Place: Borders.
Source: Sir George Douglas, Scottish Fairy and Folk Tales.
Narrator: Robert Oliver, a shepherd on Jed Water who died about 1820.
can tell ye about the vera last fairy that as seen hereaway.When my father was a young man he lived at Hyndlee an' herdir the Brocklaw. Weel, it was the custom to milk the yowes in thae days, an' my faither was buchtin' the Brocklaw yowes to twae young, lish, clever, hizzies ae nicht i' the gloamin'. Nae little gabbin' an' daffin' gaed on amang the threesome, I'se warrant ye, till at last, just as it chanced to get darkish, my faither chancit to luik alang the lea at the head o' the bucht, an' what did he see but a wee little creaturie a' clad i' green, an' wi' lang hair, yellow as gowd, hingin' round its shoulders, comin' straight for him, whiles gi'en a whink o' a greet, an' aye atween its haunds raisin' a queer, unyirthly cry, `Hae ye seen Hewie Milburn? Oh! hae ye seen Hewie Milburn?'
Instead o' answering the creature, my faither sprang ower the bucht-flake to be near the lasses, saying "Bill us a'--what's that?"
"Ha, ha! Patie lad," quo Bessie Elliot, a free-spoken Liddesdale hempy; "theer a wife com'd for ye the nicht, Patie lad."
"A wife!" said my faither. "May the Lord keep me frae sic a wife as that!" and he confessed till his deein' day he was in sic a fear that the hairs o' his heid stuiid up like the birses of a hurcheon.<> The creature wasnae bigger than a three-year-auld lassie, but feat an' tight, lithe o'limb as ony grown woman, an' its face was the doonright perfection of beauty, only there was something wild and unyirthly in its e'en that couldna be lookit at, faur less describit: it didna molest them, but aye taigl't on aboot the bucht, now and then repeatin' its cry, "Hae ye seen Hewie Milburn?" Sae they cam' to nae ither conclusion than that it had tint its companion.
When my faither and the lasses left the bucht it followed them hame to the Hyndlee kitchen, where they offered it yowe brose, but it wadna tak' onything till at last a ne'er-do-weel callant made as if he wad grip it wi' a pair o' reed-het tangs, an' it appeared to be offendit, an' gaed awa' doon the burnside, cryin' its auld cry eerier an' waesomer than ever, and disappeared in a bush o' seggs.
