We have said something about the people and the countries which
gave birth to our Fairy Stories, and about the meaning of such tales
generally when they were first thought of. Then they were clearly
understood, and those who told them and heard them knew what they meant;
but, as time went on, and as the Aryan race became scattered in various
countries, the old stories changed a great deal, and their meaning was
lost, and all kinds of wild legends, and strange fables and fanciful
tales, were made out of them. The earliest stories were about clouds,
and winds, and the sun, and the waters, and the earth, which were turned
into Gods and other beings of a heavenly kind. By degrees, as the
first meanings of the legends were lost, these beings gave place to
a multitude of others: some of them beautiful, and good, and kind and
friendly to mankind; and some of them terrible, and bad, and malignant,
and always trying to do harm; and there were so many of both kinds that
all the world was supposed to be full of them. There were Spirits of the
water, and the air, and the earth, forest and mountain demons, creatures
who dwelt in darkness and in fire, and others who lived in the
sunshine, or loved to come out only in the moonlight. There were some,
again--Dwarfs, and other creatures of that kind--who made their homes
in caves and underground places, and heaped up treasures of gold
and silver, and gems, and made wonderful works in metals of all
descriptions; and there were giants, some of them with two heads, who
could lift mountains, and walk through rivers and seas, and who picked
up great rocks and threw them about like pebbles. Then there were Ogres,
with shining rows of terrible teeth, who caught up men and women and
children, and strung them together like larks, and carried them home,
and cooked them for supper. Then, also, there were Good Spirits, of
the kind the Arabs call Peris, and we call Fairies, who made it their
business to defend deserving people against the wicked monsters; and
there were Magicians, and other wise or cunning people, who had power
over the spirits, whether good or bad, as you read in the story of
Aladdin and his Ring, and his Wonderful Lamp, and in other tales in
the "Arabian Nights," and collections of that kind. Many of these
beings--all of whom, for our purpose, may be called Dwellers in
Fairyland--had the power of taking any shape they pleased, like the Ogre
in the story of "Puss in Boots," who changed himself first into a lion,
and then into an elephant, and then into a mouse, when he got eaten up;
and they could also change human beings into different forms, or turn
them into stone, or carry them about in the air from place to place, and
put them under the spells of enchantment, as they liked.
Some of the most wonderful creatures of Fairyland are to be found in
Eastern stories, the tales of India, and Arabia, and Persia. Here we
have the Divs, and Jinns, and Peris, and Rakshas--who were the originals
of our own Ogres--and terrible giants, and strange mis-shapen dwarfs,
and vampires and monsters of various kinds. Many others, also very
wonderful, are to be found in what is called the Mythology--that is, the
fables and stories--of ancient Greece, such as the giant Atlas, who bore
the world upon his shoulders; and Polyphemus, the one-eyed giant, who
caught Odysseus and his companions, and shut them up in his cave; and
Kirke, the beautiful sorceress, who turned men into swine; and the
Centaurs, creatures half men and half horses; and the Gorgon Medusa,
whose head, with its hair of serpents, turned into stone all who beheld
it; and the great dragon, the Python, whom Phoebus killed, and who
resembles the dragon Vritra, in Hindu legend--the dragon slain by Indra,
the god of the Sun, because he shut up the rain, and so scorched the
earth--and who also resembles Fafnir, the dragon of Scandinavian legend,
killed by Sigurd; and the fabled dragon with whom St. George fought; and
also, the dragon of Wantley, whom our old English legends describe as
being killed by More of More Hall. In the stories of the North lands of
Europe, as we are told in the Eddas and Sagas (the songs and records),
there are likewise many wonderful beings--the Trolls, the Frost Giants,
curious dwarfs, elves, nisses, mermen and mermaids, and swan-maidens and
the like. The folk-lore--that is, the common traditionary stories--of
Germany are full of such wonders. Here, again, we have giants and dwarfs
and kobolds; and birds and beasts and fishes who can talk; and good
fairies, who come in and help their friends just when they are wanted;
and evil fairies, and witches; and the wild huntsman, who sweeps across
the sky with his ghostly train; and men and women who turn themselves
into wolves, and go about in the night devouring sheep and killing human
beings, In Russian tales we find many creatures of the same kind, and
also in those of Italy, and Spain, and France. And in our own islands
we have them too, for the traditions of English giants, and ogres, and
dwarfs still linger in the tales of Jack the Giant-killer and Jack and
the Bean-stalk, and Hop o' my Thumb; and we have also the elves whom
Shakspeare draws for us so delightfully in "Midsummer Night's Dream" and
in "The Merry Wives of Windsor"; and there are the Devonshire pixies;
and the Scottish fairies and the brownies--the spirits who do the work
of the house or the farm--and the Irish "good people;" and the Pooka,
which comes in the form of a wild colt; and the Leprechaun, a dwarf
who makes himself look like a little old man, mending shoes; and the
Banshee, which cries and moans when great people are going to die.
