Part 12

A work by a German named Massenius was published at Cologne in 1657. It was entitled “Palæstra Dramatica,” and contained, amongst other curious narratives, one of a certain Signor Vitalis, who fell into a pit in which a lion, a monkey, and a serpent had also fallen. They were all rescued by an honest countryman, Massaccio, to whom Vitalis promised a marriage-dower and his palace. Once safe, he denies all knowledge of his deliverer. The beasts prove more grateful, but a gem which is given to the peasant by the serpent leads to a suspicion that he has stolen it. At the trial Vitalis again denies him, but is overwhelmed with confusion when the beasts enter the court and force from him an involuntary confession. A translation of this story appeared in _Blackwood’s Magazine_ for March, 1835. The fable was, however, not invented by Massenius, for in a slightly different form it occurs in the “Gesta Romanorum,” that famous collection of mediæval stories. It also attracted the notice of Gower, and is told in the “Confessio Amantis,” in this the lion is omitted. Matthew Paris gives it as an apologue told by Richard of the Lion Heart. Finally it is found in that storehouse of Eastern legend, the _Calilah u Dimnah_. This was translated by Doni into Italian, and an English rendering of his version appeared in 1570. Massenius may have obtained the story either from the “Gesta,” or from this book of Doni. It is very probable that many other versions exist. But does Mr. Newbigging’s poem really represent a Lancashire tradition? To solve this doubt the readiest way was to put the question to him. The following is his reply:—“With some differences my ‘reverend Grannie’ used to relate this story to amuse my childhood. I cannot help smiling when I look back and remember the time when, if some casualty, such as an unusually wet night, or a ‘hawket heel,’ or any of the thousand and one ills attendant on boyhood, kept me chained to the fireside, my invariable petition was, ‘Grannie! gie’s auld Guy!’ (she gave the hero’s name as Guy, not Gamul, as I have given it) and forthwith ‘Auld Guy’ was related for the fiftieth time by the same patient lips, and to the same eager listener. I had never been able, though I had looked long and carefully, to find anything like it in print. My good grandam (who was a rare old Scotch woman, full of old-world lore) heard the story from her father, and she believed that he had read it in some old book.”

Doubtless this ancestor of Mr. Newbigging’s read the story in one of the many editions of the “Gesta Romanorum,” which was for centuries a favourite story-book. The name of Guido clearly indicates the source. It is a striking instance of the passage of literature into legend. In fifty years from now Mr. Newbigging’s poem would be considered no light proof of the existence of a Lancashire variant of the story; yet, as we have just learned, it has no connection with Rossendale, but came from Scotland, and even then was a book tale, and not a genuine legend. This instance will not have been cited in vain if it warns any too enthusiastic student “folk-lorist” of the pitfalls that beset his path.

We can only indicate the varied interest of Lancashire folk-lore by two or three examples. Let us take a phrase which may still be heard occasionally, “Aw’m coming too, like th’ Clegg Ho’ Boggart.” This is an allusion to a story told of more than one old house in the county. The inmates are perplexed and worried by the exploits of a tricksy spirit that upsets the furniture, makes strange noises, and generally renders everyone uncomfortable. They decide to remove, but when the furniture is on the cart, the “boggart” is heard to exclaim, “I’m going too,” whereupon they decide to remain and endure as best they may the unwelcome companionship of their household spirit. Now this story of the “flitting boggart” is a widespread one. When Professor Worsaae was in England, he surprised a Lancashire friend by narrating a Scandinavian legend which is practically identical. “_See i dag flitter vi_,” were the words of the Danish brownie. The version given by Mr. Roby appears to be merely a literary appropriation of a Yorkshire story, but the widespread character of the tale is undoubted. Tennyson is familiar with it, and has thus put it into verse:—

“... his house, for so they say, Was haunted with a jolly ghost, that shook The curtains, whined in lobbies, tapt at doors, And rummaged like a rat: no servant stay’d: The farmer vext packs up his beds and chairs, And all his household stuff; and with his boy Betwixt his knees, his wife upon the tilt, Sets out, and meets a friend who hails him, ‘What! You’re flitting!’ ‘Yes, we’re flitting,’ says the ghost (For they had pack’d the thing among the beds). ‘Oh well,’ says he, ‘you flitting with us too,— Jack, turn the horses’ heads, and home again.’”

