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Cannington Camp

Hillfort

Folklore

Fear of meeting the Wild Hunt prevents most villagers from using the footpath across the fields under the camp after dark yet. It is told that one man who dared to cross it about midnight heard the sounds of a pack of hounds in full cry, and for a time wondered what fetched "the old squire" out hunting at that time of night. However, as there was evidently a good run going on, he hastened to open the field gate toward which the pack was coming, and stood by to watch. And when the dogs came through, they were not the squire's, but terrible great black dogs, with fiery red tongues lolling out, and the gentleman with them was riding a great black horse without a head.

No harm came to the man in this case. But only the quick wit of another man saved him. He also dared to cross the path in the dark, and was overtaken by the Wild Hunt as it passed overhead. And when he looked up, there was the devil himself following the hounds and riding on a great pig. What was worse, the devil pulled up and spoke to him.
"Good fellow," he called, "how ambles my sow?"
The man was "most terrible feared," but he knew that he must make some answer, so he replied:
"Eh, by the Lord, her ambles well enow!"
And that saved him, for the devil could not abide the Name of the Lord, so he and his dogs vanished in a flash of fire!
Local Traditions of the Quantocks
C. W. Whistler
Folklore, Vol. 19, No. 1. (Mar. 30, 1908), pp. 31-51.
Rhiannon Posted by Rhiannon
7th October 2006ce

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