To all these, and more, whom there is no room to mention, we must add
other dwellers in Fairyland--forms, in one shape or other, of the great
Sun-myths of the ancient Aryan race--such as Arthur and the Knights
of the Round Table and Vivien and Merlin, and Queen Morgan le hay, and
Ogier the Dane, and the story of Roland, and the Great Norse poems which
tell of Sigurd, and Brynhilt, and Gudrun, and the Niblung folk. And to
these, again, there are to be added many of the heroes and heroines who
figure in the Thousand-and-one Nights--such, for example, as Aladdin,
and Sindbad, and Ali Baba, and the Forty Thieves, and the Enchanted
Horse, and the Fairy Peri Banou, with her wonderful tent that would
cover an army, and her brother Schaibar, the dwarf, with his beard
thirty feet long, and his great bar of iron with which he could sweep
down a city. Even yet we have not got to the end of the long list of
Fairy Folk, for there are still to be reckoned the well-known characters
who figure in our modern Fairy Tales, such as Cinderella, and the Yellow
Dwarf, and the White Cat, and Fortunatus, and Beauty and the Beast,
and Riquet with the Tuft, and the Invisible Prince, and many more whom
children know by heart, and whom all of us, however old we may be, still
cherish with fond remembrance, because they give us glimpses into the
beautiful and wondrous land, the true Fairyland whither good King Arthur
went--
"The island-valley of Avilion,
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow,
Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies
Deep-meadowed, happy, fair with orchard lawns,
And bowery hollows crowned with summer sea."
Now it is plain that we cannot speak of all these dwellers in Fairyland;
but we can only pick out a few here and there, and those of you who want
to know more must go to the books that tell of them. As to me, who have
undertaken to tell something of these wonders, I feel very much like the
poor boy in the little German story of "The Golden Key." Do you know the
story? If you don't, I will tell it you. "One winter, when a deep snow
was lying on the ground, a poor boy had to go out in a sledge to fetch
wood. When he had got enough he thought he would make a fire to warm
himself, for his limbs were quite frozen. So he swept the snow away and
made a clear space, and there he found a golden key. Then he began to
think that where there was a key there must also be a lock; and digging
in the earth he found a small iron chest. 'I hope the key will fit,' lie
said to himself, 'for there must certainly be great treasures in this
box.' After looking all round the box he found a little keyhole, and to
his great joy, the golden key fitted it exactly. Then he turned the
key once round"--and now we must wait till he has quite unlocked it and
lifted the lid up, and then we shall learn what wonderful treasures were
in the chest. This is all that this book can do for you. It can give you
the golden key, and show you where the chest is to be found, and then
you must unlock it for yourselves.
Where shall we begin our hasty journey into Wonderland? Suppose we
take a glance at those famous Hindu demons, the Rakshas, who are the
originals of all the ogres and giants of our nursery tales? Now the
Rakshas were very terrible creatures indeed, and in the minds of many
people in India are so still, for they are believed in even now. Their
natural form, so the stories say, is that of huge, unshapely giants,
like clouds, with hair and beard of the colour of the red lightning; but
they can take any form they please, to deceive those whom they wish to
devour, for their great delight, like that of the ogres, is to kill
all they meet, and to eat the flesh of those whom they kill. Often they
appear as hunters, of monstrous size, with tusks instead of teeth, and
with horns on their heads, and all kinds of grotesque and frightful
weapons and ornaments. They are very strong, and make themselves
stronger by various arts of magic; and they are strongest of all at
nightfall, when they are supposed to roam about the jungles, to enter
the tombs, and even to make their way into the cities, and carry
off their victims. But the Rakshas are not alone like ogres in their
cruelty, but also in their fondness for money, and for precious stones,
which they get together in great quantities and conceal in their
palaces; for some of them are kings of their species, and have thousands
upon thousands of inferior Rakshas under their command. But while they
are so numerous and so powerful, the Rakshas, like all the ogres and
giants in Fairyland, are also very stupid, and are easily outwitted by
clever people. There are many Hindu stories which are told to show this.