The late Mr. Charles Hardwick thought that the flitting boggart was of Scandinavian origin, and the evidence seemed strong enough, but there is evidence that he is known in Italy. In that charming book by Janet Ross, “The Land of Manfred,” there is this interesting bit of folk-lore:—“I observed that some of the flock the old shepherd was guarding looked tired and hung their heads wearily. I asked whether they were ill, and he answered, ‘No; but I must get rid of them, because the Laùro has taken an antipathy to them.’ On further inquiry, he told me that the Laùro was a little man, only thirty centimetres high, always dressed in velvet, and wearing a Calabrese hat with a feather stuck into it. The Laùro is most capricious: to some who ask him for money he gives a sackful of broken potsherds; to others who ask for sand he gives old coins. He took a particular dislike to a cousin of the old shepherd’s, sitting on her chest at night and giving her terrible dreams. At last she was so worried by the Laùro that she determined to leave her house. All the household goods and chattels were on the cart; nothing was left but an old broom, and when the goodwife went to fetch it the Laùro suddenly appeared, saying, ‘I’ll take that; let us be off to the new house.’ His antipathies or likings are unaccountable; he will steal the corn from one horse or mule to give it to another, twist up their manes and tails in a fantastic way, or shave them in queer patterns. The Laùro would not allow the sheep I had asked about to rest at night, and any animal he hated had to be sold.”

It may, of course, be said that the flitting boggart went to Taranto with Guiscard’s Normans in the eleventh century, but it is equally probable that the Lancashire weaver and the Italian peasant have each inherited their belief from a common and an earlier source.

The devil occupies a conspicuous place in folk-lore, but he is not the fallen angel, dark, gloomy, and majestic whom Milton drew, nor is he the accomplished Mephistophiles, the spirit that denies, whom Goethe has painted. The devil of folk-lore is malignant but stupid, and oftener the dupe of humanity than the slayer of souls. This is evident in the story of the devil’s task of making a rope of sand already named, and is equally clear in the story of the tailor who made a wager with the devil that he would beat him at a sewing match. He succeeded by giving the Evil One a needle with a thread in it so long that for every stitch the demon had to fly all round the room, whilst the tailor’s was only of the normal length. The devil of folk-lore is more like Pan and the satyrs, than he is like the Adversary who tempted Job. But _de mortuis nil nisi honum_, and _if_—there is much virtue in an _if_—if the devil is drowned let him rest in peace.

