CHAPTER X. THE ETERNAL SOUL IN FOLK-TALES.

(M80) In a former part of this work we saw that, in the opinion of

primitive people, the soul may temporarily absent itself from the body

without causing death.(320) Such temporary absences of the soul are often

believed to involve considerable risk, since the wandering soul is liable

to a variety of mishaps at the hands of enemies, and so forth. But there

is another aspect to this power of disengaging the soul from the body. If

only the safety of the soul can be ensured during its absence, there is no

reason why the soul should not continue absent for an indefinite time;

indeed a man may, on a pure calculation of personal safety, desire that

his soul should never return to his body. Unable to conceive of life

abstractly as a “permanent possibility of sensation” or a “continuous

adjustment of internal arrangements to external relations,” the savage

thinks of it as a concrete material thing of a definite bulk, capable of

being seen and handled, kept in a box or jar, and liable to be bruised,

fractured, or smashed in pieces. It is not needful that the life, so

conceived, should be in the man; it may be absent from his body and still

continue to animate him by virtue of a sort of sympathy or action at a

distance. So long as this object which he calls his life or soul remains

unharmed, the man is well; if it is injured, he suffers; if it is

destroyed, he dies. Or, to put it otherwise, when a man is ill or dies,

the fact is explained by saying that the material object called his life

or soul, whether it be in his body or out of it, has either sustained

injury or been destroyed. But there may be circumstances in which, if the

life or soul remains in the man, it stands a greater chance of sustaining

injury than if it were stowed away in some safe and secret place.

Accordingly, in such circumstances, primitive man takes his soul out of

his body and deposits it for security in some snug spot, intending to

replace it in his body when the danger is past. Or if he should discover

some place of absolute security, he may be content to leave his soul there

permanently. The advantage of this is that, so long as the soul remains

unharmed in the place where he has deposited it, the man himself is

immortal; nothing can kill his body, since his life is not in it.

(M81) Evidence of this primitive belief is furnished by a class of

folk-tales of which the Norse story of “The giant who had no heart in his

body” is perhaps the best-known example. Stories of this kind are widely

diffused over the world, and from their number and the variety of incident

and of details in which the leading idea is embodied, we may infer that

the conception of an external soul is one which has had a powerful hold on

the minds of men at an early stage of history. For folk-tales are a

faithful reflection of the world as it appeared to the primitive mind; and

we may be sure that any idea which commonly occurs in them, however absurd

it may seem to us, must once have been an ordinary article of belief. This

assurance, so far as it concerns the supposed power of disengaging the

soul from the body for a longer or shorter time, is amply corroborated by

a comparison of the folk-tales in question with the actual beliefs and

practices of savages. To this we shall return after some specimens of the

tales have been given. The specimens will be selected with a view of

illustrating both the characteristic features and the wide diffusion of

this class of tales.(321)

(M82) In the first place, the story of the external soul is told, in

various forms, by all Aryan peoples from Hindoostan to the Hebrides. A

very common form of it is this: A warlock, giant, or other fairyland being

is invulnerable and immortal because he keeps his soul hidden far away in

some secret place; but a fair princess, whom he holds enthralled in his

enchanted castle, wiles his secret from him and reveals it to the hero,

who seeks out the warlock’s soul, heart, life, or death (as it is

variously called), and, by destroying it, simultaneously kills the

warlock. Thus a Hindoo story tells how a magician called Punchkin held a

queen captive for twelve years, and would fain marry her, but she would

not have him. At last the queen’s son came to rescue her, and the two

plotted together to kill Punchkin. So the queen spoke the magician fair,

and pretended that she had at last made up her mind to marry him. “And do

tell me,” she said, “are you quite immortal? Can death never touch you?

And are you too great an enchanter ever to feel human suffering?” “It is

true,” he said, “that I am not as others. Far, far away, hundreds of

thousands of miles from this, there lies a desolate country covered with

thick jungle. In the midst of the jungle grows a circle of palm trees, and

in the centre of the circle stand six chattees full of water, piled one

above another: below the sixth chattee is a small cage, which contains a

little green parrot;—on the life of the parrot depends my life;—and if the

parrot is killed I must die. It is, however,” he added, “impossible that

the parrot should sustain any injury, both on account of the

inaccessibility of the country, and because, by my appointment, many

thousand genii surround the palm trees, and kill all who approach the

place.” But the queen’s young son overcame all difficulties, and got

possession of the parrot. He brought it to the door of the magician’s

palace, and began playing with it. Punchkin, the magician, saw him, and,

coming out, tried to persuade the boy to give him the parrot. “Give me my

parrot!” cried Punchkin. Then the boy took hold of the parrot and tore off

one of his wings; and as he did so the magician’s right arm fell off.

Punchkin then stretched out his left arm, crying, “Give me my parrot!” The

prince pulled off the parrot’s second wing, and the magician’s left arm

tumbled off. “Give me my parrot!” cried he, and fell on his knees. The

prince pulled off the parrot’s right leg, the magician’s right leg fell

off; the prince pulled off the parrot’s left leg, down fell the magician’s

left. Nothing remained of him except the trunk and the head; but still he

rolled his eyes, and cried, “Give me my parrot!” “Take your parrot, then,”

cried the boy; and with that he wrung the bird’s neck, and threw it at the

magician; and, as he did so, Punchkin’s head twisted round, and, with a

fearful groan, he died!(322) In another Hindoo tale an ogre is asked by

his daughter, “Papa, where do you keep your soul?” “Sixteen miles away

from this place,” he said, “is a tree. Round the tree are tigers, and

bears, and scorpions, and snakes; on the top of the tree is a very great

fat snake; on his head is a little cage; in the cage is a bird; and my

soul is in that bird.” The end of the ogre is like that of the magician in

the previous tale. As the bird’s wings and legs are torn off, the ogre’s

arms and legs drop off; and when its neck is wrung he falls down

dead.(323)

(M83) In another Hindoo story a princess called Sodewa Bai was born with a

golden necklace about her neck, and the astrologer told her parents, “This

is no common child; the necklace of gold about her neck contains your

daughter’s soul; let it therefore be guarded with the utmost care; for if

it were taken off, and worn by another person, she would die.” So her

mother caused it to be firmly fastened round the child’s neck, and, as

soon as the child was old enough to understand, she told her its value,

and warned her never to let it be taken off. In course of time Sodewa Bai

was married to a prince who had another wife living. The first wife,

jealous of her young rival, persuaded a negress to steal from Sodewa Bai

the golden necklace which contained her soul. The negress did so, and, as

soon as she put the necklace round her own neck, Sodewa Bai died. All day

long the negress used to wear the necklace; but late at night, on going to

bed, she would take it off and put it by till morning; and whenever she

took it off, Sodewa Bai’s soul returned to her and she lived. But when

morning came, and the negress put on the necklace, Sodewa Bai died again.

At last the prince discovered the treachery of his elder wife and restored

the golden necklace to Sodewa Bai.(324) In another Hindoo story a holy

mendicant tells a queen that she will bear a son, adding, “As enemies will

try to take away the life of your son, I may as well tell you that the

life of the boy will be bound up in the life of a big _boal_ fish which is

in your tank, in front of the palace. In the heart of the fish is a small

box of wood, in the box is a necklace of gold, that necklace is the life

of your son.” The boy was born and received the name of Dalim. His mother

was the Suo or younger queen. But the Duo or elder queen hated the child,

and learning the secret of his life, she caused the _boal_ fish, with

which his life was bound up, to be caught. Dalim was playing near the tank

at the time, but “the moment the _boal_ fish was caught in the net, that

moment Dalim felt unwell; and when the fish was brought up to land, Dalim

fell down on the ground, and made as if he was about to breathe his last.

He was immediately taken into his mother’s room, and the king was

astonished on hearing of the sudden illness of his son and heir. The fish

was by the order of the physician taken into the room of the Duo queen,

and as it lay on the floor striking its fins on the ground, Dalim in his

mother’s room was given up for lost. When the fish was cut open, a casket

was found in it; and in the casket lay a necklace of gold. The moment the

necklace was worn by the queen, that very moment Dalim died in his

mother’s room.” The queen used to put off the necklace every night, and

whenever she did so, the boy came to life again. But every morning when

the queen put on the necklace, he died again.(325)

(M84) In a Cashmeer story a lad visits an old ogress, pretending to be her

grandson, the son of her daughter who had married a king. So the old

ogress took him into her confidence and shewed him seven cocks, a spinning

wheel, a pigeon, and a starling. “These seven cocks,” said she, “contain

the lives of your seven uncles, who are away for a few days. Only as long

as the cocks live can your uncles hope to live; no power can hurt them as

long as the seven cocks are safe and sound. The spinning-wheel contains my

life; if it is broken, I too shall be broken, and must die; but otherwise

I shall live on for ever. The pigeon contains your grandfather’s life, and

the starling your mother’s; as long as these live, nothing can harm your

grandfather or your mother.” So the lad killed the seven cocks and the

pigeon and the starling, and smashed the spinning-wheel; and at the moment

he did so the ogres and ogresses perished.(326) In another story from

Cashmeer an ogre cannot die unless a particular pillar in the verandah of

his palace be broken. Learning the secret, a prince struck the pillar

again and again till it was broken in pieces. And it was as if each stroke

had fallen on the ogre, for he howled lamentably and shook like an aspen

every time the prince hit the pillar, until at last, when the pillar fell

down, the ogre also fell down and gave up the ghost.(327) In another

Cashmeer tale an ogre is represented as laughing very heartily at the idea

that he might possibly die. He said that “he should never die. No power

could oppose him; no years could age him; he should remain ever strong and

ever young, for the thing wherein his life dwelt was most difficult to

obtain.” It was in a queen bee, which was in a honeycomb on a tree. But

the bees in the honeycomb were many and fierce, and it was only at the

greatest risk that any one could catch the queen. However, the hero

achieved the enterprise and crushed the queen bee; and immediately the

ogre fell stone dead to the ground, so that the whole land trembled with

the shock.(328) In some Bengalee tales the life of a whole tribe of ogres

is described as concentrated in two bees. The secret was thus revealed by

an old ogress to a captive princess who pretended to fear lest the ogress

should die. “Know, foolish girl,” said the ogress, “that we ogres never

die. We are not naturally immortal, but our life depends on a secret which

no human being can unravel. Let me tell you what it is, that you may be

comforted. You know yonder tank; there is in the middle of it a crystal

pillar, on the top of which in deep waters are two bees. If any human

being can dive into the waters, and bring up to land the two bees from the

pillar in one breath, and destroy them so that not a drop of their blood

falls to the ground, then we ogres shall certainly die; but if a single

drop of blood falls to the ground, then from it will start up a thousand

ogres. But what human being will find out this secret, or, finding it,

will be able to achieve the feat? You need not, therefore, darling, be

sad; I am practically immortal.” As usual, the princess reveals the secret

to the hero, who kills the bees, and that same moment all the ogres drop

down dead, each on the spot where he happened to be standing.(329) In

another Bengalee story it is said that all the ogres dwell in Ceylon, and

that all their lives are in a single lemon. A boy cuts the lemon in

pieces, and all the ogres die.(330)

(M85) In a Siamese or Cambodian story, probably derived from India, we are

told that Thossakan or Ravana, the King of Ceylon, was able by magic art

to take his soul out of his body and leave it in a box at home, while he

went to the wars. Thus he was invulnerable in battle. When he was about to

give battle to Rama, he deposited his soul with a hermit called Fire-eye,

who was to keep it safe for him. So in the fight Rama was astounded to see

that his arrows struck the king without wounding him. But one of Rama’s

allies, knowing the secret of the king’s invulnerability, transformed

himself by magic into the likeness of the king, and going to the hermit

asked back his soul. On receiving it he soared up into the air and flew to

Rama, brandishing the box and squeezing it so hard that all the breath

left the King of Ceylon’s body, and he died.(331) In a Bengalee story a

prince going into a far country planted with his own hands a tree in the

courtyard of his father’s palace, and said to his parents, “This tree is

my life. When you see the tree green and fresh, then know that it is well

with me; when you see the tree fade in some parts, then know that I am in

an ill case; and when you see the whole tree fade, then know that I am

dead and gone.”(332) In another Indian tale a prince, setting forth on his

travels, left behind him a barley plant, with instructions that it should

be carefully tended and watched; for if it flourished, he would be alive

and well, but if it drooped, then some mischance was about to happen to

him. And so it fell out. For the prince was beheaded, and as his head

rolled off, the barley plant snapped in two and the ear of barley fell to

the ground.(333) In the legend of the origin of Gilgit there figures a

fairy king whose soul is in the snows and who can only perish by

fire.(334)