I will tell you one of them.[7] Two little Princesses were badly treated
at home, and so they ran away into a great forest, where they found a
palace belonging to a Rakshas, who had gone out. So they went into the
house and feasted, and swept the rooms, and made everything neat and
tidy. Just as they had done this, the Rakshas and his wife came
home, and the two Princesses ran up to the top of the house, and hid
themselves on the flat roof. When the Rakshas got indoors he said to his
wife: "Somebody has been making everything clean and tidy. Wife, did you
do this?" "No," she said; "I don't know who can have done it." "Some
one has been sweeping the court-yard," said the Rakshas. "Wife, did you
sweep the court-yard?" "No," she answered; "I did not do it." Then the
Rakshas walked round and round several times, with his nose up in the
air, saying, "Some one is here now; I smell flesh and blood. Where can
they be?" "Stuff and nonsense!" cried the Rakshas' wife. "You smell
flesh and blood, indeed! Why, you have just been killing and eating a
hundred thousand people. I should wonder if you didn't still smell flesh
and blood!" They went on disputing, till at last the Rakshas gave it
up. "Never mind," lie said; "I don't know how it is--I am very thirsty:
let's come and drink some water." So they went to the well, and began
letting down jars into it, and drawing them up, and drinking the water.
Then the elder of the two Princesses, who was very bold and wise, said
to her sister, "I will do something that will be very good for us both."
So she ran quickly down stairs, and crept close behind the Rakshas and
his wife, as they stood on tip-toe more than half over the side of the
well, and catching hold of one of the Rakshas' heels, and one of his
wife's, she gave each a little push, and down they both tumbled into the
well, and were drowned--the Rakshas and the Rakshas' wife. The Princess
then went back to her sister, and said, "I have killed the Rakshas!"
"What, both?" cried her sister. "Yes, both," she said. "Won't they come
back?" said her sister. "No, never," answered she.
This, you see, is something like the story of the Little Girl and the
Three Bears, so well known amongst our Nursery Tales.
Another story will show you how stupid a Rakshas is, and how easily he
can be outwitted.[8]
Once upon a time a Blind Man and a Deaf Man made an agreement. The Blind
Man was to hear for the Deaf Man; and the Deaf Man was to see for the
Blind Man; and so they were to go about on their travels together. One
day they went to a nautch--that is, a singing and dancing exhibition.
The Deaf Man said, "The dancing is very good; but the music is not worth
listening to." "I do not agree with you," the Blind Man said; "I think
the music is very good; but the dancing is not worth looking at." So
they went away for a walk in the jungle. On the way they found a donkey,
belonging to a dhobee, or washerman, and a big chattee, or iron pot,
which the washerman used to boil clothes in. "Brother," said the Deaf
Man, "here is a donkey and a chattee; let us take them with us, they may
be useful." So they took them, and went on. Presently they came to an
ants' nest. "Here," said the Deaf Man, "are a number of very fine black
ants; let us take some of them to show our friends." "Yes," said the
Blind Man, "they will do as presents to our friends." So the Deaf Man
took out a silver box from his pocket, and put several of the black ants
into it. After a time a terrible storm came on. "Oh dear!" cried the
Deaf Man, "how dreadful this lightning is! let us get to some place of
shelter." "I don't see that it's dreadful at all," said the Blind Man,
"but the thunder is terrible; let us get under shelter." So they went
up to a building that looked like a temple, and went in, and took the
donkey and the big pot and the black ants with them. But it was not a
temple, it was the house of a powerful Rakshas, and the Rakshas came
home as soon as they had got inside and had fastened the door. Finding
that he couldn't get in, he began to make a great noise, louder than the
thunder, and he beat upon the door with his great fists. Now the Deaf
Man looked through a chink, and saw him, and was very frightened, for
the Rakshas was dreadful to look at. But the Blind Man, as he couldn't
see, was very brave; and he went to the door and called out, "Who are
you? and what do you mean by coming here and battering at the door in
this way, and at this time of night?" "I'm a Rakshas," he answered, in
a rage; "and this is my house, and if you don't let me in I will kill
you." Then the Blind Man called out in reply, "Oh! you're a Rakshas,
