fairy-horse compare the Russian hero-horses in Dietrich's collection
of Russian tales, who remain shut up behind twelve iron doors, and
often loaded with chains as well, till the advent of heroes great
enough to ride them. They generally speak with human voices, are their
masters' devoted servants, fight for him, often slaughtering more of
his enemies than he does himself, and when turned loose in the free
fields, as Ka[t.]ar was in his jungle, till they are needed, always
staying in them and coming at once to their master when he calls. See
in the collection by Dietrich (_Russische Volksmaerchen_) No. 1, "Von
Ljubim Zarewitch," &c., p. 3; No. 2, "Von der selbstspielenden Harfe,"
p. 17; No. 4, "Von Ritter Iwan, dem Bauersohne," p. 43; No. 10, "Von
Bulat dem braven Burschen," p. 133; Jeruslan Lasarewitsch in the story
that bears his name (No. 17, p. 208) catches and tames a wonderful
horse near which even lions and eagles do not dare to go, p. 214. And
the Hungarian fairy horses (Zauberpferde) who, like the Servian
hero-horses, become ugly and lame at pleasure, and speak with human
voice, must also be compared to Ka[t.]ar. One in particular plays a
leading part in the story of "Weissnittle" (Stier's _Ungarische
Volksmaerchen_, p. 61). He saves the king's son twice from death and
then flies with him to another land. He speaks with human voice,
advises him in all his doings, and marries him to a king's daughter;
Weissnittle obeying his horse as implicitly as our hero does Ka[t.]ar.
The heroes' horses in Haltrich's _Siebenbuergische Maerchen_ also
speak with human voice and give their masters good counsel. See p. 35
of "Der goldne Vogel;" p. 49 of "Der Zauberross;" p. 101 of "Der Knabe
und der Schlange." These last two horses have more than four legs:
like Odin's Sleipnir, they each have eight. See, too, the dragon's
horse and this horse's brother in "Der goldne Apfelbaum und die neun
Pfauinnen" (Karadschitsch, _Volksmaerchen der Serben_, pp. 33-40). The
"steed" in the "Rider of Grianaig," pp. 14 and 15 of vol. III. of
Campbell's _Tales of the Western Highlands_, and the "Shaggy dun
filly" in "The young king of Easaidh Ruadh," at p. 4 of vol. I. of the
same work, may also be compared; and, lastly, in a list of hero-horses
Cúchulainn's Gray of Macha deserves a place. On the morning of the day
which was to see his last fight, Cúchulainn ordered his charioteer,
Loeg, to harness the Gray to his chariot. "'I swear to God what my
people swears,' said Loeg, 'though the men of Conchobar's fifth
(Ulster) were around the Gray of Macha, they could not bring him to
the chariot.... If thou wilt, come thou, and speak with the Gray
himself.' Cúchulainn went to him. And thrice did the horse turn his
left side to his master.... Then Cúchulainn reproached his horse,
saying that he was not wont to deal thus with his master. Thereat the
Gray of Macha came and let his big round tears of blood fall on
Cúchulainn's feet." The hero then leaps into his chariot, and goes to
battle. At last the Gray is sore wounded, and he and Cúchulainn bid
each other farewell. The Gray leaves his master; but when Cúchulainn,
wounded to death, has tied himself to a stone pillar to die standing,
"then came the Gray of Macha to Cúchulainn to protect him so long as
his soul abode in him, and the 'hero's light' out of his forehead
remained. Then the Gray of Macha wrought the three red routs all
around him. And fifty fell by his teeth and thirty by each of his
hooves. This is what he slew of the host. And hence is (the saying)
'Not keener were the victorious courses of the Gray of Macha after
Cúchulainn's slaughter.'" Then Lugaid and his men cut off the hero's
head and right hand and set off, driving the Gray before them. They
met Conall the Victorious, who knew what had happened when he saw his
friend's horse. "And he and the Gray of Macha sought Cúchulainn's
body. They saw Cúchulainn at the pillar-stone. Then went the Gray of
Macha and laid his head on Cúchulainn's breast. And Conall said, 'A
heavy care to the Gray of Macha is that corpse.'" Conall himself, in
the fight he has with Lugaid, to avenge his friend's slaughter, is
helped by his own horse, the Dewy-Red. "When Conall found that he
prevailed not, he saw his steed, the Dewy-Red, by Lugaid. And the
steed came to Lugaid and tore a piece out of his side." ("Cúchulainn's
Death, abridged from the Book of Leinster," _Revue celtique_, Juin
1877, pp. 175, 176, 180, 182, 183, 185.)
