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THE
MINISTER AND THE FAIRY
Not long since, a pious clergyman was returning home, after
administering spiritual consolation to a dying member of his
flock. It was late of the night, and he had to pass through a
good deal of uncanny land. He was, however, a good and a
conscientious minister of the Gospel, and feared not all the spirits in
the country. On his reaching the end of a lake which
stretched
along the roadside for some distance, he was a good deal surprised at
hearing the most melodious strains of music. Overcome by
pleasure
and curiosity, the minister coolly sat down to listen to the harmonious
sounds, and try what new discoveries he could make with regard to their
nature and source. He had not sat many minutes before he
could
distinguish the approach of the music, and also observe a light in the
direction from whence it proceeded gliding across the lake towards
him. Instead of taking to his heels, as any faithless wight
would
have done, the pastor fearlessly determined to await the issue of the
phenomenon. As the light and music drew near, the clergyman
could
at p. 64length distinguish an object resembling a human being walking
on the surface of the water, attended by a group of diminutive
musicians, some of them bearing lights, and others instruments of
music, from which they continued to evoke those melodious strains which
first attracted his attention. The leader of the band
dismissed
his attendants, landed on the beach, and afforded the minister the
amplest opportunities of examining his appearance. He was a
little primitive-looking grey-headed man, clad in the most grotesque
habit the clergyman had ever seen, and such as led him at once to
suspect his real character. He walked up to the minister,
whom he
saluted with great grace, offering an apology for his
intrusion.
The pastor returned his compliments, and, without further explanation,
invited the mysterious stranger to sit down by his side. The
invitation was complied with, upon which the minister proposed the
following question:—“Who art thou, stranger, and
from
whence?”
To this question the fairy, with downcast eye, replied that he was one
of those sometimes called Doane Shee, or men of peace, or good men,
though the reverse of this title was a more fit appellation for
them. Originally angelic in his nature and attributes, and
once a
sharer of the indescribable joys of the regions of light, he was
seduced by Satan to join him in his mad conspiracies; and, as a
punishment for his transgression, he was cast down p. 65from those
regions of bliss, and was now doomed, along with millions of
fellow-sufferers, to wander through seas and mountains, until the
coming of the Great Day. What their fate would be then they
could
not divine, but they apprehended the worst.
“And,”
continued he, turning to the minister, with great anxiety,
“the
object of my present intrusion on you is to learn your opinion, as an
eminent divine, as to our final condition on that dreadful
day.” Here the venerable pastor entered upon a long
conversation with the fairy, touching the principles of faith and
repentance. Receiving rather unsatisfactory answers to his
questions, the minister desired the “sheech” to
repeat
after him the Paternoster, in attempting to do which, it was not a
little remarkable that he could not repeat the word
“art,”
but said “wert,” in heaven. Inferring
from every
circumstance that their fate was extremely precarious, the minister
resolved not to puff the fairies up with presumptuous, and, perhaps,
groundless expectations. Accordingly, addressing himself to
the
unhappy fairy, who was all anxiety to know the nature of his
sentiments, the reverend gentleman told him that he could not take it
upon him to give them any hopes of pardon, as their crime was of so
deep a hue as scarcely to admit of it. On this the unhappy
fairy
uttered a shriek of despair, plunged headlong into the loch, and the
minister resumed his course to his home.
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