are you? Well, if you're Rakshas, I'm Bakshas, and Bakshas is as good as
Rakshas." "What nonsense is this?" cried the monster; "there is no such
creature as a Bakshas." "Go away," replied the Blind Man, "if you make
any further disturbance I'll punish you; for know that I _am_ Bakshas,
and Bakshas is Rakshas' father." "Heavens and earth!" cried the Rakshas,
"I never heard such an extraordinary thing in my life. But if you are
my father, let me see your face,"--for he began to get puzzled and
frightened, as the person inside was so very positive. Now the Blind Man
and the Deaf Man didn't quite know what to do; but at last they opened
the door just a little, and poked the donkey's nose out. "Bless me,"
thought the Rakshas, "what a terribly ugly face my father Bakshas has
got." Then he called out again "O! father Bakshas, you have a very big
fierce face, but people have sometimes very big heads and very little
bodies; let me see you, body and head, before I go away." Then the Blind
Man and the Deaf Man rolled the great iron pot across the floor with
a thundering noise; and the Rakshas, who watched the chink of the door
very carefully, said to himself, "He has got a great body as well, so I
had better go away." But he was still doubtful; so he said, "Before I
go away let me hear you scream," for all the tribe of the Rakshas scream
dreadfully. Then the Blind Man and the Deaf Man took two of the black
ants out of the box, and put one into each of the donkey's ears, and the
ants bit the donkey, and the donkey began to bray and to bellow as loud
as he could; and then the Rakshas ran away quite frightened.
In the morning the Blind Man and the Deaf Man found that the floor
of the house was covered with heaps of gold, and silver, and precious
stones; and they made four great bundles of the treasure, and took one
each, and put the other two on the donkey, and off they went, But the
Rakshas was waiting some distance off to see what his father Bakshas was
like by daylight; and he was very angry when he saw only a Deaf Man, and
a Blind Man, and a big iron pot, and a donkey, all loaded with his gold
and silver. So he ran off and fetched six of his friends to help him,
and each of the six had hair a yard long, and tusks like an elephant.
When the Blind Man and the Deaf Man saw them coming they went and hid
the treasure in the bushes, and then they got up into a lofty betel palm
and waited--the Deaf Man, because he could see, getting up first, to be
furthest out of harm's way. Now the seven Rakshas were not able to reach
them, and so they said, "Let us get on each other's shoulders and pull
them down." So one Rakshas stooped down, and the second got on his
shoulders, and the third on his, and the fourth on his, and the fifth on
his, and the sixth on his, and the seventh--the one who had invited
the others--was just climbing up, when the Deaf Man got frightened and
caught hold of the Blind Man's arm, and as he was sitting quite at
ease, not knowing that they were so close, the Blind Man was upset, and
tumbled down on the neck of the seventh Rakshas. The Blind Man thought
he had fallen into the branches of another tree, and stretching out his
hands for something to take hold of, he seized the Rakshas' two great
ears and pinched them very hard. This frightened the Rakshas, who lost
his balance and fell down to the ground, upsetting the other six of his
friends; the Blind Man all the while pinching harder than ever, and
the Deaf Man crying out from the top of the tree--"You're all right,
brother, hold on tight, I'm coming down to help you"--though he really
didn't mean to do anything of the kind. Well, the noise, and the
pinching, and all the confusion, so frightened the six Rakshas that they
thought they had had enough of helping their friend, and so they ran
away; and the seventh Rakshas, thinking that because they ran there must
be great danger, shook off the Blind Man and ran away too. And then the
Deaf Man came down from the tree and embraced the Blind Man, and said,
"I could not have done better myself." Then the Deaf Man divided the
treasure; one great heap for himself, and one little heap for the Blind
Man. But the Blind Man felt his heap and then felt the other, and then,
being angry at the cheat, he gave the Deaf Man a box on the ear, so
tremendous that it made the Deaf Man hear. And the Deaf Man, also being
angry, gave the other such a blow in the face that it made the Blind Man
see. So they became good friends directly, and divided the treasure into
equal shares, and went home laughing at the stupid Rakshas.