(M86) In Greek tales, ancient and modern, the idea of an external soul is

not uncommon. When Meleager was seven days old, the Fates appeared to his

mother and told her that Meleager would die when the brand which was

blazing on the hearth had burnt down. So his mother snatched the brand

from the fire and kept it in a box. But in after-years, being enraged at

her son for slaying her brothers, she burnt the brand in the fire and

Meleager expired in agonies, as if flames were preying on his vitals.(335)

Again, Nisus King of Megara had a purple or golden hair on the middle of

his head, and it was fated that whenever the hair was pulled out the king

should die. When Megara was besieged by the Cretans, the king’s daughter

Scylla fell in love with Minos, their king, and pulled out the fatal hair

from her father’s head. So he died.(336) Similarly Poseidon made Pterelaus

immortal by giving him a golden hair on his head. But when Taphos, the

home of Pterelaus, was besieged by Amphitryo, the daughter of Pterelaus

fell in love with Amphitryo and killed her father by plucking out the

golden hair with which his life was bound up.(337) In a modern Greek

folk-tale a man’s strength lies in three golden hairs on his head. When

his mother pulls them out, he grows weak and timid and is slain by his

enemies.(338) Another Greek story, in which we may perhaps detect a

reminiscence of Nisus and Scylla, relates how a certain king, who was the

strongest man of his time, had three long hairs on his breast. But when he

went to war with another king, and his own treacherous wife had cut off

the three hairs, he became the weakest of men.(339) In another modern

Greek story the life of an enchanter is bound up with three doves which

are in the belly of a wild boar. When the first dove is killed, the

magician grows sick; when the second is killed, he grows very sick; and

when the third is killed, he dies.(340) In another Greek story of the same

sort an ogre’s strength is in three singing birds which are in a wild

boar. The hero kills two of the birds, and then coming to the ogre’s house

finds him lying on the ground in great pain. He shews the third bird to

the ogre, who begs that the hero will either let it fly away or give it to

him to eat. But the hero wrings the bird’s neck, and the ogre dies on the

spot.(341) In a variant of the latter story the monster’s strength is in

two doves, and when the hero kills one of them, the monster cries out,

“Ah, woe is me! Half my life is gone. Something must have happened to one

of the doves.” When the second dove is killed, he dies.(342) In another

Greek story the incidents of the three golden hairs and three doves are

artificially combined. A monster has on his head three golden hairs which

open the door of a chamber in which are three doves: when the first dove

is killed, the monster grows sick; when the second is killed, he grows

worse; and when the third is killed, he dies.(343) In another Greek tale

an old man’s strength is in a ten-headed serpent. When the serpent’s heads

are being cut off, he feels unwell; and when the last head is struck off,

he expires.(344) In another Greek story a dervish tells a queen that she

will have three sons, that at the birth of each she must plant a pumpkin

in the garden, and that in the fruit borne by the pumpkins will reside the

strength of the children. In due time the infants are born and the

pumpkins planted. As the children grow up, the pumpkins grow with them.

One morning the eldest son feels sick, and on going into the garden they

find that the largest pumpkin is gone. Next night the second son keeps

watch in a summer-house in the garden. At midnight a negro appears and

cuts the second pumpkin. At once the boy’s strength goes out of him, and

he is unable to pursue the negro. The youngest son, however, succeeds in

slaying the negro and recovering the lost pumpkins.(345)

(M87) Ancient Italian legend furnishes a close parallel to the Greek story

of Meleager. Silvia, the young wife of Septimius Marcellus, had a child by

the god Mars. The god gave her a spear, with which he said that the fate

of the child would be bound up. When the boy grew up he quarrelled with

his maternal uncles and slew them. So in revenge his mother burned the

spear on which his life depended.(346) In one of the stories of the

_Pentamerone_ a certain queen has a twin brother, a dragon. The

astrologers declared at her birth that she would live just as long as the

dragon and no longer, the death of the one involving the death of the

other. If the dragon were killed, the only way to restore the queen to

life would be to smear her temples, breast, pulses, and nostrils with the

blood of the dragon.(347) In a modern Roman version of “Aladdin and the

Wonderful Lamp,” the magician tells the princess, whom he holds captive in

a floating rock in mid-ocean, that he will never die. The princess reports

this to the prince her husband, who has come to rescue her. The prince

replies, “It is impossible but that there should be some one thing or

other that is fatal to him; ask him what that one fatal thing is.” So the

princess asked the magician, and he told her that in the wood was a hydra

with seven heads; in the middle head of the hydra was a leveret, in the

head of the leveret was a bird, in the bird’s head was a precious stone,

and if this stone were put under his pillow he would die. The prince

procured the stone, and the princess laid it under the magician’s pillow.

No sooner did the enchanter lay his head on the pillow than he gave three

terrible yells, turned himself round and round three times, and died.(348)

(M88) Another Italian tale sets forth how a great cloud, which was really

a fairy, used to receive a young girl as tribute every year from a certain

city; and the inhabitants had to give the girls up, for if they did not,

the cloud would throw things at them and kill them all. One year it fell

to the lot of the king’s daughter to be handed over to the cloud, and they

took her in procession, to the roll of muffled drums, and attended by her

weeping father and mother, to the top of a mountain, and left her sitting

in a chair there all alone. Then the fairy cloud came down on the top of

the mountain, set the princess in her lap, and began to suck her blood out

of her little finger; for it was on the blood of girls that this wicked

fairy lived. When the poor princess was faint with the loss of blood and

lay like a log, the cloud carried her away up to her fairy palace in the

sky. But a brave youth had seen all that happened from behind a bush, and

no sooner did the fairy spirit away the princess to her palace than he

turned himself into an eagle and flew after them. He lighted on a tree

just outside the palace, and looking in at the window he beheld a room

full of young girls all in bed; for these were the victims of former years

whom the fairy cloud had half killed by sucking their blood; yet they

called her mamma. When the fairy went away and left the girls, the brave

young man had food drawn up for them by ropes, and he told them to ask the

fairy how she might be killed and what was to become of them when she

died. It was a delicate question, but the fairy answered it, saying, “I

shall never die.” However, when the girls pressed her, she took them out

on a terrace and said, “Do you see that mountain far off there? On that

mountain is a tigress with seven heads. If you wish me to die, a lion must

fight that tigress and tear off all seven of her heads. In her body is an

egg, and if any one hits me with it in the middle of my forehead, I shall

die; but if that egg falls into my hands, the tigress will come to life

again, resume her seven heads, and I shall live.” When the young girls

heard this they pretended to be glad and said, “Good! certainly our mamma

can never die,” but naturally they were discouraged. However, when she

went away again, they told it all to the young man, and he bade them have

no fear. Away he went to the mountain, turned himself into a lion, and

fought the tigress. Meantime the fairy came home, saying, “Alas! I feel

ill!” For six days the fight went on, the young man tearing off one of the

tigress’s heads each day, and each day the strength of the fairy kept

ebbing away. Then after allowing himself two days’ rest the hero tore off

the seventh head and secured the egg, but not till it had rolled into the

sea and been brought back to him by a friendly dog-fish. When he returned

to the fairy with the egg in his hand, she begged and prayed him to give

it her, but he made her first restore the young girls to health and send

them away in handsome carriages. When she had done so, he struck her on

the forehead with the egg, and she fell down dead.(349) Similarly in a

story from the western Riviera a sorcerer called Body-without-Soul can

only be killed by means of an egg which is in an eagle, which is in a dog,

which is in a lion; and the egg must be broken on the sorcerer’s forehead.

The hero, who achieves the adventure, has received the power of changing

himself into a lion, a dog, an eagle, and an ant from four creatures of

these sorts among whom he had fairly divided the carcase of a dead

ass.(350)

(M89) Stories of the same sort are current among Slavonic peoples. In some

of them, as in the biblical story of Samson and Delilah, the warlock is

questioned by a treacherous woman as to the place where his strength

resides or his life or death is stowed away; and his suspicions being

roused by her curiosity, he at first puts her off with false answers, but

is at last beguiled into telling her the truth, thereby incurring his doom

through her treachery. Thus a Russian story tells how a certain warlock

called Kashtshei or Koshchei the Deathless carried off a princess and kept

her prisoner in his golden castle. However, a prince made up to her one

day as she was walking alone and disconsolate in the castle garden, and

cheered by the prospect of escaping with him she went to the warlock and

coaxed him with false and flattering words, saying, “My dearest friend,

tell me, I pray you, will you never die?” “Certainly not,” says he.

“Well,” says she, “and where is your death? is it in your dwelling?” “To

be sure it is,” says he, “it is in the broom under the threshold.”

Thereupon the princess seized the broom and threw it on the fire, but

although the broom burned, the deathless Koshchei remained alive; indeed

not so much as a hair of him was singed. Balked in her first attempt, the

artful hussy pouted and said, “You do not love me true, for you have not

told me where your death is; yet I am not angry, but love you with all my

heart.” With these fawning words she besought the warlock to tell her

truly where his death was. So he laughed and said, “Why do you wish to

know? Well then, out of love I will tell you where it lies. In a certain

field there stand three green oaks, and under the roots of the largest oak

is a worm, and if ever this worm is found and crushed, that instant I

shall die.” When the princess heard these words, she went straight to her

lover and told him all; and he searched till he found the oaks and dug up

the worm and crushed it. Then he hurried to the warlock’s castle, but only

to learn from the princess that the warlock was still alive. Then she fell

to wheedling and coaxing Koshchei once more, and this time, overcome by

her wiles, he opened his heart to her and told her the truth. “My death,”

said he, “is far from here and hard to find, on the wide ocean. In that

sea is an island, and on the island there grows a green oak, and beneath

the oak is an iron chest, and in the chest is a small basket, and in the

basket is a hare, and in the hare is a duck, and in the duck is an egg;

and he who finds the egg and breaks it, kills me at the same time.” The

prince naturally procured the fateful egg and with it in his hands he

confronted the deathless warlock. The monster would have killed him, but

the prince began to squeeze the egg. At that the warlock shrieked with

pain, and turning to the false princess, who stood by smirking and

smiling, “Was it not out of love for you,” said he, “that I told you where

my death was? And is this the return you make to me?” With that he grabbed

at his sword, which hung from a peg on the wall; but before he could reach

it, the prince had crushed the egg, and sure enough the deathless warlock

found his death at the same moment.(351)

(M90) In another version of the same story, when the cunning warlock

deceives the traitress by telling her that his death is in the broom, she

gilds the broom, and at supper the warlock sees it shining under the

threshold and asks her sharply, “What’s that?” “Oh,” says she, “you see

how I honour you.” “Simpleton!” says he, “I was joking. My death is out

there fastened to the oak fence.” So next day when the warlock was out,

the prince came and gilded the whole fence; and in the evening when the

warlock was at supper he looked out of the window and saw the fence

glittering like gold. “And pray what may that be?” said he to the

princess. “You see,” said she, “how I respect you. If you are dear to me,

dear too is your death. That is why I have gilded the fence in which your

death resides.” The speech pleased the warlock, and in the fulness of his

heart he revealed to her the fatal secret of the egg. When the prince,

with the help of some friendly animals, obtained possession of the egg, he

put it in his bosom and repaired to the warlock’s house. The warlock

himself was sitting at the window in a very gloomy frame of mind; and when

the prince appeared and shewed him the egg, the light grew dim in the

warlock’s eyes and he became all of a sudden very meek and mild. But when

the prince began to play with the egg and to throw it from one hand to the

other, the deathless Koshchei staggered from one corner of the room to the

other, and when the prince broke the egg, Koshchei the Deathless fell down

and died.(352) “In one of the descriptions of Koshchei’s death, he is said

to be killed by a blow on the forehead inflicted by the mysterious

egg—that last link in the magic chain by which his life is darkly bound.