When Archbishop Whately was a Fellow of Oriel, he told this story in the Common Room:—“A cobbler in Somersetshire dreamt that a person told him that if he would go to London Bridge he would meet with something to his advantage. He dreamt the same the next night, and again the night after. He then determined to go to London Bridge, and walked thither accordingly. When arrived there, he walked about the whole of the first day without anything occurring; the next day was passed in a similar manner. He resumed his place the third day, and walked about till evening, when, giving it up as hopeless, he determined to leave London and return home. At this moment a stranger came up and said to him, ‘I have seen you for the last three days walking up and down this bridge; may I ask if you are waiting for anyone?’ The answer was ‘No!’ ‘Then what is your object in staying here?’ The cobbler then frankly told his reason for being there, and the dream that had visited him three successive nights. The stranger then advised him to go home again to his work, and no more pay any attention to dreams. ‘I myself,’ he said, ‘had about six months ago a dream. I dreamed three nights together that, if I would go into Somersetshire, in an orchard, under an apple-tree, I should find a pot of gold; but I paid no attention to my dream, and have remained quietly at my business.’ It immediately occurred to the cobbler that the stranger described his own orchard and his own apple-tree. He immediately returned home, dug under the apple-tree, and found a pot of gold. After this increase of fortune he was enabled to send his son to school, where the boy learnt Latin. When he came home for the holidays, he one day examined the pot which had contained the gold, on which was some writing. He said, ‘Father, I can show you that what I have learnt at school is of some use.’ He then translated the Latin inscription on the pot thus, ‘Look under, and you will find better.’ They did look under, and a larger quantity of gold was found.” This story was as current in Lancashire as in Somersetshire. At Swaffham, in Norfolk, there is a figure of a chapman and his dog. This pedlar popular tradition describes as founding the church out of a treasure found in the manner already described. The story is current also in Cornwall and in Yorkshire. It is narrated as a matter of fact in the history of “Dost in Holland.” But it is found in the Eastern as well as in the Western world. This will be seen from this story which is given in E. W. Lane’s “Arabian Tales and Anecdotes”:—“It is related that a man of Baghdád was possessed of ample riches and great wealth; but his wealth passed away and his state changed, and he became utterly destitute, and could not obtain his sustenance save by laborious exertion. And he slept one night, overwhelmed and oppressed, and saw in his sleep a person who said to him, ‘Verily thy fortune is in Cairo; therefore seek it and repair to it.’ So he journeyed to Cairo; and when he arrived there, the evening overtook him, and he slept in a mosque. Now there was, adjacent to the mosque, a house; and as God (whose name be exalted!) had decreed, a party of robbers entered the mosque, and thence passed to that house; and the people of the house, awaking at the disturbance occasioned by the robbers, raised cries; whereupon the Wálee[13] came to their aid with his followers, and the robbers fled. The Wálee then entered the mosque, and found the man of Baghdád sleeping there: so he laid hold upon him, and inflicted upon him a painful beating with mikra’ahst (the thick end of a palm stick used for beating), until he was at the point of death, and imprisoned him; and he remained three days in the prison; after which, the Wálee caused him to be brought, and said to him, ‘From what country art thou?’ He answered, ‘From Baghdád.’—‘And what affair,’ said the Wálee, ‘was the cause of thy coming to Cairo?’ He answered, ‘I saw in my sleep a person who said to me, ‘Verily thy fortune is in Cairo: therefore repair to it.’ And when I came to Cairo, I found the fortune of which he told me to be those blows of the palm stick that I have received from thee.’—And upon this the Wálee laughed so that his grinders appeared, and said to him, ‘O thou son of little sense, _I_ saw three times in my sleep a person who said to me, ‘Verily a house in Baghdád, in such a district, and of such a description, hath in its court a garden, at the lower end of which is a fountain, wherein is wealth of great amount: therefore repair to it and take it. But I went not: and thou, through the smallness of thy sense, hast journeyed from city to city on account of a thing thou hast seen in sleep, when it was only an effect of confused dreams.’—Then he gave him some money, and said to him, ‘Help thyself with this to return to thy city.’ So he took it and returned to Baghdád. Now the house which the Wálee had described, in Baghdád, was the house of that man; therefore when he arrived at his abode, he dug beneath the fountain, and beheld abundant wealth. Thus God enriched and sustained him; and this was a wonderful coincidence.” This story is found in the “Masnavi,” written by Jaláuddin, who died about A.D. 1260.

It is not always easy or even possible to trace the precise pedigree of a popular superstition or custom, but many of them can be identified as fragments of bygone religious and mythological systems. When an old faith is supplanted by a new, the missionaries, as a matter of tact, will leave untouched customs that are harmless, and will turn to better uses those that can safely be modified or appropriated. Thus much of folk-lore is fossil theology, and much of it is fossil science. The wonderful “cures,” and sometimes disgusting remedies that linger in use among the ignorant, were the recognised methods of the healing art a few generations ago. Folk-lore, in some respect, corresponds to that wonderful faculty of “make-believe” possessed by all children, and is an inheritance from the mental childhood of the race. The physical evils, the mental and moral discordances of life, are to primitive man not the result of the operation of natural law, but abnormal phenomena, the result of external non-human agencies. Disease is not regarded as the result of infractions of hygienic rules, but as the possession of the sufferer by evil spirits. When man looked around for an explanation of the facts of nature, he found it by peopling the world with unseen beings, who guarded the trees and the wells; who let loose the storm and chained up the winds; who had the good and the evil gifts of human nature; who helped and hindered; who cheated and were cheated. These imaginary beings are sometimes merely the distortion and personification of words. It is not every great language that has attained to the dignity of a neuter gender, though our own possesses one. Personification is a common enough rhetorical device. It is possible, then, that if we could accurately analyse the notions of a modern Lancashire mind, we should find in addition to the deliberately-held faith of conviction fragments of the mythologies of Greece and Rome and Scandinavia and India.

