A Straunge and terrible Wunder

From Rev. Abraham Fleming's account of the appearance of the ghostly black dog "Black Shuck" at the church of Bungay, Suffolk in 1577

This should be a morning to set the church bells ringing in 
that vanished village of Shipden which lies beneath the sea! 
But all I can hear above the roaring of wind and sea is 
the scream of a sea-bird and the song of a lark which the 
storm cannot keep from soaring. If there were any truth 
in those old legends of tolling bells in the sea depths, such a 
gale as this should make the East Anglian coast as musical as 
the "City of Churches" on a Christmas Eve ; for many a ham- 
let, and many a church which was a landmark to seamen, has 
gone down cliff between Aldborough and Lynn. But now 
it is the children only who listen for the bells, just as it is
the children only who go about at night in fear of Black Shuck. 
If this were a stormy night instead of a stormy day the old 
fisher-folk of the coast would say it were just the time for
Black Shuck to be abroad ; for he revels in the roaring of the
waves and loves to raise his awful voice above the howling of the 
gale.

Vanished from the fen when the pools growed up

Marsh White (1975) by Margaret Mellis

" Hob-o'-Lantern," or the " lantern-man," seems to 
have vanished from the fen when the pools "growed up," 
No one appears to regret this, for he is supposed to have 
been a dangerous sprite to encounter, and only foolhardy 
persons went out of their way to make his acquaintance. 
As old Ben once said, "If so be as how you went a-nigh 
him, he would 'come for you' like as though he wor a- 
goin' ter knock you down." This had not been his own 
experience, for he had always kept away from the fen 
when the lantern-man was in possession ; but he had 
known a man to go down into the fen at night with a 
lantern, and have a lantern-man " go right tru him and 
take his breath right away." He had heard people say 
that the lantern-man was only a kind of marsh gas ; but 
he did not believe it, for no matter in what direction the 
wind might be blowing, there were times when the light 
was seen going against it ; in fact, it used to " mamder 
around" in all directions, and then suddenly go "a- 
slidderen orf as though it wor a flash o' lightnin'."

Will O' The Wisp.

Illustration from Robert Mudie's A Popular Guide to the Observation of Nature (1836)

 I have often seen this, although it is every day becoming more rare from the extension of drainage. The first I saw was in a fenny bog called "Quy Bottom," a few miles from Cambridge, on the Newmarket road. I have seen them since, both in Norfolk and Suffolk. Probably W. might procure a sight of one if he would inquire of some rustic where they most frequently occur. But for this purpose he must know the venacular name in the district in which he lives. In Herts they are called "hob o' lanterns," or "hobby-lanterns." Along the valley of the Waveney they are called "Syleham lamps," from a village in Suffolk named Syleham, where formerly they were common, although now destroyed by good drainage. In Norfolk they are called "lantern-men," and it is popularly believed that if a man with a lighted lantern goes near one, the enraged "lanternman" will knock him down and burst his lantern to pieces. More than one labourer, whose truthfulness I have no reason to question, has assured me that such a thing has happened to himself. Quest, Can the lighted lantern have ignited the gas, and caused an explosion, which has startled the rustic and burst his lantern? I have generally seen them at the end of October and beginning of November, probably because the marsh vegetation is then beginning to decay. But I find in my diary that I saw one on the second day of March, 1844.

I do not think that any one could be led astray by a Will o' the Wisp. Its appearance is so peculiar, and its movements so fanstastic, that I cannot imagine it to be mistaken for a light in a house, or a lantern carried by a man. In Norfolk a person who has lost his way, and cannot find a gate or stile, with the situation of which he ought to be familiar, and is in fact utterly bewildered, is said to be "ledwilled." A common remedy with rustics, in such a case, is to turn the left stocking wrong side outwards, and then to renew the search. Forby, and after him Halliwell, derive this phrase "ledwilled" from being led by Will o' the Wisp. But I am inclined to suggest a different origin for it. There is an obsolete adjective "wille," given by Halliwell and Jamieson, signifying lost in doubt: "will of wone," at a loss for a habitation; "will of rede," without advice. Jamieson compares it with Su. G., will, Isl. vill-a, error; Isl. vill-az, to lead astray. He has also, "Wilsum, in a wandering state, implying the ideas of dreariness and ignorance of one's way." This, in Old English, seems to have been wilful. For, in the Robin Hood ballad (Percy's Reliques), Sir Guy of Gisborne says :

"'I am wilful of my way,' quo' the yeman,
     'And of my morning tyde.'
'I'll lead thee through the wood,' sayd Robin,
  'Good fellow, I'll be thy guide.'"

This word, like the Scotch wilsum, seems to answer completely to the Norfolk "ledwilled," which thus would mean "will of leading, at a loss to guide oneself." In the notes to Canto IV. of The Lady of the Lake, Scott quotes from Jamieson's translation of the Kæmpe Viser:

"'Up, will of rede, the husbande stood,
 Wi' heart fu' sad and sair," &c.

To which he appends the following glossorial note :

"Will of rede, bewildered in thought; in the Danish original vildraadage, Lat. inopa consilii; Gr. ἀπορωψ."

 "This expression," he adds, "is obsolete in the Danish as well as in the English." If, however, my conjectural etymology be correct, it is not obsolete in the Norfolk dialect.   E. G. R.

 The anonymous "E.G.R." (1855), Will o' the Wisp. In Notes and Queries, 13th October 1855, p.290.