Tyne and Wear Folk Tales for Children E-Book

Adam Bushnell

• Herausgeber: The History Press
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 100

Beschreibung

Wise witches, flying donkeys and Half Hanged Macdonald: Tyne and Wear has a rich and diverse history of folklore, magic, evil fairies, saints and even the Devil himself. Storytellers Adam Bushnell and Dave Silk bring to life the rolling hills, winding rivers and Jurassic coastline in this illustrated collection of lively tales for children.

Leseprobe

First published 2018

The History Press

The Mill, Brimscombe Port

Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL5 2QG

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

© Adam Bushnell & Dave Silk, 2018

The right of Adam Bushnell & Dave Silk to be identified as the Authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the Publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978 0 7509 9027 1

Typesetting and origination by The History Press

Printed and bound in Great Britain by TJ International Ltd

eBook converted by Geethik Technologies

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Rude Rabbit

The Wizard’s Cave

The Pig of Doom

Jackey Johnson

Johnny Reed’s Cat

The Wallsend Witches

The Newcastle Witches

Super Hero Saint

Saint Cuthbert’s Journey

The Flying Donkey

The Cauld Lad of Hylton

Half-Hanged MacDonald

The Evil Fairies of Stanhope

Brancepeth’s Brawn

The Hedley Kow

The Lambton Worm

Bibliography

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would both like to thank The History Press for asking us to write this book. We’d also like to thank Durham Cathedral, Newcastle Castle and Hylton Castle for their continued support to us both.

Enormous thanks to Nigel Clifton, the awesome and talented illustrator of this book.

Adam would also like to express his gratitude to Sarah, Michael, Lorna, Isla and his parents for their patience and support.

Thanks also to Chris Bostock, Paul Martin, Ian McKone; and editors Harry and Dee.

Dave would like to thank his mam and Becky for persuading him to write this (and lending him the laptop). He would also like to thank his fellow Moss Troopers, Jez Hunt and Mica Hind, for being a constant source of useful nonsense, inane chatter and patient friendship, and Pearl Saddington for getting him into this line of business in the first place!

INTRODUCTION

It was a real challenge to select which folk tales from the rivers Tyne and Wear we would tell in this collection for children. There were some monsters that simply had to go into the book, such as The Lambton Worm and the Bishop Auckland boar. There were some characters that needed to be included too, such as St Cuthbert and Jackey Johnson. In the end, we went with a mixture of well-known tales and those not so well known. We also added new characters such as Tia Maria, the wise witch, too.

Even though the book is aimed at children, we want the tales to be enjoyed by anyone who reads them. They can be read alone or be told aloud to an audience. The tone of voice is meant to be that of a local lad sharing the tales of the past with the whole community: tales that have been told many times before across the whole of the North East of England, but perhaps never quite like this.

Hold on to your flat caps and your whippets, ladies and gentlemen. These folk tales are not your ordinary retellings. There are triple-plaited nasal hairs, donkeys that zoom across the sky and witches that don’t use broomsticks to fly but plates on their feet! There’s more madness and shenanigans within these pages than can be kept in a wizard’s cave.

So read on to find something old, something new, something borrowed and it’s all just for you!

The people of Castle Eden Dene were shocked. As shocked as finding a kitten in a carrier bag! That’s how shocked they were. And it was all down to a rabbit.

It had begun as something that they thought of as quite funny. At first, anyway. Some little black rabbit had started to watch the villagers as they went about their daily business. It sat and eyed them curiously.

‘There he is again!’ they would laugh when the furry bundle would sit and watch.

‘It’s so cute!’ laughed a small girl.

‘I want it as my pet!’ declared her friend.

But then the rabbit began not just to watch but to interfere with the daily business in the village.

When the maids would go to milk the cows, they found that the rabbit had beaten them to it! The milk was already taken. Drunk dry by the little furry fiend.

When the blacksmith was looking for his hammer, the rabbit had hidden it. Actually, taken it and buried it out in the fields!

When the fisherman had gone down to the river, he found his fishing lines had been chewed right through.

‘That’s it!’ bellowed the farmer.

‘What’s it?’ asked his wife.

‘That rabbit!’

‘What about it?’

‘It has to go!’

‘Go where?’

The farmer jumped to his feet. ‘Right into the jaws of my hunting dog, that’s where!’

Soon a bit of a crowd was following the farmer as he huffed and puffed to the edge of the village. He was dragging along a rather dishevelled-looking greyhound named Bolt.

‘Right, Bolt.’ The farmer grinned. ‘You see that rabbit, there?’

Bolt looked into the distance. He didn’t reply. He didn’t nod. But the farmer knew he understood every word.

‘Get him!’

Bolt scratched his ear with his back leg and then sat down.

‘Bolt!’ the farmer said, stamping his foot. ‘Get that rabbit!’ The farmer gave Bolt a nudge and he was off chasing after the rabbit. Now you might think that a greyhound racing over the land toward its prey might make a rabbit move. But this rabbit did not. It just sat there with an almost mischievous grin upon its face.

Bolt drew nearer.

The rabbit just sat there.

Bolt was almost on top of the furry creature.

It didn’t even blink.

Bolt leapt into the air.

The rabbit stepped to one side and Bolt landed in a gigantic heap of cow poo. Splat!

The rabbit turned and looked at the villagers. It stuck out its tongue and did a long and loud raspberry sound.