From the legends of India we now go on to Persia and Arabia, to learn
something about the Divs and the Peris, and the Jinns. When the ancient
Persians separated from the Aryan race from which they sprang, they
altered their religion as well as changed their country. They came to
believe in two principal gods, Ormuzd, the spirit of goodness, who sits
enthroned in the Realms of Light, with great numbers of angels around
him; and Ahriman, the spirit of evil, who reigns in the Realms of
Darkness and Fire, and round whose throne are the great six arch-Divs,
and vast numbers of inferior Divs, or evil beings; and these two powers
are always at war with each other, and are always trying to obtain the
government of the world. From Ormuzd and Ahriman there came in time,
according to popular fancy, the two races of the Divs and the Peris,
creatures who were like mankind in some things, but who had great powers
of magic; which made them visible and invisible at pleasure, enabled
them to change their shapes when they pleased, and to move about on
the earth or in the air. They dwelt in the land of Jinnestan, in the
mountains of Kaf. These mountains were supposed to go round the earth
like a ring; they were thousands of miles in height, and they were made
of the precious stone called chrysolite, which is of a green colour, and
this colour, so the Persian poets say, is reflected in the green which
we sometimes see in the sky at sunset. In this land of Jinnestan
there are many cities. The Peris have for their abode the kingdom
of Shad-u-Kan, that is, of Pleasure and Delight, with its capital
Juber-a-bad, or the Jewel City; and the Divs have for their dwelling
Ahermambad, or Ahriman's city, in which there are enchanted castles and
palaces, guarded by terrible monsters and powerful magicians. The Peris
are very beautiful beings, usually represented as women with wings, and
charming robes of all colours. The Divs are painted as demons of the
most frightful kind. One of them, a very famous one named Berkhyas, is
described as being a mountain in size, his face black, his body covered
with hair, his neck like that of a dragon; two boar's tusks proceed from
his mouth, his eyes are wells of blood, his hair bristles like needles,
and is so thick and long that pigeons make their nests in it. Between
the Peris and the Divs there was always war; but the Divs were too
powerful for the Peris, and used to capture them and hang them in iron
cages from the tree-tops, where their companions came and fed them with
perfumes, of which the Peris are very fond, and which the Divs very much
dislike, so that the smell kept the evil spirits away. Sometimes the
Peris used to call in the help of men against the Divs; and in the older
Persian stories there are many tales of the wonders done by these
heroes who fought against the Divs. The most famous of these were called
Tamuras and Rustem. Tamuras conquered so many of the evil spirits that
he was called the Div-binder. He began his fights in this way. He was
a great king, whose help both sides wished to get. So the Peris sent a
splendid embassy to him, and so did the Divs. Tamuras did not know what
to do; so he went to consult a wonderful bird, called the Simurg, who
speaks all tongues, and who knows everything that has happened, or that
will happen. The Simurg told him to fight for the Peris. Then the Simurg
gave him three feathers from her own breast, and also the magic shield
of Jan-ibn-Jan, the Suleiman or King of the Jinns, and then she carried
him on her back into the country of Jinnestan, where he fought with and
conquered the king of the Divs. The account of this battle is given
at great length in the Persian romance poems. Then Tamuras conquered
another Div, named Demrush, who lived in a gloomy cavern, where he kept
in prison the Peri Merjan, or the Pearl, a beautiful fairy, whom Tamuras
set free. Rustem, however, is the great hero of Persian romance, and the
greatest defender of the Peris. His adventures, as told by the Persian
poets, would make a very large book, so that we cannot attempt to
describe them. But there are two stories of him which may be told. One
night, while he lay sleeping under a rock, a Div, named Asdiv, took the
form of a dragon, and came upon him suddenly. Rustem's horse, Reksh, who
had magic powers, knew the Div in this disguise, and awakened his
master twice, at which Rustem was angry, and tried to kill the horse for
disturbing him. Reksh, however, awakened him the third time, and then
Rustem saw the Div, and slew him after a fearful combat. The other story
is this. There came a wild ass of enormous size, with a skin like the
sun, and a black stripe along his back, and this creature got amongst
the king's horses and killed them. Now the wild ass was no other than
a very powerful Div, named Akvan, who haunted a particular fountain
or spring. So Rustem, mounted on his horse Reksh, went to look for him
there. Three days he waited, but saw nothing. On the fourth day the Div
appeared, and Rustem tried to throw a noose over his head, but the Div
suddenly vanished. Then he reappeared, and Rustem shot an arrow at him,
but he vanished again. Rustem then turned his horse to graze, and laid
himself down by the spring to sleep. This was what the cunning Akvan
wanted, and while Rustem was asleep, Akvan seized him, and flew high
up into the air with him. Then Rustem awoke, and the Div gave him
his choice of being dropped from the sky into the sea, or upon the
mountains. Rustem knew that if he fell upon the mountains he would be
dashed in pieces, so he secretly chose to fall into the sea; but he did
not say so to the Div. On the contrary, he pretended not to know what to
do, but he said he feared the sea, because those who were drowned
could not enter into Paradise. On hearing this, the Div at once dropped
Rustern into the sea--which was what he wanted--and then went back
to his fountain. But when he got there, he found that Rustem had got
ashore, and was also at the fountain, and then they fought again and
the Div was killed. After this Rustem had a son named Zohrab, about whom
many wonderful things are told; and it so happened that Rustem and his
son Zohrab came to fight each other without knowing one another; and
Rustem was killed, and while dying he slew his son. Now all these
stories mean the same thing: they are only the old Aryan Sun-myths put
into another form by the poets and story-tellers: the Peris are the rays
of the sun, or the morning or evening Aurora; the Divs are the black
clouds of night; the hero is the sun who conquers them, and binds
them in the realms of darkness; and the death of Rustem is the
sunset--Zohrab, his son, being either the moon or the rising sun.
