WHO WERE THE FAIRIES? 267 



erected over his name. This was the view of 

 Euhemerus in the fourth century, B.C. ; it has 

 been the view of many since ; it is not too much 

 perhaps to say that it is the view of many, perhaps 

 most, of those most competent to form an opinion 

 to-day. Such a view would teach that behind the 

 legendary Arthur of Malory and Tennyson there 

 was a real Artorius or some such named man 

 around whom many extraneous legends accumu- 

 lated. Such men recognize the amazing toughness 

 of tradition, and it is certain that they can support 

 their belief in its toughness by many remarkable 

 examples. At any rate, such an attitude underlies 

 Mr. MacRitchie's well-known effort to explain 

 the fairies. 



According to his view the stories about the 

 fairies are really stories, half-forgotten, almost 

 wholly perverted, entirely misunderstood, respect- 

 ing early races of this and other countries, but 

 especially these islands : tales told of them by an 

 after coming invading race which may often have 

 had to surfer from a pin-prick policy on the part 

 of those whom it had dispossessed. And he points 

 out that such a race of dispossessed inhabitants 

 would naturally, when not actually enslaved, lead 

 a furtive, underground, nocturnal existence as the 

 fairies are fabled to do. They might from time to 

 time have been called in to act as midwives, perhaps 

 from that belief in their magic which all conquer- 

 ing races seem to have accorded to those whom 

 they had conquered ; they very likely did on occa- 

 sion steal from their supplanters not merely food 

 and other articles, but sometimes children. In 