In another version of the same story, but told of a snake, the fatal blow

is struck by a small stone found in the yolk of an egg, which is inside a

duck, which is inside a hare, which is inside a stone, which is on an

island.”(353) In another Russian story the death of an enchantress is in a

blue rose-tree in a blue forest. Prince Ivan uproots the rose-tree,

whereupon the enchantress straightway sickens. He brings the rose-tree to

her house and finds her at the point of death. Then he throws it into the

cellar, crying, “Behold her death!” and at once the whole building shakes,

“and becomes an island, on which are people who had been sitting in Hell,

and who offer up thanks to Prince Ivan.”(354) In another Russian story a

prince is grievously tormented by a witch who has got hold of his heart,

and keeps it seething in a magic cauldron.(355)

(M91) In a Bohemian tale a warlock’s strength lies in an egg which is in a

duck, which is in a stag, which is under a tree. A seer finds the egg and

sucks it. Then the warlock grows as weak as a child, “for all his strength

had passed into the seer.”(356) A Servian story relates how a certain

warlock called True Steel carried off a prince’s wife and kept her shut up

in his cave. But the prince contrived to get speech of her and told her

that she must persuade True Steel to reveal to her where his strength lay.

So when True Steel came home, the prince’s wife said to him, “Tell me,

now, where is your great strength?” He answered, “My wife, my strength is

in my sword.” Then she began to pray and turned to his sword. When True

Steel saw that, he laughed and said, “O foolish woman! my strength is not

in my sword, but in my bow and arrows.” Then she turned towards the bow

and arrows and prayed. But True Steel said, “I see, my wife, you have a

clever teacher who has taught you to find out where my strength lies. I

could almost say that your husband is living, and it is he who teaches

you.” But she assured him that nobody had taught her. When she found he

had deceived her again, she waited for some days and then asked him again

about the secret of his strength. He answered, “Since you think so much of

my strength, I will tell you truly where it is. Far away from here there

is a very high mountain; in the mountain there is a fox; in the fox there

is a heart; in the heart there is a bird, and in this bird is my strength.

It is no easy task, however, to catch the fox, for she can transform

herself into a multitude of creatures.” So next day, when True Steel went

forth from the cave, the prince came and learned from his wife the true

secret of the warlock’s strength. So away he hied to the mountain, and

there, though the fox, or rather the vixen, turned herself into various

shapes, he managed with the help of certain friendly eagles, falcons, and

dragons, to catch and kill her. Then he took out the fox’s heart, and out

of the heart he took the bird and burned it in a great fire. At that very

moment True Steel fell down dead.(357)

(M92) In another Servian story we read how a dragon resided in a

water-mill and ate up two king’s sons, one after the other. The third son

went out to seek his brothers, and coming to the water-mill he found

nobody in it but an old woman. She revealed to him the dreadful character

of the being that kept the mill, and how he had devoured the prince’s two

elder brothers, and she implored him to go away home before the same fate

should overtake him. But he was both brave and cunning, and he said to

her, “Listen well to what I am going to say to you. Ask the dragon whither

he goes and where his strength is; then kiss all that place where he tells

you his strength is, as if from love, till you find it out, and afterwards

tell me when I come.” So when the dragon came in, the old woman began to

question him, “Where in God’s name have you been? Whither do you go so

far? You will never tell me whither you go.” The dragon replied, “Well, my

dear old woman, I do go far.” Then the old woman coaxed him, saying, “And

why do you go so far? Tell me where your strength is. If I knew where your

strength is, I don’t know what I should do for love; I would kiss all that

place.” Thereupon the dragon smiled and said to her, “Yonder is my

strength, in that fireplace.” Then the old woman began to fondle and kiss

the fireplace; and the dragon on seeing it burst into a laugh. “Silly old

woman,” he said, “my strength is not there. It is in the tree-fungus in

front of the house.” Then the old woman began to fondle and kiss the tree;

but the dragon laughed again and said to her, “Away, old woman! my

strength is not there.” “Then where is it?” asked the old woman. “My

strength,” said he, “is a long way off, and you cannot go thither. Far in

another kingdom under the king’s city is a lake; in the lake is a dragon;

in the dragon is a boar; in the boar is a pigeon, and in the pigeon is my

strength.” The murder was now out; so next morning when the dragon went

away from the mill to attend to his usual business of eating people up,

the prince came to the old woman and she let him into the secret of the

dragon’s strength. The prince accordingly set off to find the lake in the

far country and the other dragon that lived in it. He found them both at

last; the lake was a still and lonely water surrounded by green meadows,

where flocks of sheep nibbled the sweet lush grass. The hero tucked up his

hose and his sleeves, and wading out into the lake called aloud on the

dragon to come forth and fight. Soon the monster emerged from the water,

slimy and dripping, his scaly back glistening in the morning sun. The two

grappled and wrestled from morning to afternoon of a long summer day. What

with the heat of the weather and the violence of his exertions the dragon

was quite exhausted, and said, “Let me go, prince, that I may moisten my

parched head in the lake and toss you to the sky.” But the prince sternly

refused; so the dragon relaxed his grip and sank under the water, which

bubbled and gurgled over the place where he plunged into the depths. When

he had disappeared and the ripples had subsided on the surface, you would

never have suspected that under that calm water, reflecting the green

banks, the white, straying sheep, the blue sky, and the fleecy

gold-flecked clouds of a summer evening, there lurked so ferocious and

dangerous a monster. Next day the combat was renewed with the very same

result. But on the third day the hero, fortified by a kiss from the fair

daughter of the king of the land, tossed the dragon high in air, and when

the monster fell with a most tremendous thud on the water he burst into

little bits. Out of the pieces sprang a boar which ran away as fast as it

could lay legs to the ground. But the prince sent sheep-dogs after it

which caught it up and rent it in pieces. Out of the pieces sprang a

pigeon; but the prince let loose a falcon, which stooped on the pigeon,

seized it in its talons, and brought it to the prince. In the pigeon was

the life of the dragon who kept the mill, so before inflicting on the

monster the doom he so richly merited, the prince questioned him as to the

fate of his two elder brothers who had perished at the hands, or rather

under the claws and fangs, of the dragon. Having ascertained how to

restore them to life and to release a multitude of other victims whom the

dragon kept prisoners in a vault under the water-mill, the prince wrung

the pigeon’s neck, and that of course was the end of the dragon and his

unscrupulous career.(358)

(M93) A Lithuanian story relates how a prince married a princess and got

with her a kingdom to boot. She gave him the keys of the castle and told

him he might enter every chamber except one small room, of which the key

had a bit of twine tied to it. But one day, having nothing to do, he

amused himself by rummaging in all the rooms of the castle, and amongst

the rest he went into the little forbidden chamber. In it he found twelve

heads and a man hanging on the hook of the door. The man said to the

prince, “Oblige me by fetching me a glass of beer.” The prince fetched it

and the man drank it. Then the man said to the prince, “Oblige me by

releasing me from the hook.” The prince released him. Now the man was a

king without a soul, and he at once availed himself of his liberty to come

to an understanding with the coachman of the castle, and between them they

put the prince’s wife in the coach and drove off with her. The prince rode

after them and coming up with the coach called out, “Halt, Soulless King!

Step out and fight!” The King stepped out and the fight began. In a trice

the King had sliced the buttons off the prince’s coat and pinked him in

the side. Then he stepped into the coach and drove off. The prince rode

after him again, and when he came up with the coach he called out, “Halt,

Soulless King! Step out and fight!” The King stepped out and they fought

again, and again the King sliced off the prince’s buttons and pinked him

in the side. Then, after carefully wiping and sheathing his sword, he said

to his discomfited adversary, “Now look here. I let you off the first time

for the sake of the glass of beer you gave me, and I let you off the

second time because you let me down from that infernal hook; but if you

fight me a third time, by Gad I’ll make mince meat of you.” Then he

stepped into the coach, told the coachman to drive on, jerked up the coach

window with a bang, and drove away like anything. But the prince galloped

after him and coming up with the coach for the third time he called out,

“Halt, Soulless King! Step out and fight!” The King did step out, and at

it the two of them went, tooth and nail. But the prince had no chance.

Before he knew where he was, the King ran him through the body, whisked

off his head, and left him lying a heap of raw mince beside the road. His

wife, or rather his widow, said to the King, “Let me gather up the

fragments that remain.” The King said, “Certainly.” So she made up the

mince into a neat parcel, deposited it on the front seat of the coach, and

away they drove to the King’s castle. Well to cut a long story short, a

brother-in-law of the deceased prince sent a hawk to fetch the water of

life; the hawk brought it in his beak; the brother-in-law poured the water

on the fragments of the prince, and the prince came to life again at once

safe and sound. Then he went to the King’s castle and played on a little

pipe, and his wife heard it in the castle and said, “That is how my

husband used to play, whom the King cut in bits.” So she went out to the

gate and said to him, “Are you my husband?” “That I am,” said he, and he

told her to find out from the King where he kept his soul and then to come

and tell him. So she went to the King and said to him, “Where my husband’s

soul is, there must mine be too.” The King was touched by this artless

expression of her love, and he replied, “My soul is in yonder lake. In

that lake lies a stone; in that stone is a hare; in the hare is a duck, in

the duck is an egg, and in the egg is my soul.” So the queen went and told

her former husband, the prince, and gave him plenty of money and food for

the journey, and off he set for the lake. But when he came to the lake, he

did not know in which part of it the stone was; so he roamed about the

banks, and he was hungry, for he had eaten up all the food. Then he met a

dog, and the dog said to him, “Don’t shoot me dead. I will be a mighty

helper to you in your time of need.” So he let the dog live and went on

his way. Next he saw a tree with two hawks on it, an old one and a young

one, and he climbed up the tree to catch the young one. But the old hawk

said to him, “Don’t take my young one. He will be a mighty helper to you

in your time of need.” So the prince climbed down the tree and went on his

way. Then he saw a huge crab and wished to break off one of his claws for

something to eat, but the crab said to him, “Don’t break off my claw. It

will be a mighty helper to you in your time of need.” So he left the crab

alone and went on his way. And he came to people and got them to fish up

the stone for him from the lake and to bring it to him on the bank. And

there he broke the stone in two and out of the stone jumped a hare. But

the dog seized the hare and tore him, and out of the hare flew a duck. The

young hawk pounced on the duck and rent it, and out of the duck fell an

egg, and the egg rolled into the lake. But the crab fetched the egg out of

the lake and brought it to the prince. Then the King fell ill. So the

prince went to the King and said, “You killed me. Now I will kill you.”

“Don’t,” said the King. “I will,” said the prince. With that he threw the

egg on the ground, and the King fell out of the bed as dead as a stone. So

the prince went home with his wife and very happy they were, you may take

my word for it.(359)

(M94) Amongst peoples of the Teutonic stock stories of the external soul

are not wanting. In a tale told by the Saxons of Transylvania it is said

that a young man shot at a witch again and again. The bullets went clean

through her but did her no harm, and she only laughed and mocked at him.

