WHO WERE THE FAIRIES ? 265 



with them) ; stealing cattle, children, goods from 

 their human neighbours to whom they sometimes 

 act in the capacity of midwives ; wandering from 

 place to place ; sometimes kindly, sometimes re- 

 vengeful in a word the fairies with whom we 

 learnt to be familiar when children from our story 

 books. 



Who were these fairies ? From what did all these 

 tales flow ? Were they pure efforts of imagination 

 or is there an underlying stratum of actual fact 

 beneath these seeming trifles ? It is the problem 

 of Euhemerus once more, and many are the efforts 

 which have been made to solve it, not, it must so 

 far be admitted, with any very conspicuous suc- 

 cess. Some there are like Kirk, who dispose readily 

 of the matter by asserting that there really are 

 fairies, a solution which would of course at once 

 account for the belief in their existence. Of these 

 is Mr. Wentz who came over from America, 

 where there are plenty of legends of little people 

 though no true fairies, to find out what he could 

 find out about the genuine article. The result is 

 the truly amazing book which must be treated 

 with respect, since it has won for its writer degrees 

 in Academies no less distinguished than the Uni- 

 versities of Rennes and Oxford (to place them in 

 the chronological order in which the degrees were 

 obtained). It is not a wholly satisfactory guide 

 even to things as to which our knowledge is 

 sufficient, as may be instanced by the assertion 

 that the Catholic Doctrine of Purgatory was 

 derived from the Celtic notion of Re-Birth, and 

 might be made evident by many another example, 



