from under a stone

I had always thought of fairies as dull, too pretty to be interesting. But suddenly I found myself reading about a fairy that wasn’t pretty at all. He was Yallery Brown, a sprite from the Fen Country of Eastern England, and he was inexorably, mindlessly cruel. He was found by a farmhand who heard a soft weeping sound, like a child crying. The man was a kindly soul, and he searched for the child, to comfort it. What he found, when he overturned a rock, was a little withered thing with bright dark eyes and cloud of long yellow hair. The little thing made him a promise: to stay with him for ever and to help him with his work, as long as he was never thanked. So far, not too bad. But Yallery Brown’s help turned out to be no help at all. Everyone avoided the farmhand because they could see his work being done for him by invisible hands, Things went from bad to worse, until one day the poor farmhand thanked his helper in a despairing effort to get rid of him. From then on Yallery Brown spoiled everything he did, and haunted him day and night, crying out,

“Loss and mischance and Yallery Brown

You’ve let out yourself from under a stone.”

The farmhand died friendless and destitute, with that voice ringing in his ears.

- excerpt from
Introduction: Fear of Fairies
“Troublesome Things”
A history of fairies and fairy stories

by Diane Purkiss

Penguin Books
ISBN 0-140-281-72X