“Silly earthworm,” she cried, “shoot as much as you like. It does me no

harm. For know that my life resides not in me but far, far away. In a

mountain is a pond, on the pond swims a duck, in the duck is an egg, in

the egg burns a light, that light is my life. If you could put out that

light, my life would be at an end. But that can never, never be.” However,

the young man got hold of the egg, smashed it, and put out the light, and

with it the witch’s life went out also.(360) In this last story, as in

many other stories of the same type, the hero achieves his adventure by

the help of certain grateful animals whom he had met and done a service to

on his travels. The same incident occurs in another German tale of this

class which runs thus. Once upon a time there was a young fellow called

Body-without-Soul, or, for short, Soulless, and he was a cannibal who

would eat nothing but young girls. Now it was a custom in that country

that the girls drew lots every year, and the one on whom the lot fell was

handed over to Soulless. In time it happened that the lot fell on the

king’s daughter. The king was exceedingly sorry, but what could he do? Law

was law, and had to be obeyed. So they took the princess to the castle

where Soulless resided; and he shut her up in the larder and fattened her

for his dinner. But a brave soldier undertook to rescue her, and off he

set for the cannibal’s castle. Well, as he trudged along, what should he

see but a fly, an eagle, a bear, and a lion sitting in a field by the side

of the road, and quarrelling about their shares in a dead horse. So he

divided the carcase fairly between them, and as a reward the fly and the

eagle bestowed on him the power of changing himself at will into either of

their shapes. That evening he made himself into an eagle, and flew up a

high tree; there he looked about, but could see nothing but trees. Next

morning he flew on till he came to a great castle, and at the gate was a

big black board with these words chalked up on it: “Mr. Soulless lives

here.” When the soldier read that he was glad, and changed himself into a

fly, and flew buzzing from window to window, looking in at every one till

he came to the one where the fair princess sat a prisoner. He introduced

himself at once and said, “I am come to free you, but first you must learn

where the soul of Soulless really is.” “I don’t know,” replied the

princess, “but I will ask.” So after much coaxing and entreaty she learned

that the soul of Soulless was in a box, and that the box was on a rock in

the middle of the Red Sea. When the soldier heard that, he turned himself

into an eagle again, flew to the Red Sea, and came back with the soul of

Soulless in the box. Arrived at the castle he knocked and banged at the

door as if the house was on fire. Soulless did not know what was the

matter, and he came down and opened the door himself. When he saw the

soldier standing at it, I can assure you he was in a towering rage. “What

do you mean,” he roared, “by knocking at my door like that? I’ll gobble

you up on the spot, skin and hair and all.” But the soldier laughed in his

face. “You’d better not do that,” said he, “for here I’ve got your soul in

the box.” When the cannibal heard that, all his courage went down into the

calves of his legs, and he begged and entreated the soldier to give him

his soul. But the soldier would not hear of it; he opened the box, took

out the soul, and flung it over his head; and that same instant down fell

the cannibal, dead as a door-nail.(361)

(M95) Another German story, which embodies the notion of the external soul

in a somewhat different form, tells how once upon a time a certain king

had three sons and a daughter, and for each of the king’s four children

there grew a flower in the king’s garden, which was a life-flower; for it

bloomed and flourished so long as the child lived, but drooped and

withered away when the child died. Now the time came when the king’s

daughter married a rich man and went to live with him far away. But it was

not long before her flower withered in the king’s garden. So the eldest

brother went forth to visit his brother-in-law and comfort him in his

bereavement. But when he came to his brother-in-law’s castle he saw the

corpse of his murdered sister weltering on the ramparts. And his wicked

brother-in-law set before him boiled human hands and feet for his dinner.

And when the king’s son refused to eat of them, his brother-in-law led him

through many chambers to a murder-hole, where were all sorts of implements

of murder, but especially a gallows, a wheel, and a pot of blood. Here he

said to the prince, “You must die, but you may choose your kind of death.”

The prince chose to die on the gallows; and die he did even as he had

said. So the eldest son’s flower withered in the king’s garden, and the

second son went forth to learn the fate of his brother and sister. But it

fared with him no better than with his elder brother, for he too died on

the gallows in the murder-hole of his wicked brother-in-law’s castle, and

his flower also withered away in the king’s garden at home. Now when the

youngest son was also come to his brother-in-law’s castle and saw the

corpse of his murdered sister weltering on the ramparts, and the bodies of

his two murdered brothers dangling from the gallows in the murder-hole, he

said that for his part he had a fancy to die by the wheel, but he was not

quite sure how the thing was done, and would his brother-in-law kindly

shew him? “Oh, it’s quite easy,” said his brother-in-law, “you just put

your head in, so,” and with that he popped his head through the middle of

the wheel. “Just so,” said the king’s youngest son, and he gave the wheel

a twirl, and as it spun round and round, the wicked brother-in-law died a

painful death, which he richly deserved. And when he was quite dead, the

murdered brothers and sister came to life again, and their withered

flowers bloomed afresh in the king’s garden.(362)

(M96) In another German story an old warlock lives with a damsel all alone

in the midst of a vast and gloomy wood. She fears that being old he may

die and leave her alone in the forest. But he reassures her. “Dear child,”

he said, “I cannot die, and I have no heart in my breast.” But she

importuned him to tell her where his heart was. So he said, “Far, far from

here in an unknown and lonesome land stands a great church. The church is

well secured with iron doors, and round about it flows a broad deep moat.

In the church flies a bird and in the bird is my heart. So long as the

bird lives, I live. It cannot die of itself, and no one can catch it;

therefore I cannot die, and you need have no anxiety.” However the young

man, whose bride the damsel was to have been before the warlock spirited

her away, contrived to reach the church and catch the bird. He brought it

to the damsel, who stowed him and it away under the warlock’s bed. Soon

the old warlock came home. He was ailing, and said so. The girl wept and

said, “Alas, daddy is dying; he has a heart in his breast after all.”

“Child,” replied the warlock, “hold your tongue. I _can’t_ die. It will

soon pass over.” At that the young man under the bed gave the bird a

gentle squeeze; and as he did so, the old warlock felt very unwell and sat

down. Then the young man gripped the bird tighter, and the warlock fell

senseless from his chair. “Now squeeze him dead,” cried the damsel. Her

lover obeyed, and when the bird was dead, the old warlock also lay dead on

the floor.(363)

(M97) In the Norse tale of “the giant who had no heart in his body,” the

giant tells the captive princess, “Far, far away in a lake lies an island,

on that island stands a church, in that church is a well, in that well

swims a duck, in that duck there is an egg, and in that egg there lies my

heart.” The hero of the tale, with the help of some animals to whom he had

been kind, obtains the egg and squeezes it, at which the giant screams

piteously and begs for his life. But the hero breaks the egg in pieces and

the giant at once bursts.(364) In another Norse story a hill-ogre tells

the captive princess that she will never be able to return home unless she

finds the grain of sand which lies under the ninth tongue of the ninth

head of a certain dragon; but if that grain of sand were to come over the

rock in which the ogres live, they would all burst “and the rock itself

would become a gilded palace, and the lake green meadows.” The hero finds

the grain of sand and takes it to the top of the high rock in which the

ogres live. So all the ogres burst and the rest falls out as one of the

ogres had foretold.(365)

(M98) In a Danish tale a warlock carries off a princess to his wondrous

subterranean palace; and when she anxiously enquires how long he is likely

to live, he assures her that he will certainly survive her. “No man,” he

says, “can rob me of my life, for it is in my heart, and my heart is not

here; it is in safer keeping.” She urges him to tell her where it is, so

he says: “Very far from here, in a land that is called Poland, there is a

great lake, and in the lake is a dragon, and in the dragon is a hare, and

in the hare is a duck, and in the duck is an egg, and in the egg is my

heart. It is in good keeping, you may trust me. Nobody is likely to

stumble upon it.” However, the hero of the tale, who is also the husband

of the kidnapped princess, has fortunately received the power of turning

himself at will into a bear, a dog, an ant, or a falcon as a reward for

having divided the carcase of a deer impartially between four animals of

these species; and availing himself of this useful art he not only makes

his way into the warlock’s enchanted palace but also secures the egg on

which the enchanter’s life depends. No sooner has he smashed the egg on

the enchanter’s ugly face than that miscreant drops down as dead as a

herring.(366)

(M99) Another Danish story tells how a lad went out into the world to look

for service. He met a man, who hired him for three years and said he would

give him a bushel of money for the first year, two bushels of money for

the second, and three bushels of money for the third. The lad was well

content, as you may believe, to get such good wages. But the man was a

magician, and it was not long before he turned the lad into a hare, by

pronouncing over him some strange words. For a whole year the lad scoured

the woods in the shape of a hare, and there was not a sportsman in all the

country round about that had not a shot at him. But not one of them could

hit him. At the end of the year the magician spoke some other words over

him and turned him back into human form and gave him the bushel of money.

But then the magician mumbled some other words, and the lad was turned

into a raven and flew up into the sky. Again all the marksmen of the

neighbourhood pointed their guns at him and banged away; but they only

wasted powder and shot, for not one of them could hit him. At the end of

the year the magician changed him back into a man and gave him two

bushelfuls of money. But soon after he changed him into a fish, and in the

form of a fish the young man jumped into the brook and swam down into the

sea. There at the bottom of the ocean he saw a most beautiful castle all

of glass and in it a lovely girl all alone. Round and round the castle he

swam, looking into all the rooms and admiring everything. At last he

remembered the words the magician had spoken when he turned him back into

a man, and by repeating them he was at once transformed into a stripling

again. He walked into the glass castle and introduced himself to the girl,

and though at first she was nearly frightened to death, she was soon very

glad to have him with her. From her he learned that she was no other than

the daughter of the magician, who kept her there for safety at the bottom

of the sea. The two now laid their heads together, and she told him what

to do. There was a certain king who owed her father money and had not the

wherewithal to pay; and if he did not pay by such and such a day, his head

was to be cut off. So the young man was to take service with the king,

offer him the bushels of money which he had earned in the service of the

magician, and go with him to the magician to pay his debt. But he was to

dress up as the court Fool so that the magician would not know him, and in

that character he was to indulge in horse-play, smashing windows and so

on, till the magician would fall into such a rage that though the king had

paid his debt to the last farthing he would nevertheless be condemned to

instant execution unless he could answer the magician’s questions. The

questions would be these, “Where is my daughter?” “Would you know her if

you saw her?” Now the magician would cause a whole line of phantom women

to pass by, so that the young man would not be able to tell which of them

was the sorcerer’s daughter; but when her turn came to pass by she would

give him a nudge as a sign, and so he would know her. Then the magician

would ask, “And where is my heart?” And the young man was to say, “In a

fish.” And the magician would ask, “Would you know the fish if you saw

it?” And he would cause all sorts of fishes to pass by, and the young man

would have to say in which of them was the heart of the magician. He would

never be able of himself to tell in which of them it was, but the girl

would stand beside him, and when the right fish passed by, she would nudge

him and he was to catch it and rip it up, and the magician would ask him

no more questions. Everything turned out exactly as she had said. The king

paid his debt to the last farthing; but the young man disguised as the

court Fool cut such capers and smashed so many glass windows and doors

that the heaps of broken glass were something frightful to contemplate. So

there was nothing for it but that the king, who was of course responsible

for the pranks of his Fool, should either answer the magician’s questions

or die the death. While they were getting the axe and the block ready in

the courtyard, the trembling king was interrogated by the stern magician.

“Where is my daughter?” asked the sorcerer. Here the court Fool cut in and

said, “She is at the bottom of the sea.” “Would you know her if you saw

her?” enquired the magician. “To be sure I would,” answered the Fool. So

the magician caused a whole regiment of girls to defile before him, one

after the other; but they were mere phantoms and apparitions. Almost the

last of all came the magician’s daughter, and when she passed the young

man she pinched his arm so hard that he almost shrieked with pain.

However, he dissembled his agony and putting his arm round her waist held

her fast. The magician now played his last trump. “Where is my heart?”

said he. “In a fish,” said the Fool. “Would you know the fish if you saw

it?” asked the magician. “To be sure I would,” answered the Fool. Then all

the fishes of the sea swam past, and when the right one came last of all,

the girl nudged her lover; he seized the fish, and with one stroke of his

knife slit it from end to end. Out tumbled the magician’s heart; the young

man seized it and cut it in two, and at the same moment the magician fell

dead.(367)

(M100) In Iceland they say that once a king’s son was out hunting in a

wood with the courtiers, when the mist came down so thick that his

companions lost sight of the prince, and though they searched the woods

till evening they could not find him. At the news the king was

inconsolable, and taking to his bed caused proclamation to be made that he

who could find and bring back his lost son should have half the kingdom.

Now an old man and his old wife lived together in a wretched hut, and they

had a daughter. She resolved to seek the lost prince and get the promised

reward. So her parents gave her food for the journey and a pair of new

shoes, and off she set. Well, she walked and better walked for days, and

at last she came towards evening to a cave and going into it she saw two

beds. One of them was covered with a cloth of silver and the other with a

cloth of gold; and in the bed with the golden coverlet was the king’s son

fast asleep. She tried to wake him, but all in vain. Then she noticed some

runes carved on the bedsteads, but she could not read them. So she went

back to the mouth of the cave and hid behind the door. Hardly had she time

to conceal herself when she heard a loud noise and saw two giantesses, two

great hulking louts they were, stride into the cave. No sooner were they

in than one said to the other, “Ugh, what a smell of human flesh in our

cave!” But the other thought the smell might come from the king’s son.

