The most serious of all the fairy thefts was the theft of human beings: human babies taken to reinforce the fairy stock and changelings left in their place, children enticed away, young maidens to be brides, newly delivered mothers to act as nurses to fairy babies and others. Once these humans had been made captives in fairyland it was very difficult, though not impossible, to rescue them, but there are quite a number of anecdotes of the prevention of theft or of rescues before the captive had reached fairyland. 'The Laird of Balmachie's Wife', from Gibbings's Folk-Lore and Legends, Scotland' is a representative example. It is reproduced in A Dictionary of British Folk-Tales in the English Language (Part B, Vol.I):

In the olden times, when it was the fashion for gentlemen to wear swords, the Laird of Balmachie went one day to Dundee, leaving his wife at home ill in bed. Riding home in the twilight, he had occasion to leave the high road, and when crossing between some little romantic knolls, called the Cur-hills, in the neighbourhood of Carlungy, he encountered a troop of fairies supporting a kind of litter, upon which some person seemed to be borne. Being a man of dauntless courage, and, as he said, impelled by some internal impulse, he pushed his horse close to the litter, drew his sword, laid it across the vehicle, and in a firm tone exclaimed:

'In the name of God, release your captive.'