Edigar and the Fairies

In the mornings, crispy frost covers the landscape, icily knitting its way around ever leaf and stick. Last night, as dusk was settling in, we hurriedly dug the very last rows of potatoes from the garden, piling them into crates to take to the root cellar to join all the other tuberous companions, along with the colorful array of winter squash. The root cellar is full, and all these crops are safe from the nighttime freezing temperatures.

This morning, we’re preparing for a delivery of hay to help beef up the light yields from our own fields this summer because of the drought. Just as the potatoes, squashes, and onions stored in the root cellar are food for us and our member families all winter, the hay is critical food for the livestock all winter as well.

It reminds me of a story I’d like to share with you, and as Halloween draws nigh, it’s fitting that this is a fairy story. I learned the tale from delightful Tracy Chipman, and she learned the story when she visited the Shetland and Hebridean Islands, north of Scotland.

Many of these islands are farmed, and regionally these farms are called crofts. A person who farms them is known as a crofter. Edigar was one such crofter, and he was a bachelor whose parents had passed on, so he was living all alone on his small croft with his gardens and a cow, a few sheep and pigs, and the windswept beauty of the island.

It was about this time of year, when winter is inching in and they say the veil between the worlds grows thin. It was the time of the gloaming, or evening, and Edigar was in his barn milking the cow, when suddenly he could sense that he was being watched. Turning, Edigar could see a hundred tiny eyes peering in at him through the barn door. It was the fairies, watching him milk the cow in awe, licking their lips. Fairies don’t raise livestock, and they covet the deliciousness of milk.

“Please, please Edigar,” they begged, “Give us the pail of warm milk with the frothy cream on top, and we would do any task for you, anything at all.”

Well, Edigar thought about this for a moment. See, he was all alone and there was always so much work to be done on the farm, and with winter settling in, he could certainly think of a few things where help would be most welcome. So, he decided to take the fairies up on their offer. He set out the pail and in they came, gathering around the warm pail of milk, lap-lap-lapping it up with their tongues. In no time at all, the milk was gone.

“Alright Edigar,” they chimed in unison, “What shall you have us do in the morning?”

“I haven’t got the hay in yet,” Edigar replied earnestly. “I’d like it cut, dried, and stacked in the barn for winter.”

“It shall be done!” they cried with glee, clapped their hands, and disappeared into the night.

And, in the morning, there were all the fairy folk with their tiny scythes and tiny pitch forks out in the field harvesting the hay. And in the magic that is only available to fairies, all the hay was cut and dried and bundled and stacked all in one day.

That night, when Edigar was in the barn milking the cow, the fairies returned, licking their lips at the sight of the milk.

“Please, please Edigar,” they begged, “Give us the pail of warm milk with the frothy cream on top, and we would do any task for you, anything at all.”

Well, Edigar had another task ready to give them, so he let them have the pail of milk again, and in they came to the barn. With a lap-lap-lap of their tiny tongues, all the milk soon was gone.

“Alright Edigar,” they chimed in unison, “What shall you have us do in the morning?”

“I want you to dig my potatoes,” was his request, and a mighty request that is indeed if you’ve dug your own potatoes. This would be Edigar’s main food all winter for himself, and his potato patch was quite large and down a hill from the house, so all the spuds would have to be carried up the hill.

“It shall be done!” they chimed, undaunted, clapped their hands and scurried off into the night.

And, in the morning, there were the fairy folk out in his potato patch with their tiny shovels and forks, and in the magical way only available to fairies, all the potatoes were harvested, dried, and stored away before nightfall.

But Edigar was concerned that things might soon go badly, remembering his mother’s retellings of how if the fairies grew angry, life could go terribly wrong. It crept into his dreams that night, where sand was everywhere in his house—in the tea cups, in the drawers, everywhere!

But in the morning, he had a plan, and when the fairies came back for more milk, he again let them have it. And when they asked for the next day’s work, he calmly said, “Make me a rope out of sand.”

The room went quiet. The fairies looked at each other, and then they burst out laughing. “Oh, oh, Edigar, that is a good one! We understand that you don’t need our help anymore. Thank you for the milk, and we won’t bother you again.” And off they went, into the night.

And off I go to stack the hay. See you down on the farm sometime.