More from ‘Local Traditions of the Quantocks’ by C. W. Whistler
(in Folklore, Vol. 19, No. 1. (Mar. 30, 1908), pp. 31-51.), which I seem to have overlooked. Must have been the Pixy Effect.
The Pixy legends of the district are of no unusual type. Belief in “Pixy leading” is general, and only a few years since a woman, lost in a sudden evening mist within a few minutes walk across the fields from her house, and unable to regain the pathway or find the stile, became actually demented from terror, firmly believing that she was “Pixy led.” The legends have one special centre round a large mound on the Wick “moor”, exploration of which has this year yielded some very remarkable results. The mound is about ninety feet across by eleven feet high, mainly composed of stones, and it was said to move bodily about the field in whose centre it stands.
Barrows moving about? How very unusual. But I do refer you to Grinsell’s cautious remarks below.