The Mythology of Fairies - Thomas Keightley

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thunder and lightning, that you will think the world is going to end. Then you will think that you see a great flowing river before you, wondrously black and deep; but know, sire, that right easily will you be able to go through it without wetting the feet of your horse, for it is nothing but a phantom and enchantments that the dwarf will make for you, because he wishes to have you with him, and if it so be that you keep firm to your resolve, not to speak to him, you will be surely able to escape," etc.70

      Huon for some time followed the sage advice of Gerasmes, and avoided Oberon le fayé. The storms of rain and thunder came on as predicted, the magic horn set them all dancing, and at last the knight determined to await and accost the dwarf.

      "The Dwarf Fay came riding through the wood, and was clad in a robe so exceeding fine and rich, that it would be a marvel to relate it for the great and marvellous riches that were upon it; for so much was there of precious stones, that the great lustre that they cast was like unto the sun when he shineth full clear. And therewithal he bare a right fair bow in his fist, so rich that no one could value it, so fine it was; and the arrow that he bare was of such sort and manner, that there was no beast in the world that he wished to have, that it did not stop at that arrow. He had at his neck a rich horn, which was hung by two rich strings of fine gold."71

      This horn was wrought by four Fairies, who had endowed it with its marvellous properties.

      Oberon, on bringing Huon to speech, informed him that he was the son of Julius Cæsar, and the lady of the Hidden Island, afterwards called Cephalonia. This lady's first love had been Florimont of Albania, a charming young prince, but being obliged to part from him, she married, and had a son named Neptanebus, afterwards King of Egypt, who begot Alexander the Great, who afterwards put him to death. Seven hundred years later, Cæsar, on his way to Thessaly, was entertained in Cephalonia by the lady of the isle, and he loved her, for she told him he would defeat Pompey, and he became the father of Oberon. Many a noble prince and noble fairy were at the birth, but one Fairy was unhappily not invited, and the gift she gave was that he should not grow after his third year, but repenting, she gave him to be the most beautiful of nature's works. Other Fairies gave him the gift of penetrating the thoughts of men, and of transporting himself and others from place to place by a wish; and the faculty, by like easy means, of raising and removing castles, palaces, gardens, banquets, and such like. He further informed the knight, that he was king and lord of Mommur; and that when he should leave this world his seat was prepared in Paradise—for Oberon, like his prototype Elberich, was a veritable Christian.

      When after a variety of adventures Oberon comes to Bordeaux to the aid of Huon, and effects a reconciliation between him and Charlemagne, he tells Huon that the time is at hand that he should leave this world and take the seat prepared for him in Paradise, "en faerie ne veux plus demeurer." He directs him to appear before him within four years in his city of Mommur, where he will crown him as his successor.

      Here the story properly ends, but an addition of considerable magnitude has been made by a later hand, in which the story is carried on.

      Many are the perils which Huon encounters before the period appointed by Oberon arrives. At length, however, he and the fair Esclairmonde (the Rezia of Wieland) come to Mommur. Here, in despite of Arthur (who, with his sister Morgue la faée and a large train, arrives at court, and sets himself in opposition to the will of the monarch, but is reduced to order by Oberon's threat of turning him into a Luyton de Mer72), Huon is crowned king of all Faerie "tant du pais des Luytons comme des autres choses secretes reservées dire aux hommes." Arthur gets the kingdom of Bouquant, and that which Sybilla held of Oberon, and all the Faeries that were in the plains of Tartary. The good king Oberon then gave Huon his last instructions, recommending his officers and servants to him, and charging him to build an abbey before the city, in the mead which the dwarf had loved, and there to bury him. Then, falling asleep in death, a glorious troop of angels, scattering odours as they flew, conveyed his soul to Paradise.

      Isaie le Triste is probably one of the latest romances, certainly posterior to Huon de Bordeaux, for the witty but deformed dwarf Tronc, who is so important a personage in it, is, we are told, Oberon, whom Destiny compelled to spend a certain period in that form. And we shall, as we have promised, prove Oberon to be the handsome dwarf-king Elberich. In Isaie the Faery ladies approach to the Fées of Perrault, and Madame D'Aulnoy. Here, as at the birth of Oberon and of Ogier le Danois, they interest themselves for the new-born child, and bestow their gifts upon it. The description in this romance of the manner in which the old hermit sees them occupied about the infant Isaie is very pleasing. It was most probably Fairies of this kind, and not the diminutive Elves, that Milton had in view when writing these lines:

      Good luck betide thee, son, for, at thy birth,

       The Faery ladies danced upon the hearth.

       Thy drowsy nurse hath sworn she did them spy

       Come tripping to the room where thou didst lie,

       And, sweetly singing round about thy bed,

       Strew all their blessings on thy sleeping head.

      The description of the Vergier des Fées in Isaie le Triste, and of the beautiful valley in which it was situated, may rival in richness and luxuriancy similar descriptions in Spenser and the Italian poets.73

      We have now, we trust, abundantly proved our position of the Fairies of romance being, at least at the commencement, only 'human mortals,' endowed with superhuman powers, though we may perceive that, as the knowledge of Oriental fiction increased, the Fairies began more and more to assume the character of a distinct species. Our position will acquire additional strength when in the course of our inquiry we arrive at France and Italy.

      Closely connected with the Fairies is the place of their abode, the region to which they convey the mortals whom they love, 'the happy lond of Faery.'

      FAIRY LAND.

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      There, renewed the vital spring,

       Again he reigns a mighty king

       And many a fair and fragrant clime,

       Blooming in immortal prime,

       By gales of Eden ever fanned,

       Owns the monarch's high command.

       T. Warton.

      Among all nations the mixture of joy and pain, of exquisite delight and intense misery in the present state, has led the imagination to the conception of regions of unmixed bliss destined for the repose of the good after the toils of this life, and of climes where happiness prevails, the abode of beings superior to man. The imagination of the Hindoo paints his Swergas as 'profuse of bliss,' and all the joys of sense are collected into the Paradise of the Mussulman. The Persian lavished the riches of his fancy in raising the Cities of Jewels and of Amber that adorn the realms of Jinnestân; the romancer erected castles and palaces filled with knights and ladies in Avalon and in the land of Faerie; while the Hellenic bards, unused to pomp and glare, filled the Elysian Fields and the Island of the Blest with tepid gales and brilliant flowers. We shall quote without apology two beautiful passages from Homer and Pindar, that our readers may at one view satisfy themselves of the essential difference between classic and romantic imagination.

      In Homer, Proteus tells Menelaus that, because he had had the honour of being the son-in-law of Zeus, he should not die in "horse-feeding Argos."

      But thee the ever-living gods will send

       Unto the Elysian plain and distant bounds

       Of Earth, where dwelleth fair-hair'd Rhadamanthus.

       There life is easiest unto men; no snow,

       Or wintry storm, or rain, at any time,

       Is there; but evermore the Ocean sends

       Soft-breathing airs of Zephyr to refresh

       The habitants.—Od. iv. 563.

      This passage is finely imitated by Pindar, and

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