🦄 Do you like fantasy?

Colonel Thomas Sydney lived at the Old Hall, Ranworth, in Norfolk. He was a bully and a drunkard who liked to hunt and be the best at everything. The Colonel enjoyed nothing better than galloping ahead of everyone else! He was always in the lead by hook or by crook! He also loved a dare and a bet. It got him into a whole heap of trouble, as you will see.



The Colonel just couldn't help himself. He had to be the best. On the last day of December, at the biggest and grandest hunt meeting of 1770, he challenged one of his neighbours to a race. All the important locals were there. They wanted to see the Colonel take a fall; many of them thought that was what he deserved.



The race was quickly underway and soon the neighbour began to draw ahead of the Colonel, to the excited cheers from the crowd. When the Colonel saw that he was well behind and about to lose, a devilish look crossed his face.



He promptly pulled out his pistol and shot the neighbour's horse! The injured horse reared up as the crowd gasped in horror; the neighbour was thrown from his horse and trampled to death, right in front of the Colonel's eyes.



Well, you can bet if the devil did not have a claim on the Colonel's wicked soul before, there was little doubt now. What a dastardly deed!



You may think that the Colonel would have felt sorry or kept out of the way for a bit after that, but you would be wrong.



A stormy New Year's Eve was the night of the Great Hunt Banquet at the Old Hall, and nothing, but nothing, was going to stop the Colonel's enjoyment of a good night of feasting and drinking. Sorry and sad he was not!



Just as the drunken Colonel's voice could be heard shouting out above the other drunken banquet-goers, the door of the Hall was suddenly flung wide open with a BANG!



Standing in the doorway was a tall commanding figure in a jet-black cloak - a stranger - nobody could see his face.



Without a word, he dragged the open-mouthed and terrified Colonel screaming and kicking from his seat, out into the dark night. A few merrymakers dared to look as the stranger threw the terrified Colonel across his saddle.





Quickly mounting his black horse, the stranger galloped off into the darkness, with the Colonel cursing, kicking and screaming, held tightly under his arm.



Away went the stranger across Ranworth Broad, the hooves of his horse raised clouds of steam as they galloped through the rain and spray - they were so hot!



They continued to watch until the dark rider and the Colonel faded into the mist and steam.





It won't come as a surprise that the Colonel was never seen alive again after that. His mysterious disappearance was the subject of much gossip. Some said, with a smirk, that they had seen the devil carrying his body away across the marshes and it was what the Colonel rightly deserved.



However, today, you can still catch a glimpse of the Colonel according to legend. It is said, that every year on the last night in December, the same terrifying scene can be glimpsed when the ghostly Colonel and his black-cloaked capturer can be seen galloping across the broads in a cloud of steam and spray.

A classic tale I never tire of reading, Foxy

The Changeling

Once upon a time in Ireland, there lived a woman called Shiela. Shiela had a small baby whom she loved above all else.



One Saturday morning, she noticed that her baby did not look right. Her baby boy was fat, healthy, and happy. This "thing" in her baby's crib was thin and looked like a skeleton. It was ugly and had shifty eyes, not at all like Shiela's baby. This baby "thing" never stopped crying. Shiela was at wit's end. Where was her son? What was in her son's crib? And would it never stop wailing?



Shiela's neighbors came and tried to comfort her. They told her that what was in her baby's crib was certainly a changeling. She must ask the wise woman what to do.



Shiela left her small thatched cottage and went along the road to the wise woman's house. But she traveled slowly because tears were pouring down her cheeks. She missed her little son and worried about him. Had the good people really taken her baby and left one of theirs in his place? Were they treating her son kindly? Would she ever see him again? These and other sad thoughts chased each other through her mind.



When Sheila was in the wise woman's house, she told the woman the whole story. The wise woman asked many questions about the baby in Sheila's cottage. Finally, after talking for two hours, the wise woman said, "Yes, you have a changeling. Here is what you must do."



When sheila returned to her home, she hurried to her chicken house and collected a dozen eggs. Going into her house, she did not look at the changeling. Instead, she went to the hearth, started a huge, hot fire, and put on a big pot of water. When the water was boiling, Sheila broke the eggs and threw away the yolks and whites. But she kept the shells.



Sheila noticed that the changeling, for once, was very quiet. She saw from the corner of her eye that it was watching what she did very closely. But Sheila never looked at it directly.



Sheila tossed the egg shells into the boiling water.



"What are you doing, Mother?" asked the baby.



Sheila knew then that the baby was indeed a changeling, for her own son was too young to speak.



"I am brewing, my son," replied Sheila.



"What are you brewing, Mother?" asked the changeling in the creaky voice of a very old man.



"I am brewing egg shells, son," said Sheila.



"I have lived for fifteen hundred years and I have never seen anyone brew egg shells before," laughed the changeling.



At that, Sheila jumped up from the fireplace and ran toward the changeling. But she had risen so quickly that she slipped and fell. When she got up and ran to the crib, the changeling was no longer there. But there was her own dear baby, sleeping quietly and with a smile on his lips.



Sheila gently picked him up. Tears slipped down her face and dropped onto his head. But this time the tears were tears of joy!



courtesy Irish Culture & Customs