They went up to the bed where he was sleeping, and calling two swans,

which the girl had not perceived in the dim light of the cave, they said:—

“_Sing, sing, my swans,_

_That the king’s son may wake._”

So the swans sang and the king’s son awoke. The younger of the two hags

offered him food, but he refused it; then she asked him, if he would marry

her, but he said “No, certainly not.” Then she shrieked and said to the

swans:—

“_Sing, sing, my swans,_

_That the king’s son may sleep._”

The swans sang and the king’s son fell fast asleep. Then the two

giantesses lay down in the bed with the silver coverlet and slept till

break of day. When they woke in the morning, they wakened the prince and

offered him food again, but he again refused it; and the younger hag again

asked him if he would have her to wife, but he would not hear of it. So

they put him to sleep again to the singing of the swans and left the cave.

When they were gone a while, the girl came forth from her hiding-place and

waked the king’s son to the song of the swans, and he was glad to see her

and to get the news. She told him that, when the hag asked him again to

marry her, he must say, “Yes, but you must first tell me what is written

on the beds, and what you do by day.” So when it drew to evening, the girl

hid herself again, and soon the giantesses came, lit a fire in the cave,

and cooked at it the game they had brought with them. And the younger hag

wakened the king’s son and asked him if he would have something to eat.

This time he said “Yes.” And when he had finished his supper, the giantess

asked him if he would have her to wife. “That I will,” said he, “but first

you must tell me what the runes mean that are carved on the bed.” She said

that they meant:—

“_Run, run, my little bed,_

_Run whither I will._”

He said he was very glad to know it, but she must also tell him what they

did all day long out there in the wood. The hag told him that they hunted

beasts and birds, and that between whiles they sat down under an oak and

threw their life-egg from one to the other, but they had to be careful,

for if the egg were to break, they would both die. The king’s son thanked

her kindly, but next morning when the giantess asked him to go with them

to the wood he said that he would rather stay at home. So away went the

giantesses by themselves, after they had lulled him to sleep to the

singing of the swans. But hardly were their backs turned when out came the

girl and wakened the prince and told him to take his spear, and they would

pursue the giantesses, and when they were throwing their life-egg to each

other he was to hurl his spear at it and smash it to bits. “But if you

miss,” said she, “it is as much as your life is worth.” So they came to

the oak in the wood, and there they heard a loud laugh, and the king’s son

climbed up the tree, and there under the oak were the two giantesses, and

one of them had a golden egg in her hand and threw it to the other. Just

then the king’s son hurled his spear and hit the egg so that it burst. At

the same time the two hags fell dead to the ground and the slaver dribbled

out of their mouths.(368) In an Icelandic parallel to the story of

Meleager the spae-wives or sibyls come and foretell the high destiny of

the infant Gestr as he lies in his cradle. Two candles were burning beside

the child, and the youngest of the spae-wives, conceiving herself

slighted, cried out, “I foretell that the child shall live no longer than

this candle burns.” Whereupon the chief sibyl put out the candle and gave

it to Gestr’s mother to keep, charging her not to light it again until her

son should wish to die. Gestr lived three hundred years; then he kindled

the candle and expired.(369)

(M101) The conception of the external soul meets us also in Celtic

stories. Thus a tale, told by a blind fiddler in the island of Islay,

relates how a giant carried off a king’s wife and his two horses and kept

them in his den. But the horses attacked the giant and mauled him so that

he could hardly crawl. He said to the queen, “If I myself had my soul to

keep, those horses would have killed me long ago.” “And where, my dear,”

said she, “is thy soul? By the books I will take care of it.” “It is in

the Bonnach stone,” said he. So on the morrow when the giant went out, the

queen set the Bonnach stone in order exceedingly. In the dusk of the

evening the giant came back, and he said to the queen, “What made thee set

the Bonnach stone in order like that?” “Because thy soul is in it,” quoth

she. “I perceive,” said he, “that if thou didst know where my soul is,

thou wouldst give it much respect.” “That I would,” said she. “It is not

there,” said he, “my soul is; it is in the threshold.” On the morrow she

set the threshold in order finely, and when the giant returned, he asked

her, “What brought thee to set the threshold in order like that?” “Because

thy soul is in it,” said she. “I perceive,” said he, “that if thou knewest

where my soul is, thou wouldst take care of it.” “That I would,” said she.

“It is not there that my soul is,” said he. “There is a great flagstone

under the threshold. There is a wether under the flag. There is a duck in

the wether’s belly, and an egg in the belly of the duck, and it is in the

egg that my soul is.” On the morrow when the giant was gone, they raised

the flagstone and out came the wether. They opened the wether and out came

the duck. They split the duck, and out came the egg. And the queen took

the egg and crushed it in her hands, and at that very moment the giant,

who was coming home in the dusk, fell down dead.(370) In another Celtic

tale, a sea beast has carried off a king’s daughter, and an old smith

declares that there is no way of killing the beast but one. “In the island

that is in the midst of the loch is Eillid Chaisfhion—the white-footed

hind, of the slenderest legs, and the swiftest step, and though she should

be caught, there would spring a hoodie out of her, and though the hoodie

should be caught, there would spring a trout out of her, but there is an

egg in the mouth of the trout, and the soul of the beast is in the egg,

and if the egg breaks, the beast is dead.” As usual the egg is broken and

the beast dies.(371)

(M102) In these Celtic tales the helpful animals reappear and assist the

hero in achieving the adventure, though for the sake of brevity I have

omitted to describe the parts they play in the plot. They figure also in

an Argyleshire story, which seems however to be of Irish origin; for the

Cruachan of which we hear in it is not the rugged and lofty mountain Ben

Cruachan which towers above the beautiful Loch Awe, but Roscommon Cruachan

near Belanagare, the ancient palace of the kings of Connaught, long famous

in Irish tradition.(372) The story relates how a big giant, King of

Sorcha, stole away the wife and the shaggy dun filly of the herdsman or

king of Cruachan. So the herdsman baked a bannock to take with him by the

way, and set off in quest of his wife and the filly. He went for a long,

long time, till at last his soles were blackened and his cheeks were

sunken, the yellow-headed birds were going to rest at the roots of the

bushes and the tops of the thickets, and the dark clouds of night were

coming and the clouds of day were departing; and he saw a house far from

him, but though it was far from him he did not take long to reach it. He

went in, and sat in the upper end of the house, but there was no one

within; and the fire was newly kindled, the house newly swept, and the bed

newly made; and who came in but the hawk of Glencuaich, and she said to

him, “Are you here, young son of Cruachan?” “I am,” said he. The hawk said

to him, “Do you know who was here last night?” “I do not,” said he. “There

were here,” said she, “the big giant, King of Sorcha, your wife, and the

shaggy dun filly; and the giant was threatening terribly that if he could

get hold of you he would take the head off you.” “I well believe it,” said

he. Then she gave him food and drink, and sent him to bed. She rose in the

morning, made breakfast for him, and baked a bannock for him to take with

him on his journey. And he went away and travelled all day, and in the

evening he came to another house and went in, and was entertained by the

green-headed duck, who told him that the giant had rested there the night

before with the wife and shaggy dun filly of the herdsman of Cruachan. And

next day the herdsman journeyed again, and at evening he came to another

house and went in and was entertained by the fox of the scrubwood, who

told him just what the hawk of Glencuaich and the green-headed duck had

told him before. Next day the same thing happened, only it was the brown

otter of the burn that entertained him at evening in a house where the

fire was newly kindled, the floor newly swept, and the bed newly made. And

next morning when he awoke, the first thing he saw was the hawk of

Glencuaich, the green-headed duck, the fox of the scrubwood, and the brown

otter of the burn all dancing together on the floor. They made breakfast

for him, and partook of it all together, and said to him, “Should you be

at any time in straits, think of us, and we will help you.” Well, that

very evening he came to the cave where the giant lived, and who was there

before him but his own wife? She gave him food and hid him under clothes

at the upper end of the cave. And when the giant came home he sniffed

about and said, “The smell of a stranger is in the cave.” But she said no,

it was only a little bird she had roasted. “And I wish you would tell me,”

said she, “where you keep your life, that I might take good care of it.”

“It is in a grey stone over there,” said he. So next day when he went

away, she took the grey stone and dressed it well, and placed it in the

upper end of the cave. When the giant came home in the evening he said to

her, “What is it that you have dressed there?” “Your own life,” said she,

“and we must be careful of it.” “I perceive that you are very fond of me,

but it is not there,” said he. “Where is it?” said she. “It is in a grey

sheep on yonder hillside,” said he. On the morrow, when he went away, she

got the grey sheep, dressed it well, and placed it in the upper end of the

cave. When he came home in the evening he said, “What is it that you have

dressed there?” “Your own life, my love,” said she. “It is not there as

yet,” said he. “Well!” said she, “you are putting me to great trouble

taking care of it, and you have not told me the truth these two times.” He

then said, “I think that I may tell it to you now. My life is below the

feet of the big horse in the stable. There is a place down there in which

there is a small lake. Over the lake are seven grey hides, and over the

hides are seven sods from the heath, and under all these are seven oak

planks. There is a trout in the lake, and a duck in the belly of the

trout, an egg in the belly of the duck, and a thorn of blackthorn inside

of the egg, and till that thorn is chewed small I cannot be killed.

Whenever the seven grey hides, the seven sods from the heath, and the

seven oak planks are touched I shall feel it wherever I shall be. I have

an axe above the door, and unless all these are cut through with one blow

of it the lake will not be reached; and when it will be reached I shall

feel it.” Next day, when the giant had gone out hunting on the hill, the

herdsman of Cruachan contrived, with the help of the friendly animals—the

hawk, the duck, the fox, and the otter—to get possession of the fateful

thorn and to chew it before the giant could reach him; and no sooner had

he done so than the giant dropped stark and stiff, a corpse.(373)

(M103) Another Argyleshire story relates how a certain giant, who lived in

the Black Corrie of Ben Breck, carried off three daughters of a king, one

after the other, at intervals of seven years. The bereaved monarch sent

champions to rescue his lost daughters, but though they surprised the

giant in his sleep and cut off his head, it was all to no purpose; for as

fast as they cut it off he put it on again and made after them as if

nothing had happened. So the champions fled away before him as fast as

they could lay legs to the ground, and the more agile of them escaped, but

the shorter-winded he caught, bared them to the skin, and hanged them on

hooks against the turrets of his castle. So he went by the name of the

Bare-Stripping Hangman. Now this amiable man had announced his intention

of coming to fetch away the fourth and last of the king’s daughters, when

another seven years should be up. The time was drawing near, and the king,

with the natural instincts of a father, was in great tribulation, when as

good luck would have it a son of the king of Ireland, by name Alastir,

arrived in the king’s castle and undertook to find out where the

Bare-Stripping Hangman had hidden his soul. To cut a long story short, the

artful Hangman had hidden his soul in an egg, which was in the belly of a

duck, which was in the belly of a salmon, which was in the belly of a

swift-footed hind of the cliffs. The prince wormed the secret from a

little old man, and by the help of a dog, a brown otter, and a falcon he

contrived to extract the egg from its various envelopes and crushed it to

bits between his hands and knees. So when he came to the giant’s castle he

found the Bare-Stripping Hangman lying dead on the floor.(374)

(M104) Another Highland story sets forth how Hugh, prince of Lochlin, was

long held captive by a giant who lived in a cave overlooking the Sound of

Mull. At last, after he had spent many years of captivity in that dismal

cave, it came to pass that one night the giant and his wife had a great

dispute, and Hugh overheard their talk, and learned that the giant’s soul

was in a precious gem which he always wore on his forehead. So the prince

watched his opportunity, seized the gem, and having no means of escape or

concealment, hastily swallowed it. Like lightning from the clouds, the

giant’s sword flashed from its scabbard and flew between Hugh’s head and

his body to intercept the gem before it could descend into the prince’s

stomach. But it was too late; and the giant fell down, sword in hand, and

expired without a gasp. Hugh had now lost his head, it is true, but having

the giant’s soul in his body he felt none the worse for the accident. So

he buckled the giant’s sword at his side, mounted the grey filly, swifter

than the east wind, that never had a bridle, and rode home. But the want

of his head made a painful impression on his friends; indeed they

maintained that he was a ghost and shut the door in his face, so now he

wanders for ever in shades of darkness, riding the grey filly fleeter than

the wind. On stormy nights, when the wind howls about the gables and among

the trees, you may see him galloping along the shore of the sea “between

wave and sand.” Many a naughty little boy, who would not go quietly to

bed, has been carried off by Headless Hugh on his grey filly and never

seen again.(375)

(M105) In Sutherlandshire at the present day there is a sept of Mackays

known as “the descendants of the seal,” who claim to be sprung from a

mermaid, and the story they tell in explanation of their claim involves

the notion of the external soul. They say that the laird of Borgie used to

go down to the rocks under his castle to bathe. One day he saw a mermaid

close in shore, combing her hair and swimming about, as if she were

anxious to land. After watching her for a time, he noticed her cowl on the

rocks beside him, and knowing that she could not go to sea without it, he

carried the cowl up to the castle in the hope that she would follow him.

