IV.  An absurd belief in the fables of classical antiquity lent an additional feature to the character of the woodland spirits of whom we treat.  Greece and Rome had not only assigned tutelary deities to each province and city, but had peopled, with peculiar spirits, the Seas, the Rivers, the Woods, and the Mountains.  The memory of the pagan creed was not speedily eradicated, in the extensive provinces through which it was once universally received; and, in many particulars, it continued long to mingle with, and influence, the original superstitions of the Gothic nations.  Hence, we find the elves occasionally arrayed in the costume of Greece and Rome, and the Fairy Queen and her attendants transformed into Diana and her nymphs, and invested with their attributes and appropriate insignia.—­DELRIUS, pp. 168, 807.  According to the same author, the Fairy Queen was also called Habundia.  Like Diana, who, in one capacity, was denominated Hecate, the goddess of enchantment, the Fairy Queen is identified in popular tradition, with the Gyre-Carline, Gay Carline, or mother witch, of the Scottish peasantry.  Of this personage, as an individual, we have but few notices.  She is sometimes termed Nicneven, and is mentioned in the Complaynt of Scotland, by Lindsay in his Dreme, p. 225, edit. 1590, and in his Interludes, apud PINKERTON’S Scottish Poems, Vol.  II. p. 18.  But the traditionary accounts regarding her are too obscure to admit of explanation.  In the burlesque fragment subjoined, which is copied from the Bannatyne MS. the Gyre Carline is termed the Queen of Jowis (Jovis, or perhaps Jews), and is, with great consistency, married to Mohammed.[A]

[Footnote A: 

  In Tyberius tyme, the trew imperatour,
  Quhen Tynto hills fra skraipiug of toun-henis was keipit,
  Thair dwelt are grit Gyre Carling in awld Betokis bour,
  That levit upoun Christiane menis flesche, and rewheids unleipit;
  Thair wynit ane hir by, on the west syde, callit Blasour,
  For luve of hir lanchane lippis, he walit and he weipit;
  He gadderit are menzie of modwartis to warp doun the tour: 
  The Carling with are yren club, quhen yat Blasour sleipit,
     Behind the heil scho hat him sic ane blaw,
     Quhil Blasour bled ane quart
     Off milk pottage inwart,
     The Carling luche, and lut fart
       North Berwik Law.

  The king of fary than come, with elfis many ane,
  And sett are sege, and are salt, with grit pensallis of pryd;
  And all the doggis fra Dunbar wes thair to Dumblane,
  With all the tykis of Tervey, come to thame that tyd;
  Thay quelle doune with thair gonnes mony grit stane,
  The Carling schup hir on ane sow, and is her gaitis gane,
  Grunting our the Greik sie, and durst na langer byd,
  For bruklyng of bargane, and breikhig of browis: 
     The Carling now for dispyte
     Is maieit with Mahomyte,
     And will the doggis interdyte,
       For scho is queue of Jowis.