But now we must leave the Peris and the Divs, and look at the jinns,
of the Arabian stories. These also dwell in the mysterious country of
Jinnestan, and in the wonderful mountains of Kaf; but they likewise
spread themselves all through the earth, and they specially liked to
live in ruined houses, or in tombs; on the sea shore, by the banks of
rivers, and at the meeting of cross-roads. Sometimes, too, they were
found in deep forests, and many travellers are supposed to find them in
desolate mountain places. Even to this day they are firmly believed in
by Arabs, and also by people in different parts of Persia and India. In
outward form, in their natural shape, they resembled the Peris and the
Divs of the ancient Persians, and they were divided into good and bad:
the good ones very beautiful and shining; the bad ones deformed, black,
and ugly, and sometimes as big as giants. They did not, however, always
appear in their own forms, for they could take the shape of any animal,
especially of serpents, and cats and dogs. They were governed by chief
spirits or kings; and over all, good and bad alike, there were set a
succession of powerful monarchs, named Suleiman, or Solomon, seventy-two
in number--the last of whom, and the greatest, Jan-ibn-Jan, is said by
Arabian story-tellers to have built the pyramids of Egypt. There is an
old tradition that the shield of Jan-ibn-Jan, which was a talisman of
magic power, was brought from Egypt to King Solomon the Wise, the son of
King David, and that it gave him power over all the tribes of the Jinns,
and this is why, in the common stories about them, the Jinns are made to
call upon the name of Solomon.
The Jinns, according to Arabian tradition, lived upon the earth
thousands of years before man was created. They were made, the Koran
says, of "the smokeless fire," that is, the hot breath of the desert
wind, Simoon. But they became disobedient, and prophets were sent to
warn them. They would not obey the prophets, and angels were then sent
to punish them. The angels drove them out of Jinnestan into the islands
of the seas, killed some, and shut some of them up in prison. Among the
prisoners was a young Jinns, named Iblees, whose name means Despair; and
when Adam was created, God commanded the angels and the Jinns to do him
reverence, and they all obeyed but Iblees, who was then turned into a
Shaitan, or devil, and became the father of all the Shaitan tribe, the
mortal enemies of mankind. Since their dispersion the Jinns are not
immortal; they are to live longer than man, but they must die before the
general resurrection. Some of them are killed by other Jinns, some can
be slain by man, and some are destroyed by shooting stars sent from
heaven. When they receive a mortal wound, the fire which burns in their
veins breaks forth and burns them into ashes.
Such are the Arab fancies about the Jinns. The meaning of them is clear,
for the Jinns are the winds, derived plainly from the Ribhus and the
Maruts of the ancient Aryan myths; and they still survive in European
folk-lore in the train of Woden, or the Wild Huntsman, who sweeps at
midnight over the German forests.
Some of the stories of the Jinns are to be found in the book of the
Thousand and One Nights.
One of these stories is that of "the Fisherman and the Genie." A poor
fisherman, you remember, goes out to cast his nets; but he draws no
fish, but only, at the third cast, a vase of yellow copper, sealed with
a seal of lead. He cuts open the seal, and then there issues from the
vase a thick cloud of smoke, which rises to the sky, and spreads itself
over land and sea. Presently the smoke gathers itself together, and
becomes a solid body, taking the form of a Genie, twice as big as any
of the giants; and the Genie cries out, with a terrible voice, "Solomon,
Solomon, great prophet of Allah! Pardon! I will never more oppose thy
will, but will obey all thy commands." At first the fisherman is very
much frightened; but he grows bolder, and tells the Genie that Solomon
has been dead these eighteen hundred years, to which the Genie answers
that he means to kill the fisherman, and tells him why. I told you just
now that the Jinns rebelled, and were punished. The Genie tells the
fisherman that he is one of these rebellious spirits, that he was taken
prisoner, and brought up for judgment before Solomon himself, and that
Solomon confined him in the copper vase, and ordered him to be thrown
into the sea, and that upon the leaden cover of the vase he put the
impression of the royal seal, upon which the name of God is engraved.