THHHHHPPPPPPTTTTTTTTT!

With that, it was off.

The farmer was furious! Bolt wasn’t too happy either.

‘Don’t worry!’ called the blacksmith. ‘We’ll ALL get our dogs and be ready for him tomorrow!’

The very next day, the villagers were ready. No fewer than twelve fine hunting dogs were gathered at the edge of the field where the rabbit always showed up first. There were three greyhounds, two beagles and seven dogs whose breed could have been anything. They were up early and they were ready!

‘Here he comes!’ snarled the farmer.

Bolt sat upright. He did not like baths yet had to take one yesterday. He growled when he saw the rabbit appear from the hedgerow.

The rabbit stopped when it saw the crowd ready and waiting. Then it turned its tail to them and started waving it at them.

‘Is it teasing us?’ a boy asked.

‘Well it’s twerking its tail,’ a girl sighed. ‘What else do you think its doing?’

Then the rabbit turned to the villagers and gave out another enormous

THHHHHPPPPPPTTTTTTTTT!

That was it. Bolt was off. The other dogs ran close behind. The rabbit continued to do its weird dance, all the while making trump sound after trump sound.

It was only when the dogs were impossibly close that the rabbit turned and zoomed in and out of the hedgerow. The dogs bounded after it and each one got stuck! They whined and whimpered from the thorny hedges. They cried and called for their owners. All the while the rabbit seemed to be laughing! It was enjoying itself. It gave each dog a little kick before disappearing into the hedgerow for one last time.

‘What are we going to do?’ asked the farmer, once Bolt had been freed from the hedge. ‘That rabbit is making us look like fools!’

‘We’ll go see the only one who knows about these things!’ announced the blacksmith. ‘We’ll go see the wise woman … Tia Maria!’

Everyone nodded and carried their wounded dogs through the village and over to Tia’s house. They knocked. They waited.

Eventually the door was flung open and there was Tia Maria in all her glory. She was around 90 years old but didn’t look a day over 172. She had one eye that was looking at you and one eye that was looking for you. Her nasal hair was plaited in three parts. She was quite a sight.

‘Hiya!’ she croaked.

Everyone mumbled a miserable greeting in return.

‘What’s up?’ she enquired.

‘It’s that rabbit,’ the farmer said. ‘You must have seen it. Been up to all kinds of mischief!’

‘I still haven’t found my hammer!’ complained the blacksmith.

Tia Maria nodded. ‘It is no ordinary rabbit!’ she rasped. ‘You’ll never catch it but you might be able to follow it.’

‘How?’ asked the farmer. ‘It leaves no tracks or trace!’

‘It does, but you can’t sense it.’ She let her words hang there for a few moments. ‘You need help from a creature that can follow scents!’ she explained.

‘What, like a bloodhound?’ asked the blacksmith.

She nodded and snapped her fingers. ‘You’ve got it!’

With that, she slammed her door shut and began singing inside her house.

‘I’ve got a mate in Hesleden who has a bloodhound.’ The blacksmith grinned. ‘I’ll go get it and we can wait for the rabbit to come along in the morning!’

A great cheer went up. The people were happy. They knew they could always rely on the wisdom of Tia Maria.

The next morning, the villagers were gathered at the edge of the field once more. The atmosphere was as heavy as dragon dung. And dragons poop stone.

It seemed like seconds were passing as hours but at last the rabbit appeared. It stuck its head out of the hedgerow and revealed its pink tongue again.

THHHHHPPPPPPTTTTTTTTT!

The villagers were off towards the rabbit. It seemed to laugh and jumped into the hedgerow. It zipped and darted in and out. It leapt this way and that.

The blacksmith led the bloodhound angrily on. When the rabbit saw that, it stopped. It seemed to hold an expression of surprise upon its furry face. Then it turned and ran off.

The blacksmith gave a triumphant laugh.

‘Ha!’ he guffawed. ‘That’s done it! We’ll follow it to its home!’

The rabbit raced into the dene. It ran from tree to tree, and the villagers and the dogs followed its every move, the bloodhound in front as it pulled at the lead, straining to follow the scent of the crazy creature. They spent all day going around and around. Now the rabbit was tiring. It was slower than before.

It was then that the blacksmith let the bloodhound off the lead. It jumped and snapped and caught the rabbit’s leg. The rabbit squealed and kicked at the dog’s face. The dog let go and the rabbit zoomed off.

‘He’s lost it!’ shouted the farmer.

‘He’s lost nothing,’ grinned the blacksmith. ‘We’ve got it now!’

The lead was now back on the bloodhound. The blacksmith and the villagers were led through the dene and out to the other side. They came to the village of Easington. All the while the bloodhound led them along, pulling and panting as it went.

They walked right to the other side of the village. There they came to a house. The bloodhound barked and scratched at the door.

‘In there?’ asked the farmer.

‘I guess so!’ replied the blacksmith.

He opened the door and sitting there by the fire was a woman older than Tia Maria. She was rubbing her leg, which had tooth marks on it. The tooth marks from a bloodhound.

‘You’re the rabbit?!’ asked a shocked blacksmith.

‘She’s a witch!’ screeched the farmer.

‘That’s right,’ the old woman squawked back at them, ‘and if you don’t get out of here, I’m going to turn you into sausages or bananas or something much worse!’