lubber fiend
[Cf. lubber n. 1 c.]
A beneficent goblin supposed to perform some of the laborious work of a household or farm during the night; a ‘Lob-lie-by-the-fire’. Also transf.
| 1632 Milton L' Allegro 110 Tells how the drudging Goblin swet, To ern his Cream-bowle duly set,..Then lies him down the Lubber Fend, And stretch'd out all the Chimney's length, Basks at the fire his hairy strength. 1831 Edin. Rev. LIV. 175 The lubber-fiend has nothing of the sly humour of Robin Goodfellow about him. 1889 Morris in Mackail Life (1899) II. 222 Except that the parson is a lubber-fiend, and that the people are as poor as may be, nothing need be better. |