5. The prince makes his escape at five years old. Jeruslan
Jeruslanowitsch at the same age sets out in search of his father,
Jeruslan Lasarewitsch, equipped as a knight, at p. 250 of the 17th
Russian Maerchen in the collection by Dietrich quoted above. He meets
and fights bravely with his father, proving himself worthy of him (p.
251). Sohrab, Rustam's famous son, gives proof of a lion's courage at
five, and at ten years old vanquishes all his companions (Gubernatis,
_Zoological Mythology_, vol. I. p. 115).
6. The princess chooses the ugly common-looking man. In _Old Deccan
Days_, p. 119, so does the Princess Buccoulee. In the episode of Nala
and Damayantí we have the assemblage of suitors, and the public choice
of a husband by a princess (_svayamvara_). Damayantí recognizes the
mortal Nala among the gods, (each of whom has made himself resemble
Nala) from the fact that the flowers of which Nala's garlands were
composed had faded while the garlands of the gods were blooming
freshly. In a story from Manípúrí told by Mr. G. H. Damant in the
_Indian Antiquary_, September 1875, vol. IV. p. 260, Prince Basanta,
effectually disguised by misery, and travel-stained, arrives with the
merchant at a certain place where the king's daughter that day is to
choose her husband. The merchant takes his seat among the princely
suitors; Basanta a little way off. There is a general storm of
scoffings when the princess hangs her garland of flowers round
Basanta's neck. In one of Laura Gonzenbach's Sicilian stories, "Von
einem muthigen Königssohn, der viele Abenteuer erlebte," vol. II. p.
21, we have three kings' sons (brothers) and three princesses
(sisters.) The two elder brothers marry the two elder sisters. At a
tournament held on purpose that she may choose her husband, the
youngest sister, to the general disgust, chooses the youngest prince
(disguised as the dirty, ill-dressed servant of the court tailor), and
who is not even present as a suitor. Her suitors, princes, have passed
before her for three days. After the marriage the prince keeps up the
disguise. His brothers by way of amusing themselves at his expense
take "Stupid Peppe," as they call him, to the wood to shoot birds; he
shoots a great number, while they run here and there and cannot find
one. They agree to let him brand them with black spots on their
shoulders, on condition he gives them his birds. In the notes to this
story, vol. II. p. 240. Herr Köhler gives Spanish, Russian, South
Siberian, and others parallels. And in Stier's _Ungarische
Volksmaerchen_, p. 61, in the story of "Weissnittle," we have not only
the hero-horse mentioned in paragraph 4 of these notes, but also the
assemblage of suitors for the princess to choose her husband: her
choice of a seemingly stupid gardener's boy, who has partially
revealed himself to her; the prince retaining his disguise, after his
marriage, towards every one, even his wife: two brothers-in-law, who
are kings' sons and the wife's elder sisters' husbands; their hunting
on three different days, each time meeting a handsome prince in whom
they do not recognize their despised brother-in-law, Weissnittle, who
sells them his game the first day for their wedding-rings, the second
for leave to brand them with these rings on their foreheads, the third
for permission to brand them with a gallows on their backs: lastly, we
have Weissnittle, as a splendid young prince, publicly shaming his
brothers-in-law by exposing their branding marks. In India this
branding with red-hot pice was the punishment for stealing. Compare in
Taylor's _Confessions of a Thug_, p. 411, Amír Ali's horror at being
so branded by the Rájá of Jhalone. It was, he says years later, a
punishment worse than death, as the world would think him a thief, and
he would carry to his grave "a mark only set on the vile and the
outcasts from society."
7. Múniyá tells me that, in a variation of this story, the dog, cow,
and horse each swallow the child three times, but for shorter periods,
as he is only five years old when he escapes on Ka[t.]ar. Then when
the princess chooses her husband she rides three times round the
assemblage of Rájá's, who all sit on a great plain, and each time she
chooses the pretended _old_ man; for in this version the boy loses his
youth as well as his good looks. Instead of taking service with the
grain merchant, the boy is told by his horse to go boldly to the
king's palace and ask for service there. The shaming of the
brothers-in-law happens thus. The boy invites these princes, the king,
all the king's servants, and all the people in the king's country, to
a grand entertainment in the king's court-house. When they are all
assembled he has the six princes stripped and every one mocks at the
pice-marks on their backs. These are the only variations in the other
version.
