The Fairies

by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM (1828-1889)

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren’t go a-hunting
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 watch-dogs,
All night awake.

High on the hilltop
The old King sits;
He is now so old and gray,
He’s nigh lost his wits.
With a bridge of white mist
Columbkill he crosses,
On his stately journeys
From Slieveleague 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;
When she came down again
Her friends were all gone.
They took her lightly back,
Between the night and morrow;
They thought that she was fast asleep,
But she was dead with sorrow.
They have kept her ever since
Deep within the lake,
On a bed of flag-leaves,
Watching till she wake.

By the craggy hillside,
Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn-trees,
For pleasure here and there.
If any man so daring
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In his bed at night.

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We dare ‘t go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl’s feather!

An Irish man of letters and a poet, William Allingham was born in Ballyshannon, Co. Donegal, Ireland. He first published a volume of Poems in 1850. dedicated to Leigh Hunt, followed by Day and Night Songs, a volume containing many charming lyrics, in 1855. Allingham was friends with Dante Gabriel Rossetti, who contributed to the illustration of the Songs The opening lines from The Fairies were quoted by the character of The Tinker near the beginning of the movie Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.

William Allingham Contemporaries
Christina Rossetti
Emily Dickinson
Lewis Carroll
Anne Bronte