_Source._--Collected by Mrs. Gomme from some hop-pickers near Deptford.
_Parallels._--The beginning is _à la_ Cupid and Psyche, on which Mr.
Lang's monograph in the Carabas series is the classic authority. The
remainder is an Eastern tale, the peregrinations of which have been
studied by Mr. Clouston in his _Pop. Tales and Fictions_, ii., 289,
_seq._ _The Wright's Chaste Wife_ is the English _fabliau_ on the
subject. M. Bédier, in his recent work on _Les Fabliaux_, pp. 411-13,
denies the Eastern origin of the _fabliau_, but in his Indiaphobia M.
Bédier is _capable de tout_. In the Indian version the various
messengers are sent by the king to test the chastity of a peerless wife
of whom he has heard. The incident occurs in some versions of the
"Battle of the Birds" story (_Celtic Fairy Tales_, No. xxiv.), and
considering the wide spread of this in the British Isles, it was
possibly from this source that it came to Deptford.