_Remarks._--As both Prof. Rhys (_Hibbert Lect._, 464) and Mr_Celtic Folk and Fairy Tales

(MacInnes's _Tales_, 477) have pointed out, practically the same story

(that of Perseus and Andromeda) is told of the Ultonian hero,

Cuchulain, in the _Wooing of Emer_, a tale which occurs in the Book of

Leinster, a MS. of the twelfth century, and was probably copied from

one of the eighth. Unfortunately, it is not complete, and the

Sea-Maiden incident is only to be found in a British Museum MS. of

about 1300. In this, Cuchulain finds that the daughter of Ruad is to

be given as a tribute to the Fomori, who, according to Prof. Rhys,

_Folk-Lore_, ii., 293, have something of the night_mare_ about their

etymology. Cuchulain fights _three_ of them successively, has his

wounds bound up by a strip of the maiden's garments, and then departs.

Thereafter many boasted of having slain the Fomori, but the maiden

believed them not till at last by a stratagem she recognises

Cuchulain. I may add to this that in Mr. Curtin's _Myths_, 330, the

threefold trial of the sword is told of Cuchulain. This would seem to

trace our story back to the seventh or eighth century and certainly to

the thirteenth. If so, it is likely enough that it spread from Ireland

through Europe with the Irish missions (for the wide extent of which

see map in Mrs. Bryant's _Celtic Ireland_). The very letters that have

spread through all Europe except Russia, are to be traced to the

script of these Irish monks; why not certain folk-tales? There is a

further question whether the story was originally told of Cuchulain as

a hero-tale and then became departicularised as a folk-tale, or was

the process _vice versa_. Certainly in the form in which it appears in

the _Tochmarc Emer_ it is not complete, so that here, as elsewhere, we

seem to have an instance of a folk-tale applied to a well-known heroic

name, and becoming a hero-tale or saga.

XVIII. LEGEND OF KNOCKMANY.

_Source._--W. Carleton, _Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry_.

_Parallels._--Kennedy's "Fion MacCuil and the Scotch Giant," _Legend

Fict._, 203-5.

_Remarks._--Though the venerable name of Finn and Cucullin (Cuchulain)

are attached to the heroes of this story, this is probably only to

give an extrinsic interest to it. The two heroes could not have come

together in any early form of their sagas since Cuchulain's reputed

date is of the first, Finn's of the third century A. D. (_c. f._

however, MacDougall's _Tales_, notes, 272). Besides, the grotesque

form of the legend is enough to remove it from the region of the

hero-tale. On the other hand, there is a distinct reference to Finn's

wisdom-tooth, which presaged the future to him (on this see _Revue

Celtique_, v. 201, Joyce, _Old Celt. Rom._, 434-5, and MacDougall, _l.

c._ 274). Cucullin's power-finger is another instance of the

life-index or external soul, on which see remarks on Sea-Maiden. Mr.

Nutt informs me that parodies of the Irish sagas occur as early as the

sixteenth century, and the present tale may be regarded as a specimen.

XIX. FAIR, BROWN, AND TREMBLING.

_Source._--Curtin, _Myths, &c., of Ireland_, 78 _seq._

_Parallels._--The latter half resembles the second part of the

Sea-Maiden (No. xvii.), which see. The earlier portion is a Cinderella

tale (on which see the late Mr. Ralston's article in _Nineteenth

Century_, Nov., 1879, and Mr. Lang's treatment in his Perrault). Miss

Roalfe Cox is about to publish for the Folk-Lore Society a whole

volume of variants of the Cinderella group of stories, which are

remarkably well represented in these isles, nearly a dozen different

versions being known in England, Ireland, and Scotland.

XX. JACK AND HIS MASTER.

_Source._--Kennedy, _Fireside Stories of Ireland_, 74-80, "Shan an

Omadhan and his Master."

_Parallels._--It occurs also in Campbell, No. xlv., "Mac a Rusgaich."

It is a European droll, the wide occurrence of which--"the loss of

temper bet" I should call it--is bibliographised by M. Cosquin, _l.

c._ ii., 50 (_cf._ notes on No. vi.).

XXI. BETH GELLERT.

_Source._--I have paraphrased the well-known poem of Hon. W. R.

