and things that fly, if they be uncomely; their lives are gay with
fine frolic and delicate revelry." Puck, the jester of fairyland, stands
apart from the rest, the recognizable "lob of spirits," a rough,
"fawn-faced, shock-pated little fellow, dainty-limbed shapes around
him." Judging, then, from the elaborate account which the poet has
bequeathed us of the fairies, it is evident that the subject was one in
which he took a special interest. Indeed, the graphic pictures he has
handed down to us of

"Elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes and groves;
And ye, that on the sands with printless foot,
Do chase the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him
When he comes back; you demy-puppets that
By moonshine do the green-sour ringlets make
Whereof the ewe not bites," etc.,

show how intimately he was acquainted with the history of these little
people, and what a complete knowledge he possessed of the superstitious
fancies which had clustered round them. In Shakespeare's day, too, it
must be remembered, fairies were much in fashion; and, as Johnson
remarks, common tradition had made them familiar. It has also been
observed that, well acquainted, from the rural habits of his early life,
with the notions of the peasantry respecting these beings, he saw that
they were capable of being applied to a production of a species of the
wonderful. Hence, as Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps[1] has so aptly written,
"he founded his elfin world on the prettiest of the people's traditions,
and has clothed it in the ever-living flowers of his own exuberant
fancy." Referring to the fairy mythology in the "Midsummer-Night's
Dream," it is described by Mr. Keightley[2] as an attempt to blend "the
elves of the village with the fays of romance." His fairies agree with
the former in their diminutive stature--diminished, indeed, to dimensions
inappreciable by village gossips--in their fondness for dancing, their
love of cleanliness, and their child-abstracting propensities. Like the
fays, they form a community, ruled over by the princely Oberon and the
fair Titania. There is a court and chivalry; Oberon would have the
queen's sweet changeling to be a "knight of his train, to trace the
forests wild." Like earthly monarchs, he has his jester, "that shrewd
and knavish sprite called Robin Goodfellow."

[1] "Illustrations of the Fairy Mythology of 'A
Midsummer-Night's Dream,'" 1845, p. xiii.

[2] "Fairy Mythology," p. 325.

Of the f