When he was thrown into the sea the Genie made three vows--each in a
period of a hundred years. I swore, he says, that "if any man delivered
me within the first hundred years, I would make him rich, even after his
death. In the second hundred years I swore that if any one set me free
I would discover to him all the treasures of the earth; still no help
came. In the third period, I swore to make my deliverer a most powerful
monarch, to be always at his command, and to grant him every day any
three requests he chose to make. Then, being still a prisoner, I swore
that I would without mercy kill any man who set me free, and that the
only favour I would grant him should be the manner of his death." And so
the Genie proposed to kill the fisherman. Now the fisherman did not
like the idea of being killed; and he and the Genie had a long discourse
about it; but the Genie would have his own way, and the poor fisherman
was going to be killed, when he thought of a trick he might play upon
the Genie. He knew two things--first that the Jinns are obliged to
answer questions put to them in the name of Allah, or God; and also that
though very powerful, they are very stupid, and do not see when they are
being led into a pitfall. So he said, "I consent to die; but before
I choose the manner of my death, I conjure thee, by the great name of
Allah, which is graven upon the seal of the prophet Solomon, the son of
David, to answer me truly a question I am going to put to thee."
Then the Genie trembled, and said, "Ask, but make haste."
Now when he knew that the Genie would speak the truth, the Fisherman
said, "Darest thou swear by the great name of Allah that thou really
wert in that vase?"
"I swear it, by the great name of Allah," said the Genie.
But the Fisherman said he would not believe it, unless he saw it with
his own eyes. Then, being too stupid to perceive the meaning of the
Fisherman, the Genie fell into the trap. Immediately the form of the
Genie began to change into smoke, and to spread itself as before over
the shore and the sea, and then gathering itself together, it began to
enter the vase, and continued to do so, with a slow and even motion,
until nothing remained outside. Then, out of the vase there issued the
voice of the Genie, saying, "Now, thou unbeliever, art thou convinced
that I am in the vase?"
But instead of answering, the Fisherman quickly took up the leaden
cover, and put it on the vase; and then he cried out, "O, Genie! it is
now thy turn to ask pardon, and to choose the sort of death thou wilt
have; or I will again cast thee into the sea, and I will build upon the
shore a house where I will live, to warn all fishermen against a Genie
so wicked as thou art."
At this the Genie was very angry. First he tried to get out of the vase;
but the seal of Solomon kept him fast shut up. Then he pretended that he
was but making a jest of the Fisherman when he threatened to kill him.
Then he begged and prayed to be released; but the Fisherman only
mocked him. Next he promised that if set at liberty, he would make the
Fisherman rich. To this the Fisherman replied by telling him a long
story of how a physician who cured a king was murdered instead of being
rewarded, and of how he revenged himself. And then he preached a little
sermon to the Genie on the sin of ingratitude, which only caused the
Genie to cry out all the more to be set free. But still the Fisherman
would not consent, and so to induce him the Genie offered to tell him a
story, to which the Fisherman was quite ready to listen; but the Genie
said, "Dost thou think I am in the humour, shut up in this narrow
prison, to tell stories? I will tell thee as many as thou wilt if thou
wilt let me out." But the Fisherman only answered, "No, I will cast thee
into the sea."
At last they struck a bargain, the Genie swearing by Allah that he would
make the Fisherman rich, and then the Fisherman cut the seal again, and
the Genie came out of the vase. The first thing he did when he got out
was to kick the vase into the sea, which frightened the Fisherman, who
began to beg and pray for his life. But the Genie kept his word; and
took him past the city, over a mountain and over a vast plain, to a
little lake between four hills, where he caught four little fish, of
different colours--white, red, blue, and yellow--which the Genie bade
him carry to the Sultan, who would give him more money than he had ever
seen in his life. And then, the story says, he struck his foot against
the ground, which opened, and he disappeared, the earth closing over
him.
