moorlands of the North who fancied that the throng included anything butRatchets,i.e.dogs, for the poet goes on to sing—
'Hark! 'tis the goblin of the woodRushing down the dark hill-side,With steeds that neigh and hounds that bay.'
'Hark! 'tis the goblin of the woodRushing down the dark hill-side,With steeds that neigh and hounds that bay.'
Mr. Henderson has recorded that, about Leeds, the flight is supposed to be that of 'the souls of unbaptized children doomed to flit restlessly above their parents' abode.' In Germany, certainly the Wild Hunt or Furious Host is accompanied by unbaptized children, and it has been recorded that a woman, about the year 1800, died of grief upon learning that the Furious Host had passed over the village where her still-born child haddied just before. Mr. Kelly (Indo-European Tradition) very ably and poetically resolves all the various superstitions of this Wild Hunt into figurative descriptions of natural phenomena, but Mr. Yarrell, the distinguished naturalist, reduces the cries of the Gabriel Hounds into the whistling of the Bean Goose,Anser Segetum, as the flocks are flying southward in the night, migrating from Scandinavia.
In Wales 'The Whistlers,' the cry of the golden-plover, is considered an omen of death, but it seems to be a quite distinct superstition from that of theCwn Annwn, or Dogs of Hell, which latter is a Wild Hunt.
I have heard the weird cry of the Gabriel Ratchets at night in several of the northern countries, and in the loneliness and gloom of early winter in the heart of the hills, or upon a wild bleak moorland, it was difficult to overcome a sudden feeling of dread when the yelps rang forth, even with Mr. Yarrell's scientific explanation fresh in my mind.
To sketch the ramifications of the superstition of the Wild Hunt, however, would require a volume, so numerous and various are they.
34.
In the old witch-mania records it is not unusual to find a cock sacrificed to the Evil One, and Satan's dislike of cock-crow has become proverbial. Brand has pointed out that the Christian poet Prudentius (fourth century) mentions that antipathy as a tradition of common belief. In an old German story Satan builds a house for a peasant who agrees to pay his soul for the work. A condition is made, however, that this house must be completed before cock-crow, and the wily peasant, just before the last tile is put on the roof, imitates the bird of morn, upon which all the cocks in the locality crow, and Satan, baffled, flees.
The Evil One's appearance in the form of a cat, a goat, a pig, an old woman, a black dog, a stylish gentleman, and the conventional shape, with hoof and horns, have been testified to, and Calmet (Traité sur les apparitions des Esprits et sur les Vampires, 1751) alludes to his taking the shape of a raven, but I have not met with any record of his appearance as a cock. In this case, however, that was insisted upon, although it was suggested that it might have been some other fowl.
EDINBURGH: T. AND A. CONSTABLE,PRINTERS TO THE QUEEN, AND TO THE UNIVERSITY.