Spencer, "Beth Gelert, or the Grave of the Greyhound," first printed

privately as a broadsheet in 1800 when it was composed ("August 11,

1800, Dolymalynllyn" is the colophon). It was published in Spencer's

_Poems_, 1811, pp. 78-86. These dates, it will be seen, are of

importance. Spencer states in a note: "The story of this ballad is

traditionary in a village at the foot of Snowdon where Llewellyn the

Great had a house. The Greyhound named Gelert was given him by his

father-in-law, King John, in the year 1205, and the place to this day

is called Beth-Gelert, or the grave of Gelert." As a matter of fact,

no trace of the tradition in connection with Bedd Gellert can be found

before Spencer's time. It is not mentioned in Leland's _Itinerary_,

ed. Hearne, v., p. 37 ("Beth Kellarth"), in Pennant's _Tour_ (1770),

ii., 176, or in Bingley's _Tour in Wales_ (1800). Borrow in his _Wild

Wales_, p. 146, gives the legend, but does not profess to derive it

from local tradition.

_Parallels._--The only parallel in Celtdom is that noticed by Croker

in his third volume, the legend of Partholan who killed his wife's

greyhound from jealousy: this is found sculptured in stone at Ap

Brune, co. Limerick. As is well known, and has been elaborately

discussed by Mr. Baring-Gould (_Curious Myths of the Middle Ages_, p.

134 _seq._), and Mr. W. A. Clouston (_Popular Tales and Fictions_,

ii., 166 _seq._), the story of the man who rashly slew the dog

(ichneumon, weasel, &c.) that had saved his babe from death, is one of

those which have spread from East to West. It is indeed, as Mr.

Clouston points out, still current in India, the land of its birth.

There is little doubt that it is originally Buddhistic: the late Prof.

S. Beal gave the earliest known version from the Chinese translation

of the _Vinaya Pitaka_ in the _Academy_ of Nov. 4, 1882. The

conception of an animal sacrificing itself for the sake of others is

peculiarly Buddhistic; the "hare in the moon" is an apotheosis of

such a piece of self sacrifice on the part of Buddha (_Sasa Jataka_).

There are two forms that have reached the West, the first being that

of an animal saving men at the cost of its own life. I pointed out an

early instance of this quoted by a Rabbi of the second century, in my

_Fables of AEsop_, i., 105. This concludes with a strangely close

parallel to Gellert; "They raised a cairn over his grave, and the

place is still called The Dog's Grave." The _Culex_ attributed to

Virgil seems to be another variant of this. The second form of the

legend is always told as a moral apologue against precipitate action,

and originally occurred in _The Fables of Bidpai_ in its hundred and

one forms, all founded on Buddhistic originals (_cf._ Benfey,

_Pantschatantra_, Einleitung, No. 201).[2] Thence, according to Benfey,

it was inserted in the _Book of Sindibad_, another collection of

Oriental Apologues framed on what may be called the Mrs. Potiphar

formula. This came to Europe with the Crusades, and is known in its

Western versions as the _Seven Sages of Rome_. The Gellert story

occurs in all the Oriental and Occidental versions; _e. g._, it is the

First Master's story in Wynkyn de Worde's (ed. G. L. Gomme, for the

Villon Society.) From the _Seven Sages_ it was taken into the

particular branch of the _Gesta Romanorum_ current in England and

known as the English _Gesta_, where it occurs as c. xxxii, "Story of

Folliculus." We have thus traced it to England whence it passed to

Wales, where I have discovered it as the second apologue of the

"Fables of Cattwg the Wise," in the Iolo MS. published by the Welsh

MS. Society, p. 561, "The man who killed his Greyhound." (These

Fables, Mr. Nutt informs me, are a pseudonymous production probably of

the sixteenth century.) This concludes the literary route of the

Legend of Gellert from India to Wales: Buddhistic _Vinaya

Pitaka_--_Fables of Bidpai_;--Oriental _Sindibad_;--Occidental _Seven

Sages of Rome_;--"English" (Latin), _Gesta Romanorum_;--Welsh, _Fables

of Cattwg_.

[Footnote 2: It occurs in the same chapter as the story of La

Perrette, which has been traced, after Benfey, by Prof. M. Muller in

his "Migration of Fables." (_Sel. Essays_, i., 500-74); exactly the

same history applies to Gellert.]

