Kindly Ghosts.
Most of the ghosts whom we have been as yet considering are malignant. There are, however, others which are friendly. Such are the German Elves, the Robin Goodfellow, Puck, Brownie and the Cauld Lad of Hilton of England, the Glashan of the Isle of Man, the Phouka or Leprehaun of Ireland. Such, in one of his many forms, is the Brahmadaitya, or ghost of a Brâhman who has died unmarried. In Bengal he is believed to be more neat and less mischievous than other ghosts; the Bhûts carry him in a palanquin, he wears wooden sandals, lives in a Banyan or Bel tree, and Sankhachûrnî is his mistress. He appears to be about the only respectable bachelor ghost. In one of the folk-tales a ghostly reaper of this class assists his human friend, and can cut as much of the crop in a minute as an ordinary person can in a day.215 So, the Manx Brownie is called the Fenodyree, and he is described as a hairy, clumsy fellow who would thresh a whole barnful of corn in a single night for the people to whom he felt well disposed.216 This Brahmadaitya is the leader of the other ghosts in virtue of his respectable origin; he lives in a tree, and, unlike other varieties of Bhûts, does not eat all kinds of food, but only such as are considered ceremonially pure. He never, like common Bhûts, frightens men, but is harmless and quiet, never plaguing benighted travellers, nor entering into the bodies of living men or women, but if his dignity be insulted, or any one trespass on his domains, he wrings their necks.