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Elidor and The Golden Ball

This story was first collected by the medieval chronicler Geraldus Cambrensis, and tells of how a young boy lived for a time in the fairy kingdon, until the day he tried to steal one of their belongings. This version is from Joseph Jacob's More Celtic Fairy Tales, 1892.

In the days of Henry Beauclerc of England there was a little lad named Elidore, who was being brought up to be a cleric. Day after day he would trudge from his mother's house, and she was a widow, up to the monks' Scriptorium. There he would learn his A B C's, to read it and to write. But he was a lazy little rogue was this Elidore, and as fast as he learned to write one letter, he forgot another; so it was very little progress he was making.

Now when the good monks saw this they remembered the saying of the Book "Spare the rod and spoil the child," and whenever Elidore forgot a letter they tried to make him remember it with the rod. At first they used it seldom and lightly, but Elidore was not a boy to be driven, and the more they thwacked him the less he learned: so the thwackings became more frequent and more severe, til Elidore could not stand any longer. So one day when he was twelve years old he upped with them and offed with him into the great forest near St. David's.

There for two long days and nights he wandered about eating nothing but hips and haws. At last he found himself at the mouth of a cave, at the side of a river, and there he sank down, all tired and exhausted. Suddenly two little pigmies appeared to him and said "Come with us, and we will lead you into a land full of games and sports: "So Elidore raised himself and went with these two; at first through an underground passage all in the dark, but soon they came out into a most beautiful country, with rivers and meadows, woods and plains, as pleasant as can be; only this there was curious about it, that the sun never shone and clouds were always over the sky, so that neither sun was seen by day, nor moon and stars at night."

The two little men led Elidore before their king, who asked why and whence he came. Elidore told him, and the king said : "Thou shalt attend on my son," and waved him away. So for a long time Elidore waited on the king's son, and joined in all the games and sports of the little men.


After a time Elidore began to long to see boys and men of his own size, and he begged permission to go and visit his mother. So the King gave him permission: so the little men led him along the passage, and guided him through the forest, till he came near his mother's cottage, and when he entered, was not she rejoiced to see her dear son again? " Where have you been? What have you done?" she cried ; and he had to tell her all that had happened to him. She begged of him to stay with her, but he had promised the King to go back. And soon he returned, after making his mother promise not to tell where he was, or with whom.







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