The fairies

Up the aery mountain,

Down the rushy glen,

We daren't go ahunting

for fear of little men;

Wee folk, good folk,

Trooping all together;

Green jacket, Red cap

And white owl's feather.

Down along the rocky shore

Some make their home,

They live on crispy pancakes,

Of yellow tide foam;

Some in the reeds

Of the black mountain lake,

With frogs for their watchdogs,

all night awake.

High on the hilltop the old king sits;

He is now so old and grey

He's nigh lost his wits

With a bridge of white mist...

Columkille he crosses

On his stately journies

From Slieve

League to Rosses.

Or going up with music

On cold starry nights,

To sup with the queen

Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget

for seven years long,

And when she came down again

Her friends were all gone.

They took her lightly back,

Between the night and morrow,

They thought she was fast asleep,

But she was dead from sorrow.

They have kept her ever since

Deep within a lake,

On a bed of flag leaves,

Watching till she wake...

By the craggy hillside,

Through the mosses bare,

They have planted thorntrees,

For pleasure here and there.

Is any man so daring,

As dig them up in spite,

He shall find their sharpest thorns

In his bed at night.