Sir George Grey, in his _Polynesian Mythology_, p. 73, tells how the
hero Tawhaki when he climbed into heaven in search of his lost wife
"disguised himself, and changed his handsome and noble appearance, and
assumed the likeness of a very ugly old man." If fact, he looks such a
thoroughly common old man that in the heavens he is taken for a slave
instead of a great chief, and treated as such.
XXI.--THE BÉL-PRINCESS.
1. Múniyá says that telling the prince he would marry a Bél-Princess
was equivalent to saying he would not marry at all, for these
brothers' wives knew she lived in the fairy-country, and that it would
be very difficult, if not impossible, for the prince to find her, and
take her from it.
2. With the fakír's sleep compare that of the dragon who sleeps for a
year at a time in the Transylvanian story "Das Rosenmaerchen"
(_Siebenbuergische Maerchen_, pp. 124, 126).
3. In a Greek story, "Das Schloss des Helios" (Schmidt's _Griechische
Maerchen, Sagen und Volkslieder_, p. 106), the heroine is warned by a
monk that as she approaches the magic castle voices like her brothers'
voices will call her; but if, consequently, she looks behind she will
become stone. Her two elder brothers go to seek her, and, as they meet
no monk to warn them, they become stone. The third brother meets the
monk, obeys his warning, and thus, like his sister, escapes the evil
fate. To save him from Helios, the sister turns him into a thimble
till she has Helios's promise to do him no harm. (Compare the Tiger
and Tigress, p. 155 of this collection.) Helios gives him some water
in a flask with which he sprinkles the stone brothers, whereupon they
and all the other stone princes come to life. In these Indian tales
the healing blood from the little finger plays the part of the waters
of life and death, found in so many Russian and other European
stories.
When reading of the fate of all these princes, it is impossible not
to think of Lot's wife.
The danger of looking back, when engaged on any dealings with
supernatural powers, is insisted on in the tales and practices of the
Russians, Eskimos, Zulus, and the Khonds of Orissa. In Russia the
watcher for the golden fern-flower must seize it the instant it
blossoms and run home, taking care not to look behind him: whether
through fear of giving the demons, who also watch for it, power over
him, or whether through a dread of the flower losing its magic powers
if this precaution is neglected, Mr. Ralston does not say (_Songs of
the Russian People_, p. 99). When "the Revived who came to the
under-world people" (Dr. Rink tells us in his _Tales and Traditions of
the Eskimo_, p. 299) took the old couple to visit the ingnersuit
(supernatural beings "who have their abodes beneath the surface of the
earth, in the cliffs along the sea-shore, where the ordinarily
invisible entrances to them are found" _ib._ p. 46), he warned "them
not to look back when they approached the rock which enclosed the
abode of the ingnersuit, lest the entrance should remain shut for
them.... When they had reached the cliff, and were rowing up to it, it
forthwith opened; and inside was seen a beautiful country, with many
houses, and a beach covered with pebbles and large heaps of fish and
matak (edible skin). Perceiving this the old people for joy forgot the
warning and turned round, and instantly all disappeared: the prow of
the boat knocked right against the steep rock and was smashed in, so
that they all were thrown down by the shock. The son [the revived]
said, 'Now we must remain apart for ever.'" Mr. Tylor, in the 2nd
volume of his _Primitive Culture_, at p. 147 mentions a Zulu remedy
for preventing a dead man from tormenting his widow in her dreams; the
sorcerer goes with her to lay the ghost, and when this is done
"charges her not to look back till she gets home:" and he says the
Khonds of Orissa, when offering human sacrifices to the earth-goddess
bury their portions of the offering in holes in the ground behind
their backs without looking round (_ib._ p. 377).
4. In most of the stories of this kind the command is to open the
fruit or casket only near water, for if the beautiful maiden inside
cannot get water immediately she dies. Such is the case in the "Drei
Pomeranzen" (Stier's _Ungarische Maerchen und Sagen_, p. 83), in "Die
Schoene mit dem sieben Schleier" (_Sicilianische Maerchen_, vol. I. p.
73), and in "Die drei Citronen" (Schmidt's _Griechische Maerchen,
Sagen und Volkslieder_, p. 71). "Die Ungeborene Niegesehene" (Schott's
_Wallachische Maerchen_, p. 248) must be compared with these, though
the beautiful maiden does not come out of the golden fairy-apple. She
appears suddenly and the prince must give her water to drink and the
apple to eat, before he can take her and keep her. In all these
stories the hero has a long journey, and encounters many dangers, in
seeking his bride. In the Sicilian story he is helped by hermits; in
the Greek story, by a monk--monks in Greek and hermits in Sicilian and
Servian stories playing the part of the fakírs in these Indian tales.