She did so, but he refused to give up the cowl and detained the sea-maiden

herself and made her his wife. To this she consented with great

reluctance, and told him that her life was bound up with the cowl, and

that if it rotted or was destroyed she would instantly die. So the cowl

was placed for safety in the middle of a great hay-stack, and there it lay

for years. One unhappy day, when the laird was from home, the servants

were working among the hay and found the cowl. Not knowing what it was,

they shewed it to the lady of the house. The sight revived memories of her

old life in the depths of the sea, so she took the cowl, and leaving her

child in its cot, plunged into the sea and never came home to Borgie any

more. Only sometimes she would swim close in shore to see her boy, and

then she wept because he was not of her own kind that she might take him

to sea with her. The boy grew to be a man, and his descendants are famous

swimmers. They cannot drown, and to this day they are known in the

neighbourhood as _Sliochd an roin_, that is, “the descendants of the

seal.”(376)

(M106) In an Irish story we read how a giant kept a beautiful damsel a

prisoner in his castle on the top of a hill, which was white with the

bones of the champions who had tried in vain to rescue the fair captive.

At last the hero, after hewing and slashing at the giant all to no

purpose, discovered that the only way to kill him was to rub a mole on the

giant’s right breast with a certain egg, which was in a duck, which was in

a chest, which lay locked and bound at the bottom of the sea. With the

help of some obliging salmon, rams, and eagles, the hero as usual made

himself master of the precious egg and slew the giant by merely striking

it against the mole on his right breast.(377) Similarly in a Breton story

there figures a giant whom neither fire nor water nor steel can harm. He

tells his seventh wife, whom he has just married after murdering all her

predecessors, “I am immortal, and no one can hurt me unless he crushes on

my breast an egg, which is in a pigeon, which is in the belly of a hare;

this hare is in the belly of a wolf, and this wolf is in the belly of my

brother, who dwells a thousand leagues from here. So I am quite easy on

that score.” A soldier, the hero of the tale, had been of service to an

ant, a wolf, and a sea-bird, who in return bestowed on him the power of

turning himself into an ant, a wolf, or a sea-bird at will. By means of

this magical power the soldier contrived to obtain the egg and crush it on

the breast of the giant, who immediately expired.(378) Another Breton

story tells of a giant who was called Body-without-Soul because his life

did not reside in his body. He himself dwelt in a beautiful castle which

hung between heaven and earth, suspended by four golden chains; but his

life was in an egg, and the egg was in a dove, and the dove was in a hare,

and the hare was in a wolf, and the wolf was in an iron chest at the

bottom of the sea. In his castle in the air he kept prisoner a beauteous

princess whom he had swooped down upon and carried off in a magic chariot.

But her lover turned himself into an ant and so climbed up one of the

golden chains into the enchanted castle, for he had done a kindness to the

king and queen of ants, and they rewarded him by transforming him into an

ant in his time of need. When he had learned from the captive princess the

secret of the giant’s life, he procured the chest from the bottom of the

sea by the help of the king of fishes, whom he had also obliged; and

opening the chest he killed first the wolf, then the hare, and then the

dove, and at the death of each animal the giant grew weaker and weaker as

if he had lost a limb. In the stomach of the dove the hero found the egg

on which the giant’s life depended, and when he came with it to the castle

he found Body-without-Soul stretched on his bed at the point of death. So

he dashed the egg against the giant’s forehead, the egg broke, and the

giant straightway expired.(379) In another Breton tale the life of a giant

resides in an old box-tree which grows in his castle garden; and to kill

him it is necessary to sever the tap-root of the tree at a single blow of

an axe without injuring any of the lesser roots. This task the hero, as

usual, successfully accomplishes, and at the same moment the giant drops

dead.(380)

(M107) The notion of an external soul has now been traced in folk-tales

told by Aryan peoples from India to Brittany and the Hebrides. We have

still to shew that the same idea occurs commonly in the popular stories of

peoples who do not belong to the Aryan stock. In the first place it

appears in the ancient Egyptian story of “The Two Brothers.” This story

was written down in the reign of Rameses II., about 1300 B.C. It is

therefore older than our present redaction of Homer, and far older than

the Bible. The outline of the story, so far as it concerns us here, is as

follows. Once upon a time there were two brethren; the name of the elder

was Anpu and the name of the younger was Bata. Now Anpu had a house and a

wife, and his younger brother dwelt with him as his servant. It was Anpu

who made the garments, and every morning when it grew light he drove the

kine afield. As he walked behind them they used to say to him, “The grass

is good in such and such a place,” and he heard what they said and led

them to the good pasture that they desired. So his kine grew very sleek

and multiplied greatly. One day when the two brothers were at work in the

field the elder brother said to the younger, “Run and fetch seed from the

village.” So the younger brother ran and said to the wife of his elder

brother, “Give me seed that I may run to the field, for my brother sent me

saying, Tarry not.” She said, “Go to the barn and take as much as thou

wouldst.” He went and filled a jar full of wheat and barley, and came

forth bearing it on his shoulders. When the woman saw him her heart went

out to him, and she laid hold of him and said, “Come, let us rest an hour

together.” But he said, “Thou art to me as a mother, and my brother is to

me as a father.” So he would not hearken to her, but took the load on his

back and went away to the field. In the evening, when the elder brother

was returning from the field, his wife feared for what she had said. So

she took soot and made herself as one who had been beaten. And when her

husband came home, she said, “When thy younger brother came to fetch seed,

he said to me, Come, let us rest an hour together. But I would not, and he

beat me.” Then the elder brother became like a panther of the south; he

sharpened his knife and stood behind the door of the cow-house. And when

the sun set and the younger brother came laden with all the herbs of the

field, as was his wont every day, the cow that walked in front of the herd

said to him, “Behold, thine elder brother stands with a knife to kill

thee. Flee before him.” When he heard what the cow said, he looked under

the door of the cow-house and saw the feet of his elder brother standing

behind the door, his knife in his hand. So he fled and his brother pursued

him with the knife. But the younger brother cried for help to the Sun, and

the Sun heard him and caused a great water to spring up between him and

his elder brother, and the water was full of crocodiles. The two brothers

stood, the one on the one side of the water and the other on the other,

and the younger brother told the elder brother all that had befallen. So

the elder brother repented him of what he had done and he lifted up his

voice and wept. But he could not come at the farther bank by reason of the

crocodiles. His younger brother called to him and said, “Go home and tend

the cattle thyself. For I will dwell no more in the place where thou art.

I will go to the Valley of the Acacia. But this is what thou shalt do for

me. Thou shalt come and care for me, if evil befalls me, for I will

enchant my heart and place it on the top of the flower of the Acacia; and

if they cut the Acacia and my heart falls to the ground, thou shalt come

and seek it, and when thou hast found it thou shalt lay it in a vessel of

fresh water. Then I shall come to life again. But this is the sign that

evil has befallen me; the pot of beer in thine hand shall bubble.” So he

went away to the Valley of the Acacia, but his brother returned home with

dust on his head and slew his wife and cast her to the dogs.

(M108) For many days afterwards the younger brother dwelt alone in the

Valley of the Acacia. By day he hunted the beasts of the field, but at

evening he came and laid him down under the Acacia, on the top of whose

flower was his heart. And many days after that he built himself a house in

the Valley of the Acacia. But the gods were grieved for him; and the Sun

said to Khnumu, “Make a wife for Bata, that he may not dwell alone.” So

Khnumu made him a woman to dwell with him, who was perfect in her limbs

more than any woman on earth, for all the gods were in her. So she dwelt

with him. But one day a lock of her hair fell into the river and floated

down to the land of Egypt, to the house of Pharaoh’s washerwomen. The

fragrance of the lock perfumed Pharaoh’s raiment, and the washerwomen were

blamed, for it was said, “An odour of perfume in the garments of Pharaoh!”

So the heart of Pharaoh’s chief washerman was weary of the complaints that

were made every day, and he went to the wharf, and there in the water he

spied the lock of hair. He sent one down into the river to fetch it, and,

because it smelt sweetly, he took it to Pharaoh. Then Pharaoh’s magicians

were sent for and they said, “This lock of hair belongs to a daughter of

the Sun, who has in her the essence of all the gods. Let messengers go

forth to all foreign lands to seek her.” So the woman was brought from the

Valley of the Acacia with chariots and archers and much people, and all

the land of Egypt rejoiced at her coming, and Pharaoh loved her. But when

they asked her of her husband, she said to Pharaoh, “Let them cut down the

Acacia and let them destroy it.” So men were sent with tools to cut down

the Acacia. They came to it and cut the flower upon which was the heart of

Bata; and he fell down dead in that evil hour. But the next day, when the

earth grew light and the elder brother of Bata was entered into his house

and had sat down, they brought him a pot of beer and it bubbled, and they

gave him a jug of wine and it grew turbid. Then he took his staff and his

sandals and hied him to the Valley of the Acacia, and there he found his

younger brother lying dead in his house. So he sought for the heart of his

brother under the Acacia. For three years he sought in vain, but in the

fourth year he found it in the berry of the Acacia. So he threw the heart

into a cup of fresh water. And when it was night and the heart had sucked

in much water, Bata shook in all his limbs and revived. Then he drank the

cup of water in which his heart was, and his heart went into its place,

and he lived as before.(381)

(M109) In the _Arabian Nights_ we read how Seyf el-Mulook, after wandering

for four months over mountains and hills and deserts, came to a lofty

palace in which he found the lovely daughter of the King of India sitting

alone on a golden couch in a hall spread with silken carpets. She tells

him that she is held captive by a jinnee, who had swooped down on her and

carried her off while she was disporting herself with her female slaves in

a tank in the great garden of her father the king. Seyf el-Mulook then

offers to smite the jinnee with the sword and slay him. “But,” she

replied, “thou canst not slay him unless thou kill his soul.” “And in what

place,” said he, “is his soul?” She answered, “I asked him respecting it

many times; but he would not confess to me its place. It happened,

however, that I urged him, one day, and he was enraged against me, and

said to me, ‘How often wilt thou ask me respecting my soul? What is the

reason of thy question respecting my soul?’ So I answered him, ‘O Hátim,

there remaineth to me no one but thee, excepting God; and I, as long as I

live, would not cease to hold thy soul in my embrace; and if I do not take

care of thy soul, and put it in the midst of my eye, how can I live after

thee? If I knew thy soul, I would take care of it as of my right eye.’ And

thereupon he said to me, ‘When I was born, the astrologers declared that

the destruction of my soul would be effected by the hand of one of the

sons of the human kings. I therefore took my soul, and put it into the

crop of a sparrow, and I imprisoned the sparrow in a little box, and put

this into another small box, and this I put within seven other small

boxes, and I put these within seven chests, and the chests I put into a

coffer of marble within the verge of this circumambient ocean; for this

part is remote from the countries of mankind, and none of mankind can gain

access to it.’ ” But Seyf el-Mulook got possession of the sparrow and

strangled it, and the jinnee fell upon the ground a heap of black

ashes.(382) In a modern Arabian tale a king marries an ogress, who puts

out the eyes of the king’s forty wives. One of the blinded queens gives

birth to a son whom she names Mohammed the Prudent. But the ogress queen

hated him and compassed his death. So she sent him on an errand to the

house of her kinsfolk the ogres. In the house of the ogres he saw some

things hanging from the roof, and on asking a female slave what they were,

she said, “That is the bottle which contains the life of my lady the

queen, and the other bottle beside it contains the eyes of the queens whom

my mistress blinded.” A little afterwards he spied a beetle and rose to

kill it. “Don’t kill it,” cried the slave, “for that is my life.” But

Mohammed the Prudent watched the beetle till it entered a chink in the

wall; and when the female slave had fallen asleep, he killed the beetle in

its hole, and so the slave died. Then Mohammed took down the two bottles

and carried them home to his father’s palace. There he presented himself

before the ogress queen and said, “See, I have your life in my hand, but I

will not kill you till you have replaced the eyes which you took from the

forty queens.” The ogress did as she was bid, and then Mohammed the

Prudent said, “There, take your life.” But the bottle slipped from his

hand and fell, the life of the ogress escaped from it, and she died.(383)

