From the extreme West of the Indo-European world, we go this year to
the extreme East. From the soft rain and green turf of Gaeldom, we
seek the garish sun and arid soil of the Hindoo. In the Land of Ire,
the belief in fairies, gnomes, ogres and monsters is all but dead; in
the Land of Ind it still flourishes in all the vigour of animism.
Soils and national characters differ; but fairy tales are the same in
plot and incidents, if not in treatment. The majority of the tales in
this volume have been known in the West in some form or other, and the
problem arises how to account for their simultaneous existence in
farthest West and East. Some--as Benfey in Germany, M. Cosquin in
France, and Mr. Clouston in England--have declared that India is the
Home of the Fairy Tale, and that all European fairy tales have been
brought from thence by Crusaders, by Mongol missionaries, by Gipsies,
by Jews, by traders, by travellers. The question is still before the
courts, and one can only deal with it as an advocate. So far as my
instructions go, I should be prepared, within certain limits, to hold
a brief for India. So far as the children of Europe have their fairy
stories in common, these--and they form more than a third of the
whole--are derived from India. In particular, the majority of the
Drolls or comic tales and jingles can be traced, without much
difficulty, back to the Indian peninsula.
Certainly there is abundant evidence of the early transmission by
literary means of a considerable number of drolls and folk-tales from
India about the time of the Crusaders. The collections known in Europe
by the titles of _The Fables of Bidpai_, _The Seven Wise Masters_,
_Gesta Romanorum_, and _Barlaam and Josaphat_, were extremely popular
during the Middle Ages, and their contents passed on the one hand into
the _Exempla_ of the monkish preachers, and on the other into the
_Novelle_ of Italy, thence, after many days, to contribute their quota
to the Elizabethan Drama. Perhaps nearly one-tenth of the main
incidents of European folk-tales can be traced to this source.
There are even indications of an earlier literary contact between
Europe and India, in the case of one branch of the folk-tale, the
Fable or Beast Droll. In a somewhat elaborate discussion[1] I have
come to the conclusion that a goodly number of the fables that pass
under the name of the Samian slave, Æsop, were derived from India,
probably from the same source whence the same tales were utilised in
the Jatakas, or Birth-stories of Buddha. These Jatakas contain a large
quantity of genuine early Indian folk-tales, and form the earliest
collection of folk-tales in the world, a sort of Indian Grimm,
collected more than two thousand years before the good German brothers
went on their quest among the folk with such delightful results. For
this reason I have included a considerable number of them in this
volume; and shall be surprised if tales that have roused the laughter
and wonder of pious Buddhists for the last two thousand years, cannot
produce the same effect on English children. The Jatakas have been
fortunate in their English translators, who render with vigour and
point; and I rejoice in being able to publish the translation of two
new Jatakas, kindly done into English for this volume by Mr. W. H. D.
Rouse, of Christ's College, Cambridge. In one of these I think I have
traced the source of the Tar Baby incident in "Uncle Remus."
[Footnote 1: "History of the Æsopic Fable," the introductory volume to
my edition of Caxton's _Fables of Esope_ (London, Nutt, 1889).]
Though Indian fairy tales are the earliest in existence, yet they are
also from another point of view the youngest. For it is only about
twenty-five years ago that Miss Frere began the modern collection of
Indian folk-tales with her charming "Old Deccan Days" (London, John
Murray, 1868; fourth edition, 1889). Her example has been followed by
Miss Stokes, by Mrs. Steel, and Captain (now Major) Temple, by the
Pandit Natesa Sastri, by Mr. Knowles and Mr. Campbell, as well as
others who have published folk-tales in such periodicals as the
_Indian Antiquary_ and _The Orientalist_. The story-store of modern
India has been well dipped into during the last quarter of a century,
though the immense range of the country leaves room for any number of
additional workers and collections. Even so far as the materials
already collected go, a large number of the commonest incidents in
European folk-tales have been found in India. Whether brought there or
born there, we have scarcely any criterion for judging; but as some of
those still current among the folk in India can be traced back more
than a millennium, the presumption is in favour of an Indian origin.
From all these sources--from the Jatakas, from the Bidpai, and from
the more recent collections--I have selected those stories which throw
most light on the origin of Fable and Folk-tales, and at the same time
are most likely to attract English children. I have not, however,
included too many stories of the Grimm types, lest I should repeat
the contents of the two preceding volumes of this series. This has to
some degree weakened the case for India as represented by this book.
The need of catering for the young ones has restricted my selection
from the well-named "Ocean of the Streams of Story," _Katha-Sarit
Sagara_ of Somadeva. The stories existing in Pali and Sanskrit I have
taken from translations, mostly from the German of Benfey or the
vigorous English of Professor Rhys-Davids, whom I have to thank for
permission to use his versions of the Jatakas.
I have been enabled to make this book a representative collection of
the Fairy Tales of Ind by the kindness of the original collectors or
their publishers. I have especially to thank Miss Frere, who kindly
made an exception in my favour, and granted me the use of that fine
story, "Punchkin," and that quaint myth, "How Sun, Moon, and Wind went
out to Dinner." Miss Stokes has been equally gracious in granting me
the use of characteristic specimens from her "Indian Fairy Tales." To
Major Temple I owe the advantage of selecting from his admirable
_Wideawake Stories_, and Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench & Co. have allowed
me to use Mr. Knowles' "Folk-tales of Kashmir," in their Oriental
Library; and Messrs. W. H. Allen have been equally obliging with
regard to Mrs. Kingscote's "Tales of the Sun." Mr. M. L. Dames has
enabled me add to the published story-store of India by granting me
the use of one from his inedited collection of Baluchi folk-tales.
I have again to congratulate myself on the co-operation of my friend
Mr. J. D. Batten in giving beautiful or amusing form to the creations
of the folk fancy of the Hindoos. It is no slight thing to embody, as
he has done, the glamour and the humour both of the Celt and of the
Hindoo. It is only a further proof that Fairy Tales are something more
than Celtic or Hindoo. They are human.