"Tells how the drudging goblin sweat To earn his cream-bowl duly get, When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, His shadowy flail had thresh'd the corn That ten day-labourers could not end; Then lays him down the lubber-fiend, And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length, Basks at the fire his hairy strength, And crop-full, out of door he flings Ere the first cock his matin rings."
But beside these household Dubbies, there are others of a more gloomy and unsocial nature, that keep about lonely barns at a distance from any dwelling-house, or about ruins and old bridges. These are full of mischievous and often malignant tricks, and are fond of playing pranks upon benighted travellers. There is a story, among the old people, of one that haunted a ruined mill, just by a bridge that crosses a small stream; how that, late one night, as a traveller was passing on horseback, the Dubbie jumped up behind him, and grasped him so close round the body that he had no power to help himself, but expected to be squeezed to death: luckily his heels were loose, with which he plied the sides of his steed, and was carried, with the wonderful instinct of a traveller's horse, straight to the village inn. Had the inn been at any greater distance, there is no doubt but he would have been strangled to death; as it was, the good people were a long time in bringing him to his senses, and it was remarked that the first sign he showed of returning consciousness was to call for a bottom of brandy.
These mischievous Dubbies bear much resemblance in their natures and habits to those sprites which Heywood, in his Heirarchie, calls pugs or hobgoblins:
"------Their dwellings be In corners of old houses least frequented Or beneath stacks of wood, and these convented, Make fearfull noise in butteries and in dairies; Robin Goodfellow some, some call them fairies. In solitarie rooms these uprores keep, And beate at doores, to wake men from their slape, Seeming to force lockes, be they nere so strong, And keeping Christmasse gambols all night long. Pots, glasses, trenchers, dishes, pannes and kettles. They will make dance about the shelves and settles. As if about the kitchen tost and cast, Yet in the morning nothing found misplac't. Others such houses to their use have fitted, In which base murthers have been once committed. Some have their fearful habitations taken In desolate houses, ruin'd and forsaken."