(M110) A Basque story, which closely resembles some of the stories told

among Aryan peoples, relates how a monster—a Body-without-Soul—detains a

princess in captivity, and is questioned by her as to how he might be

slain. With some reluctance he tells her, “You must kill a terrible wolf

which is in the forest, and inside him is a fox, in the fox is a pigeon;

this pigeon has an egg in his head, and whoever should strike me on the

forehead with this egg would kill me.” The hero of the story, by name

Malbrouk, has learned, in the usual way, the art of turning himself at

will into a wolf, an ant, a hawk, or a dog, and on the strength of this

accomplishment he kills the animals, one after the other, and extracts the

precious egg from the pigeon’s head. When the wolf is killed, the monster

feels it and says despondently, “I do not know if anything is going to

happen to me. I am much afraid of it.” When the fox and the pigeon have

been killed, he cries that it is all over with him, that they have taken

the egg out of the pigeon, and that he knows not what is to become of him.

Finally the princess strikes the monster on the forehead with the egg, and

he falls a corpse.(384) In a Kabyle story an ogre declares that his fate

is far away in an egg, which is in a pigeon, which is in a camel, which is

in the sea. The hero procures the egg and crushes it between his hands,

and the ogre dies.(385) In a Magyar folk-tale, an old witch detains a

young prince called Ambrose in the bowels of the earth. At last she

confided to him that she kept a wild boar in a silken meadow, and if it

were killed, they would find a hare inside, and inside the hare a pigeon,

and inside the pigeon a small box, and inside the box one black and one

shining beetle: the shining beetle held her life, and the black one held

her power; if these two beetles died, then her life would come to an end

also. When the old hag went out, Ambrose killed the wild boar, and took

out the hare; from the hare he took the pigeon, from the pigeon the box,

and from the box the two beetles; he killed the black beetle, but kept the

shining one alive. So the witch’s power left her immediately, and when she

came home, she had to take to her bed. Having learned from her how to

escape from his prison to the upper air, Ambrose killed the shining

beetle, and the old hag’s spirit left her at once.(386) In another

Hungarian story the safety of the Dwarf-king resides in a golden

cockchafer, inside a golden cock, inside a golden sheep, inside a golden

stag, in the ninety-ninth island. The hero overcomes all these golden

animals and so recovers his bride, whom the Dwarf-king had carried

off.(387)

(M111) A Lapp story tells of a giant who slew a man and took away his

wife. When the man’s son grew up, he tried to rescue his mother and kill

the giant, but fire and sword were powerless to harm the monster; it

seemed as if he had no life in his body. “Dear mother,” at last enquired

the son, “don’t you know where the giant has hidden away his life?” The

mother did not know, but promised to ask. So one day, when the giant

chanced to be in a good humour, she asked him where he kept his life. He

said to her, “Out yonder on a burning sea is an island, in the island is a

barrel, in the barrel is a sheep, in the sheep is a hen, in the hen is an

egg, and in the egg is my life.” When the woman’s son heard this, he hired

a bear, a wolf, a hawk, and a diver-bird and set off in a boat to sail to

the island in the burning sea. He sat with the hawk and the diver-bird

under an iron tent in the middle of the boat, and he set the bear and the

wolf to row. That is why to this day the bear’s hair is dark brown and the

wolf has dark-brown spots; for as they sat at the oars without any screen

they were naturally scorched by the tossing tongues of flame on the

burning sea. However, they made their way over the fiery billows to the

island, and there they found the barrel. In a trice the bear had knocked

the bottom out of it with his claws, and forth sprang a sheep. But the

wolf soon pulled the sheep down and rent it in pieces. From out the sheep

flew a hen, but the hawk stooped on it and tore it with his talons. In the

hen was an egg, which dropped into the sea and sank; but the diver-bird

dived after it. Twice he dived after it in vain and came up to the surface

gasping and spluttering; but the third time he brought up the egg and

handed it to the young man. Great was the young man’s joy. At once he

kindled a great bonfire on the shore, threw the egg into it, and rowed

away back across the sea. On landing he went away straight to the giant’s

abode, and found the monster burning, just as he had left the egg burning

on the island. “Fool that I was,” lamented the dying giant, “to betray my

life to a wicked old woman,” and with that he snatched at an iron tube

through which in happier days he had been wont to suck the blood of his

human victims. But the woman was too subtle for him, for she had taken the

precaution of inserting one end of the tube in the glowing embers of the

hearth; and so, when the giant sucked hard at the other end, he imbibed

only fire and ashes. Thus he burned inside as well as outside, and when

the fire went out the giant’s life went out with it.(388)

(M112) A Samoyed story tells how seven warlocks killed a certain man’s

mother and carried off his sister, whom they kept to serve them. Every

night when they came home the seven warlocks used to take out their hearts

and place them in a dish which the woman hung on the tent-poles. But the

wife of the man whom they had wronged stole the hearts of the warlocks

while they slept, and took them to her husband. By break of day he went

with the hearts to the warlocks, and found them at the point of death.

They all begged for their hearts; but he threw six of their hearts to the

ground, and six of the warlocks died. The seventh and eldest warlock

begged hard for his heart and the man said, “You killed my mother. Make

her alive again, and I will give you back your heart.” The warlock said to

his wife, “Go to the place where the dead woman lies. You will find a bag

there. Bring it to me. The woman’s spirit is in the bag.” So his wife

brought the bag; and the warlock said to the man, “Go to your dead mother,

shake the bag and let the spirit breathe over her bones; so she will come

to life again.” The man did as he was bid, and his mother was restored to

life. Then he hurled the seventh heart to the ground, and the seventh

warlock died.(389) In a Kalmuck tale we read how a certain khan challenged

a wise man to shew his skill by stealing a precious stone on which the

khan’s life depended. The sage contrived to purloin the talisman while the

khan and his guards slept; but not content with this he gave a further

proof of his dexterity by bonneting the slumbering potentate with a

bladder. This was too much for the khan. Next morning he informed the sage

that he could overlook everything else, but that the indignity of being

bonneted with a bladder was more than he could stand; and he ordered his

facetious friend to instant execution. Pained at this exhibition of royal

ingratitude, the sage dashed to the ground the talisman which he still

held in his hand; and at the same instant blood flowed from the nostrils

of the khan, and he gave up the ghost.(390)

(M113) In a Tartar poem two heroes named Ak Molot and Bulat engage in

mortal combat. Ak Molot pierces his foe through and through with an arrow,

grapples with him, and dashes him to the ground, but all in vain, Bulat

could not die. At last when the combat has lasted three years, a friend of

Ak Molot sees a golden casket hanging by a white thread from the sky, and

bethinks him that perhaps this casket contains Bulat’s soul. So he shot

through the white thread with an arrow, and down fell the casket. He

opened it, and in the casket sat ten white birds, and one of the birds was

Bulat’s soul. Bulat wept when he saw that his soul was found in the

casket. But one after the other the birds were killed, and then Ak Molot

easily slew his foe.(391) In another Tartar poem, two brothers going to

fight two other brothers take out their souls and hide them in the form of

a white herb with six stalks in a deep pit. But one of their foes sees

them doing so and digs up their souls, which he puts into a golden ram’s

horn, and then sticks the ram’s horn in his quiver. The two warriors whose

souls have thus been stolen know that they have no chance of victory, and

accordingly make peace with their enemies.(392) In another Tartar poem a

terrible demon sets all the gods and heroes at defiance. At last a valiant

youth fights the demon, binds him hand and foot, and slices him with his

sword. But still the demon is not slain. So the youth asked him, “Tell me,

where is your soul hidden? For if your soul had been hidden in your body,

you must have been dead long ago.” The demon replied, “On the saddle of my

horse is a bag. In the bag is a serpent with twelve heads. In the serpent

is my soul. When you have killed the serpent, you have killed me also.” So

the youth took the saddle-bag from the horse and killed the twelve-headed

serpent, whereupon the demon expired.(393) In another Tartar poem a hero

called Kök Chan deposits with a maiden a golden ring, in which is half his

strength. Afterwards when Kök Chan is wrestling long with a hero and

cannot kill him, a woman drops into his mouth the ring which contains half

his strength. Thus inspired with fresh force he slays his enemy.(394)

(M114) In a Mongolian story the hero Joro gets the better of his enemy the

lama Tschoridong in the following way. The lama, who is an enchanter,

sends out his soul in the form of a wasp to sting Joro’s eyes. But Joro

catches the wasp in his hand, and by alternately shutting and opening his

hand he causes the lama alternately to lose and recover

consciousness.(395) In a Tartar poem two youths cut open the body of an

old witch and tear out her bowels, but all to no purpose, she still lives.

On being asked where her soul is, she answers that it is in the middle of

her shoe-sole in the form of a seven-headed speckled snake. So one of the

youths slices her shoe-sole with his sword, takes out the speckled snake,

and cuts off its seven heads. Then the witch dies.(396) Another Tartar

poem describes how the hero Kartaga grappled with the Swan-woman. Long

they wrestled. Moons waxed and waned and still they wrestled; years came

and went, and still the struggle went on. But the piebald horse and the

black horse knew that the Swan-woman’s soul was not in her. Under the

black earth flow nine seas; where the seas meet and form one, the sea

comes to the surface of the earth. At the mouth of the nine seas rises a

rock of copper; it rises to the surface of the ground, it rises up between

heaven and earth, this rock of copper. At the foot of the copper rock is a

black chest, in the black chest is a golden casket, and in the golden

casket is the soul of the Swan-woman. Seven little birds are the soul of

the Swan-woman; if the birds are killed the Swan-woman will die

straightway. So the horses ran to the foot of the copper rock, opened the

black chest, and brought back the golden casket. Then the piebald horse

turned himself into a bald-headed man, opened the golden casket, and cut

off the heads of the seven birds. So the Swan-woman died.(397) In a Tartar

story a chief called Tash Kan is asked where his soul is. He answers that

there are seven great poplars, and under the poplars a golden well; seven

_Maralen_ (?) come to drink the water of the well, and the belly of one of

them trails on the ground; in this _Maral_ is a golden box, in the golden

box is a silver box, in the silver box are seven quails, the head of one

of the quails is golden and its tail silver; that quail is Tash Kan’s

soul. The hero of the story gets possession of the seven quails and wrings

the necks of six of them. Then Tash Kan comes running and begs the hero to

let his soul go free. But the hero wrings the last quail’s neck, and Tash

Kan drops dead.(398) In another Tartar poem the hero, pursuing his sister

who has driven away his cattle, is warned to desist from the pursuit

because his sister has carried away his soul in a golden sword and a

golden arrow, and if he pursues her she will kill him by throwing the

golden sword or shooting the golden arrow at him.(399)