In all these stories, too, the maiden is killed or transformed by a
wicked woman who takes her place. In the Wallachian and Sicilian fairy
tales the rightful bride becomes a dove only. But in the Hungarian
tale she is drowned in a well and becomes a gold fish; the wicked
gipsy has no rest till she has eaten the fish's liver: from one of its
scales springs a tree; she has the tree cut down and burnt. The
wood-cutter who hews down the tree makes a cover for his wife's
milk-pot from a piece of the wood, and they find their house kept in
beautiful order from this moment. So to discover the secret, they peep
through the keyhole one day and see a lovely fairy come out of the
milk-jar. Then they enter their house suddenly and the girl tells her
story: the wood-cutter's wife burns the wooden lid to force her to
keep her own form, and goes to the king's son to tell him where he
will find his Pomegranate-bride again. In the Greek story a Lamnissa
eats the citron-girl, but a tiny bone falls unnoticed into the water
and becomes a gold-fish. The prince not only takes the Lamnissa home
with him, but he takes the gold-fish too, and keeps it in his room,
"for he loved it dearly." The Lamnissa never rests till he gives her
the fish to eat. Its bones are thrown into a garden and from them
springs a rose bush on which blooms a rose which the king's old
washerwoman wishes to break off to sell it at the castle. From out of
the bush springs the beautiful citron-maiden, and tells the old woman
her story. She also gives her the rose for the king's son, and in the
basket with the rose she lays a ring he had given her, but charges the
old woman to say nothing about her to him. The next day he comes to
the old woman's cottage and finds his real bride.
5. The youngest prince alone can gather the lotus-flower and
bél-fruit. Compare the Pomegranate-king, pp. 10 and 11, and paragraphs
1 and 4, pp. 245, 252, of the notes to that story. In his _Northern
Mythology_, vol. I., in the footnotes at p. 290, Thorpe mentions a
maiden's grave from which spring "three lilies which no one save her
lover may gather." I think he must quote from a Danish ballad.
6. The princess after drowning is first in a lotus-flower; then in a
bél-fruit again; and, lastly, her body is changed to a garden and
palace. Signor de Gubernatis at p. 152 of the 1st volume of his
_Zoological Mythology_ mentions an Esthonian story where a girl (she
who addressed the crow as "bird of light"--see paragraph 2, p. 259 of
the notes to "Brave Hírálálbásá") while fleeing with her lover is
thrown into the water by a magic ball sent after them by the old
witch, and there becomes "a pond-rose (lotus-flower)." Her lover eats
hogs'-flesh and thus learns the language of birds, and then sends
swallows to a magician in Finnland to ask what he must do to free his
bride. The answer is brought by an eagle; and the prince following the
magician's instructions helps the girl to recover her human form. And
just as Surya Bai is born again in her mango (_Old Deccan Days_, p.
87) and the Bél-Princess in her bél-fruit, so is the girl in the
Hottentot tale of "The Lion who took a woman's shape" born from her
heart in the calabash full of milk in which her mother has put it. The
lion had eaten the girl; but her mother burns the lion and persuades
the fire in which she burns him to give her her daughter's heart
(Bleek's _Hottentot Fables and Tales_, pp. 55 and 56). With the change
into the garden and palace compare the Russian story of a maiden whose
servant-girl blinds her and takes her place as the king's wife. After
some time the false queen learns her mistress is still living; so she
has her murdered and cut to pieces. "Where the maiden is buried a
garden arises, and a boy shows himself. The boy goes to the palace and
runs after the queen, making such a din that she is obliged, in order
to silence him, to give him the girl's heart which she had kept
hidden. The boy then runs off contented, the king follows him, and
finds himself before the resuscitated maiden" (Gubernatis, _Zoological
Mythology_, vol. I. pp. 218, 219). See paragraphs 7 and 8 of the notes
to "Phúlmati Rání," p. 244, and 1, 3 and 4, pp. 245, 250, 252, of
those to "The Pomegranate-king."
7. The commonplace fate of the wonderful palace is deplorable.
XXII.--HOW THE RÁJÁ'S SON WON THE PRINCESS LABÁM.