Another story is that of the Genie Maimoun, the son of Dimdim, who took
prisoner a young Prince, and conveyed him to an enchanted palace, and
changed him into the form of an ape, and the ape got on board a ship,
and was carried to the country of a great Sultan, and when the Sultan
heard that there was an ape who could write beautiful poems, he sent
for him to the palace, and they had dinner together, and they played at
chess afterwards, the ape behaving in all respects like a man, excepting
that he could not speak. Then the Sultan sent for his daughter, the
Queen of Beauty, to see this great wonder. But when the Queen of Beauty
came into the room she was very angry with her father for showing her to
a man, for the Princess was a great magician, and thus she knew that it
was a man turned into an ape, and she told her father that the change
had been made by a powerful Genie, the son of the daughter of Eblis.
So the Sultan ordered the Queen of Beauty to disenchant the Prince, and
then she should have him for her husband. On this the Queen of Beauty
went to her chamber, and came back with a knife, with Hebrew characters
engraved upon the blade. And then she went into the middle of the court
and drew a large circle in it, and in the centre she traced several
words in Arabic letters, and others in Egyptian letters. Then putting
herself in the middle of the circle, she repeated several verses of the
Koran. By degrees the air was darkened, as if night were coming on, and
the whole world seemed to be vanishing. And in the midst of the darkness
the Genie, the son of the daughter of Eblis, appeared in the shape of a
huge, terrible lion, which ran at the Princess as if to devour her.
But she sprang back, and plucked out a hair from her head, and then,
pronouncing two or three words, she changed the hair into a sharp
scythe, and with the scythe she cut the lion into two pieces through the
middle. The body of the lion now vanished, and only the head remained.
This changed itself into a large scorpion. The Princess changed herself
into a serpent and attacked the scorpion, which then changed into an
eagle, and flew away; and the serpent changed itself into a fierce black
eagle, larger and more powerful and flew after it. Soon after the eagles
had vanished the earth opened, and a great black and white cat appeared,
mewing and crying out terribly, and with its hairs standing straight
on end. A black wolf followed the cat, and attacked it. Then the cat
changed into a worm, which buried itself in a pomegranate that
had fallen from a tree over-hanging the tank in the court, and the
pomegranate began to swell until it became as large as a gourd, which
then rose into the air, rolled backwards and forwards several times, and
then fell into the court and broke into a thousand pieces. The wolf now
transformed itself into a cock, and ran as fast as possible, and ate up
the pomegranate seeds. But one of them fell into the tank and changed
into a little fish. On this the cock changed itself into a pike, darted
into the water, and pursued the little fish. Then comes the end of the
story, which is told by the Prince transformed into the Ape:--"They were
both hid hours under water, and we knew not what was become of them,
when suddenly we heard horrible cries that made us tremble. Then we saw
the Princess and the Genie all on fire. They darted flames against each
other with their breath, and at last came to a close attack. Then the
fire increased, and all was hidden in smoke and cloud, which rose to a
great height. We had other cause for terror. The Genie, breaking away
from the Princess, came towards us, and blew his flames all over us."
The Princess followed him; but she could not prevent the Sultan from
having his beard singed and his face scorched; a spark flew into the
right eye of the Ape-Prince and blinded him, and the chief of the
eunuchs was killed on the spot. Then they heard the cry of "Victory!
victory!" and the Princess appeared in her own form, and the Genie was
reduced to a heap of ashes. Unhappily the Princess herself was also
fatally hurt. If she had swallowed all the pomegranate seeds she would
have conquered the Genie without harm to herself; but one seed being
lost, she was obliged to fight with flames between earth and heaven, and
she had only just time enough to disenchant the ape and to turn him back
again into his human form, when she, too, fell to the earth, burnt to
ashes.
This story is repeated in various forms in the Fairy Tales of other
lands. The hair which the Princess changed into a scythe is like the
sword of sharpness which appears in Scandinavian legends and in the tale
of Jack the Giant Killer; the transformation of the magician reminds
us of the changes of the Ogre in Puss in Boots; and the death of
the Princess by fire because she failed to eat up the last of the
pomegranate seeds, brings to mind the Greek myth of Persephone, who ate
pomegranate seeds, and so fell into the power of Aidoneus, the God of
the lower regions, and was carried down into Hades to live with him as
his wife; and in many German and Russian tales are to be found incidents
like those of the terrible battle between the Princess and the Genie
Maimoun.