In regard to popular traditions and the household stories, so dear to children, they have come to us by many routes, but the line has always been from East to West. The Buddhist missionaries, going forth to preach the faith of Gautama, made abundant use of fables and apologues to enforce their lessons. The traders, as their caravans passed from land to land, beguiled the tedium of the journey with such narratives. The mediæval preachers freely employed them in their discourses to the unlearned people. If such a phrase be permitted, these tales formed the unwritten popular literature of the Middle Ages. The stories passed from mouth to mouth, and were gradually associated with the place and people best known to the narrator. In this way legends become localised.

The tendency of modern thought is to simplification. The African savage, bowing to his fetish, has probably a more complex theory of life than the Oxford professor, and the study of folk-lore shows how penetrating was the influence of custom and superstition upon the life of the people. It followed man from the cradle to the grave. There were ceremonies to be observed at birth, at marriage, at death; at every stage of the journey of life. It gave to clouds and birds omens that decided human fate. It peopled the meadows with fairies, and the mountains with witches; and made the woods and waters alive with spirits, sometimes friendly, but often malignant. It lighted the Beltane fires at Midsummer and the Yule-log at Christmas. The Calendar of the Year and the Calendar of Man’s Life alike registered its decrees. Whatever happened, good or bad, was referred alike to the supernatural powers, who for bane or blessing were continually intervening in the most trivial details of every home. Fairies were sometimes friends and sometimes foes, but witches and warlocks were entirely malicious. The dead rested not in their graves, but returned to terrify the living. The old gods, dethroned from their eminence, remained as demons to exercise a real and usually an evil power. Viewed in this light the decay of folk-lore may be regarded as an advantage. We may regret the nymphs and dryads, and even the “lubber fiend,” but with them vanish the whole tribe of “witches and warlocks and things that cried ‘Boh’ in the night.” We will not desire to revive or retain the popular superstitions and customs of bygone days, but as they pass away let us examine them with careful and patient attention, and see what they have to tell us of the past history of the race and the psychology of primitive man. Studied in this spirit we may sometimes learn as much from the observation of a child’s game as from the speculations of a philosopher.

Footnote 13:

Chief magistrate of the police.

Manchester Grammar School Mill.

In 1883 the Manchester School Mill was acquired by the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Company, in order to make a new road from Long Millgate to Victoria Station. With the destruction of the School Mill there passed away a curious relic of ancient custom, and a link that connected modern Manchester with the quaint old town that stood by Irk and Irwell in the fourteenth century. In the very home of Free Trade there existed a monopoly at least six centuries old. The School Mill claimed the right to grind all the malt that is brewed within the limits of the old town of Manchester. This monopoly is but a fragment of its former privileges, which were abolished as inimical to the general good more than a century ago.

In Roman times as a prime requisite a water mill, it is said, was erected upon the rocky channel of the Medlock below the station and town, on a site which in later times was called Knot Mill. If this be correct, the situation must have been found inconvenient, for the town mill next heard of was situated on the Irk. The right of compelling their vassals to grind at the “lord’s mill,” and to pay such tolls as he might fix, was a valuable privilege to the lord of the manor of a busy and thriving place. When Randle, Earl of Chester, granted the first charter to Salford in 1230, he said in it:—“No burgess ought to bake bread to be sold save at my oven by reasonable custom. If I shall have a mill there the burgesses shall grind at my mill to the twentieth measure, and if I shall not have a mill there they may grind where they will.” When Thomas Grelle, Baron of Manchester, in 1301, granted the charter, by which for many succeeding centuries Manchester was governed, he was careful to remind his burgesses that they should have their corn ground at his mill and their bread baked at his oven, “paying to the aforesaid mill and aforesaid oven the customs as they ought and are wont to do.”