1. The "four sides" in this story (p. 153), the "four directions" (p.
156) which ought to have been translated four sides and the four sides
in "The Bed," p. 202, are the four points of the compass. They appear
in a Dinájpur story told by Mr. G. H. Damant in the _Indian
Antiquary_, 5th April 1872, p. 115. In the first Russian fairy tale
published by Dietrich, the hero's parents give their elder sons
permission "to go on the four sides" when they start on their journeys
(_Russische Volksmaerchen_, p. 1). In another fairy tale in the same
collection (No. 11, p. 144) the Prince Malandrach, when he has lost
his way flying in the air and is over the sea, raises himself by a
last effort and looks on all the "four sides" in search of a
resting-place for his foot, p. 147. Of course, too, like orthodox
Russians, the Russian heroes generally bow to all the "four sides,"
before attempting their journeys and adventures.
2. Híráman is the name of a kind of parroquet. Irik in the Bohemian
tale "Princess Golden-Hair" (Naake's _Slavonic Fairy Tales_, p. 99)
first hears of the princess's existence from the chattering of birds.
3. "Aunty" was the word used in English by old Múniyá.
4. With the stone bowl compare the pot in Grimm's "Der suesse Brei,"
_Kinder und Hausmaerchen_, vol. II. p. 104.
5. With the tigers' coats compare the robes of honour wherewith the
knights in the Mabinogion clothe themselves when they go to combat.
"And he (Gwalchmai) went forth to meet the knight (Owain), having over
himself and his horse a satin robe of honour sent him by the daughter
of the Earl of Rhangyw; and in this dress he was not known by any of
the host" ("The Lady of the Fountain," _Mabinogion_, vol. I. p. 67).
Peredur wears "a bright scarlet robe of honour over his armour" given
him by the king's daughter (_ib._ p. 363 of "Peredur the son of
Evrawc"). And in "The Dream of Rhonabwy" a knight and his horse wear a
robe of honour (_ib._ vol. II. p. 413).
6. With the tigers' fight with the demons compare the combat of the
grateful lion with the giant, in which the lion bears the brunt of the
battle. On the giant's saying, "Truly, I should find no difficulty in
fighting with thee were it not for the animal that is with thee,"
Owain shuts the lion up in the castle. "The lion in the castle roared
very loud, for he heard that it went hard with Owain," so he climbed
to the top of the castle, sprang down and "joined Owain. And the lion
gave the giant a stroke with his paw, which tore him from his shoulder
to his hip, and his heart was laid bare. And the giant fell down dead"
("The Lady of the Fountain," _Mabinogion_, vol. I. pp. 79, 80).
7. Gubernatis in vol. I. p. 160, of his _Zoological Mythology_, says,
"The drum or kettle-drum thunder is a familiar image in Hindu poetry,
and the gandharvas, the musician warriors of the Hindu Olympus, have
no other instrument than the thunder." "The magic flute is a variation
of the same celestial instrument," _ib._ p. 161.
8. For the hair, see note to "How King Burtal became a Fakír,"
paragraph 2, p. 268.
XXIII.--THE PRINCESS WHO LOVED HER FATHER LIKE SALT.
1. With the task of pulling out the needles, the purchase of the
maid-servant, the sleep of the princess, the usurping of her place by
the maid who makes the prince believe the princess is her
servant-girl, compare "Der böse Schulmeister und die wandernde
Königstochter," in Laura Gonzenbach's _Sicilianische Maerchen_, vol.
I. p. 59. Here, too, the princess is driven forth from her home; she
finds a prince lying dead with a tablet by him on which is written,
"If a maiden will rub me seven years, seven months and seven days long
with grass from Mount Calvary, I shall return to life, and she shall
become my wife" (p. 61).
2. Sun-jewel box. The word thus translated is Rav-ratan-ke-pitárá.
_Raví_, sun; _ratan_, jewel; _pitárá_, a kind of box.
3. In one of Grimm's stories, "Die Gänsehirtin am Brunnen," _Kinder
und Hausmaerchen_, vol. II. p. 419, a king asks his three daughters
how much they love him (p. 425). The eldest loves him as much as the
"sweetest sugar," the second as much as her "finest dress," and the
third as much as salt. So her father in a rage has a sack of salt
bound on her back, and makes two of his servants take her away to the
forest. See also Auerbach's _Barfüssele_, Stuttgart, 1873, ss. 236,
237.
XXIV.--THE DEMON IS AT LAST CONQUERED BY THE KING'S SON.
1. The leading idea of this story is the same as that in "Brave
Hírálálbásá."