(M115) A modern Chinese story tells how an habitual criminal used to take

his soul out of his own body for the purpose of evading the righteous

punishment of his crimes. This bad man lived in Khien (Kwei-cheu), and the

sentences that had been passed on him formed a pile as high as a hill. The

mandarins had flogged him to death with sticks and flung his mangled

corpse into the river, but three days afterwards the scoundrel got his

soul back again, and on the fifth day he resumed his career of villainy as

if nothing had happened. The thing occurred again and again, till at last

it reached the ears of the Governor of the province, who flew into a

violent passion and proposed to the Governor-General to have the rascal

beheaded. And beheaded he was; but in three days the wretch was alive

again with no trace of decapitation about him except a slender red thread

round his neck. And now, like a giant refreshed, he began a fresh series

of enormities. He even went so far as to beat his own mother. This was

more than she could bear, and she brought the matter before the

magistrate. She produced in court a vase and said, “In this vase my

refractory son has hidden his soul. Whenever he was conscious of having

committed a serious crime, or a misdeed of the most heinous kind, he

remained at home, took his soul out of his body, purified it, and put it

in the vase. Then the authorities only punished or executed his body of

flesh and blood, and not his soul. With his soul, refined by a long

process, he then cured his freshly mutilated body, which thus became able

in three days to recommence in the old way. Now, however, his crimes have

reached a climax, for he has beaten me, an old woman, and I cannot bear

it. I pray you, smash this vase, and scatter his soul by fanning it away

with a windwheel; and if then you castigate his body anew, it is probable

that bad son of mine will really die.” The mandarin took the hint. He had

the rogue cudgelled to death, and when they examined the corpse they found

that decay had set in within ten days.(400)

(M116) The Khasis of Assam tell of a certain Kyllong, king of Madur, who

pursued his conquests on a remarkable principle. He needed few or no

soldiers, because he himself was a very strong man and nobody could kill

him permanently; they could, it is true, put him to death, but then he

came to life again immediately. The king of Synteng, who was much afraid

of him, once chopped him in pieces and threw the severed hands and feet

far away, thinking thus to get rid of him for good and all; but it was to

no purpose. The very next morning Kyllong came to life again and stalked

about as brisk as ever. So the king of Synteng was very anxious to learn

how his rival contrived thus to rise from the dead; and he hit on a plan

for worming out the secret. He chose the fairest girl of the whole

country, clad her in royal robes, put jewels of gold and silver upon her,

and said, “All these will I give thee and more besides, if thou canst

obtain for me King Kyllong’s secret, and canst inform me how he brings

himself to life again after being killed.” So he sent the girl to the

slave-market in King Kyllong’s country; and the king saw and loved her and

took her to wife. So she caressed him and coaxed him to tell her his

secret, and in a fatal hour he was beguiled into revealing it. He said,

“My life depends upon these things. I must bathe every day and must wash

my entrails. After that, I take my food, and there is no one on earth who

can kill me unless he obtains possession of my entrails. Thus my life

hangs only on my entrails.” His treacherous wife at once sent word to the

king of Synteng, who caused men to lie in wait while Kyllong was bathing.

As usual, Kyllong had laid his entrails on one side of the bathing-place,

while he disported himself in the water, intending afterwards to wash them

and replace them in his body. But before he could do so, one of the

liers-in-wait had seized the entrails and killed him. The entrails he cut

in pieces and gave to the dogs to eat. That was the end of King Kyllong.

He was never able to come to life again; his country was conquered, and

the members of the royal family were scattered far and wide. Seven

generations have passed since then.(401)

(M117) A Malay poem relates how once upon a time in the city of Indrapoora

there was a certain merchant who was rich and prosperous, but he had no

children. One day as he walked with his wife by the river they found a

baby girl, fair as an angel. So they adopted the child and called her

Bidasari. The merchant caused a golden fish to be made, and into this fish

he transferred the soul of his adopted daughter. Then he put the golden

fish in a golden box full of water, and hid it in a pond in the midst of

his garden. In time the girl grew to be a lovely woman. Now the King of

Indrapoora had a fair young queen, who lived in fear that the king might

take to himself a second wife. So, hearing of the charms of Bidasari, the

queen resolved to put her out of the way. She lured the girl to the palace

and tortured her cruelly; but Bidasari could not die, because her soul was

not in her. At last she could stand the torture no longer and said to the

queen, “If you wish me to die, you must bring the box which is in the pond

in my father’s garden.” So the box was brought and opened, and there was

the golden fish in the water. The girl said, “My soul is in that fish. In

the morning you must take the fish out of the water, and in the evening

you must put it back into the water. Do not let the fish lie about, but

bind it round your neck. If you do this, I shall soon die.” So the queen

took the fish out of the box and fastened it round her neck; and no sooner

had she done so, than Bidasari fell into a swoon. But in the evening, when

the fish was put back into the water, Bidasari came to herself again.

Seeing that she thus had the girl in her power, the queen sent her home to

her adopted parents. To save her from further persecution her parents

resolved to remove their daughter from the city. So in a lonely and

desolate spot they built a house and brought Bidasari thither. There she

dwelt alone, undergoing vicissitudes that corresponded with the

vicissitudes of the golden fish in which was her soul. All day long, while

the fish was out of the water, she remained unconscious; but in the

evening, when the fish was put into the water, she revived. One day the

king was out hunting, and coming to the house where Bidasari lay

unconscious, was smitten with her beauty. He tried to waken her, but in

vain. Next day, towards evening, he repeated his visit, but still found

her unconscious. However, when darkness fell, she came to herself and told

the king the secret of her life. So the king returned to the palace, took

the fish from the queen, and put it in water. Immediately Bidasari

revived, and the king took her to wife.(402)

(M118) Another story of an external soul comes from Nias, an island to the

west of Sumatra. Once on a time a chief was captured by his enemies, who

tried to put him to death but failed. Water would not drown him nor fire

burn him nor steel pierce him. At last his wife revealed the secret. On

his head he had a hair as hard as a copper wire; and with this wire his

life was bound up. So the hair was plucked out, and with it his spirit

fled.(403)

(M119) A Hausa story from Northern Nigeria closely resembles some of the

European tales which we have noticed; for it contains not only the

incident of the external soul, but also the incident of the helpful

animals, by whose assistance the hero is able to slay the Soulless King

and obtain possession of the kingdom. The story runs thus. A certain man

and his wife had four daughters born to them in succession, but every one

of the baby girls mysteriously disappeared on the day when she was to be

weaned; so the parents fell under the suspicion of having devoured them.

Last of all there was born to them a son, who to avoid accidents was left

to wean himself. One day, as he grew up, the son received a magic lotion

from an old woman, who told him to rub his eyes with it. He did so, and

immediately he saw a large house and entering it he found his eldest

sister married to a bull. She bade him welcome and so did her husband the

bull; and when he went away, the bull very kindly presented him with a

lock of his hair as a keepsake. In like manner the lad discovered his

other three sisters, who were living in wedlock with a ram, a dog, and a

hawk respectively. All of them welcomed him and from the ram, the dog, and

the hawk he received tokens of regard in the shape of hair or feathers.

Then he returned home and told his parents of his adventure and how he had

found his sisters alive and married. Next day he went to a far city, where

he made love to the Queen and persuaded her to plot with him against the

life of the King her husband. So she coaxed the King to shew his affection

for her by “taking his own life, and joining it to hers.” The unsuspecting

husband, as usual, fell into the trap set for him by his treacherous wife.

He confided to her the secret of his life. “My life,” said he, “is behind

the city, behind the city in a thicket. In this thicket there is a lake;

in the lake is a rock; in the rock is a gazelle; in the gazelle is a dove;

and in the dove is a small box.” The Queen divulged the secret to her

lover, who kindled a fire behind the city and threw into it the hair and

feathers which he had received from the friendly animals, his

brothers-in-law. Immediately the animals themselves appeared and readily

gave their help in the enterprise. The bull drank up the lake; the ram

broke up the rock; the dog caught the gazelle; the hawk captured the dove.

So the youth extracted the precious box from the dove and repaired to the

palace, where he found the King already dead. His Majesty had been ailing

from the moment when the young man left the city, and he grew steadily

worse with every fresh success of the adventurer who was to supplant him.

So the hero became King and married the false Queen; and his sisters’

husbands were changed from animals into men and received subordinate posts

in the government. The hero’s parents, too, came to live in the city over

which he reigned.(404)

(M120) A West African story from Southern Nigeria relates how a king kept

his soul in a little brown bird, which perched on a tall tree beside the

gate of the palace. The king’s life was so bound up with that of the bird

that whoever should kill the bird would simultaneously kill the king and

succeed to the kingdom. The secret was betrayed by the queen to her lover,

who shot the bird with an arrow and thereby slew the king and ascended the

vacant throne.(405) A tale told by the Ba-Ronga of South Africa sets forth

how the lives of a whole family were contained in one cat. When a girl of

the family, named Titishan, married a husband, she begged her parents to

let her take the precious cat with her to her new home. But they refused,

saying, “You know that our life is attached to it”; and they offered to

give her an antelope or even an elephant instead of it. But nothing would

satisfy her but the cat. So at last she carried it off with her and shut

it up in a place where nobody saw it; even her husband knew nothing about

it. One day, when she went to work in the fields, the cat escaped from its

place of concealment, entered the hut, put on the warlike trappings of the

husband, and danced and sang. Some children, attracted by the noise,

discovered the cat at its antics, and when they expressed their

astonishment, the animal only capered the more and insulted them besides.

So they went to the owner and said, “There is somebody dancing in your

house, and he insulted us.” “Hold your tongues,” said he, “I’ll soon put a

stop to your lies.” So he went and hid behind the door and peeped in, and

there sure enough was the cat prancing about and singing. He fired at it,

and the animal dropped down dead. At the same moment his wife fell to the

ground in the field where she was at work; said she, “I have been killed

at home.” But she had strength enough left to ask her husband to go with

her to her parents’ village, taking with him the dead cat wrapt up in a

mat. All her relatives assembled, and bitterly they reproached her for

having insisted on taking the animal with her to her husband’s village. As

soon as the mat was unrolled and they saw the dead cat, they all fell down

lifeless one after the other. So the Clan of the Cat was destroyed; and

the bereaved husband closed the gate of the village with a branch, and

returned home, and told his friends how in killing the cat he had killed

the whole clan, because their lives depended on the life of the cat. In

another Ronga story the lives of a whole clan are attached to a buffalo,

which a girl of the clan in like manner insists on taking with her.(406)

(M121) Ideas of the same sort meet us in stories told by the North

American Indians. Thus in one Indian tale the hero pounds his enemy to

pieces, but cannot kill him because his heart is not in his body. At last

the champion learns that his foe’s heart is in the sky, at the western

side of the noonday sun; so he reaches up, seizes the heart, and crushes

it, and straightway his enemy expires. In another Indian myth there

figures a personage Winter whose song brings frost and snow, but his heart

is hidden away at a distance. However, his foe finds the heart and burns

it, and so the Snow-maker perishes.(407) A Pawnee story relates how a

wounded warrior was carried off by bears, who healed him of his hurts.

When the Indian was about to return to his village, the old he-bear said

to him, “I shall look after you. I shall give you a part of myself. If I

am killed, you shall be killed. If I grow old, you shall be old.” And the

bear gave him a cap of bearskin, and at parting he put his arms round the

Indian and hugged him, and put his mouth against the man’s mouth and held

the man’s hands in his paws. The Indian who told the tale conjectured that

when the man died, the old bear died also.(408) The Navajoes tell of a

certain mythical being called “the Maiden that becomes a Bear,” who

learned the art of turning herself into a bear from the prairie wolf. She

was a great warrior and quite invulnerable; for when she went to war she

took out her vital organs and hid them, so that no one could kill her; and

when the battle was over she put the organs back in their places

again.(409) The Kwakiutl Indians of British Columbia tell of an ogress,

who could not be killed because her life was in a hemlock branch. A brave

boy met her in the woods, smashed her head with a stone, scattered her

brains, broke her bones, and threw them into the water. Then, thinking he

had disposed of the ogress, he went into her house. There he saw a woman

rooted to the floor, who warned him, saying, “Now do not stay long. I know

that you have tried to kill the ogress. It is the fourth time that

somebody has tried to kill her. She never dies; she has nearly come to

life. There in that covered hemlock branch is her life. Go there, and as

soon as you see her enter, shoot her life. Then she will be dead.” Hardly

had she finished speaking when sure enough in came the ogress, singing as

she walked:—

“_I have the magical treasure,_

_I have the supernatural power,_

_I can return to life._”

Such was her song. But the boy shot at her life, and she fell dead to the

floor.(410)