[Illustration:]

_Remarks._--We have still to connect the legend with Llewelyn and

with Bedd Gelert. But first it may be desirable to point out why it is

necessary to assume that the legend is a legend and not a fact. The

saving of an infant's life by a dog, and the mistaken slaughter of the

dog, are not such an improbable combination as to make it impossible

that the same event occurred in many places. But what is impossible,

in my opinion, is that such an event should have independently been

used in different places as the typical instance of, and warning

against, rash action. That the Gellert legend, before it was

localised, was used as a moral apologue in Wales is shown by the fact

that it occurs among the Fables of Cattwg, which are all of that

character. It was also utilised as a proverb: "_Yr wy'n edivaru

cymmaint a'r Gwr a laddodd ei Vilgi_ ("I repent as much as the man

who slew his greyhound"). The fable indeed, from this point of view,

seems greatly to have attracted the Welsh mind, perhaps as of especial

value to a proverbially impetuous temperament. Croker (_Fairy Legends

of Ireland_, vol. iii., p. 165) points out several places where the

legend seems to have been localised in place-names--two places, called

"Gwal y Vilast" ("Greyhound's Couch"), in Carmathen and

Glamorganshire; "Llech y Asp" ("Dog's Stone"), in Cardigan, and

another place named in Welsh "Spring of the Greyhound's Stone." Mr.

Baring-Gould mentions that the legend is told of an ordinary

tomb-stone, with a knight and a greyhound, in Abergavenny Church;

while the Fable of Cattwg is told of a man in Abergarwan. So

wide-spread and well-known was the legend that it was in Richard III's

time adopted as the national crest. In the Warwick Roll, at the

Herald's Office, after giving separate crests for England, Scotland,

and Ireland, that for Wales is given as figured in the margin, and

blazoned "on a coronet in a cradle or, a greyhound argent for Walys"

(see J. R. Planche, _Twelve Designs for the Costume of Shakespeare's

Richard III._, 1830, frontispiece). If this Roll is authentic, the

popularity of the legend is thrown back into the fifteenth century. It

still remains to explain how and when this general legend of rash

action was localised and specialised at Bedd Gelert: I believe I have

discovered this. There certainly was a local legend about a dog named

Gelert at that place; E. Jones, in the first edition of his _Musical

Relicks of the Welsh Bards, 1784_, p. 40, gives the following _englyn_

or epigram:

Claddwyd Cylart celfydd (ymlyniad)

Ymlaneau Efionydd

Parod giuio i'w gynydd

Parai'r dydd yr heliai Hydd;

which he Englishes thus:

The remains of famed Cylart, so faithful and good,

The bounds of the cantred conceal;

Whenever the doe or the stag he pursued

His master was sure of a meal.

No reference was made in the first edition to the Gellert legend, but

in the second edition of 1794, p. 75, a note was added telling the

legend, "There is a general tradition in North Wales that a wolf had

entered the house of Prince Llewellyn. Soon after the Prince returned

home, and, going into the nursery, he met his dog _Kill-hart_, all

bloody and wagging his tail at him; Prince Llewellyn, on entering the

room found the cradle where his child lay overturned, and the floor

flowing with blood; imagining that the greyhound had killed the child,

he immediately drew his sword and stabbed it; then, turning up the

cradle, found under it the child alive, and the wolf dead. This so

grieved the Prince, that he erected a tomb over his faithful dog's

grave; where afterwards the parish church was built and goes by that

name--_Bedd Cilhart_, or the grave of Kill-hart, in _Carnarvonshire_.

From this incident is elicited a very common Welsh proverb [that given

above which occurs also in 'The Fables of Cattwg;' it will be observed

that it is quite indefinite.]" "Prince Llewellyn ab Jorwerth married

Joan, [natural] daughter of King John, by _Agatha_, daughter of Robert

Ferrers Earl of Derby; and the dog was a present to the prince from

his father-in-law about the year 1205." It was clearly from this note

that the Hon. Mr. Spencer got his account; oral tradition does not

indulge in dates _Anno Domini_. The application of the general legend

of "the man who slew his greyhound" to the dog Cylart, was due to the

learning of E. Jones, author of the _Musical Relicks_. I am convinced

of this, for by a lucky chance I am enabled to give the real legend

about Cylart, which is thus given in Carlisle's _Topographical

Dictionary of Wales_, s.v., "Bedd Celert," published in 1811, the date

of publication of Mr. Spencer's _Poems_. "Its name, according to

tradition, implies _The Grave of Celert_, a greyhound which belonged

to Llywelyn, the last Prince of Wales: and a large Rock is still

pointed out as the monument of this celebrated Dog, being on the spot

where it was found dead, together with the stag which it had pursued

from Carnarvon," which is thirteen miles distant. The cairn was thus a

monument of a "record" run of a greyhound: the _englyn_ quoted by

Jones is suitable enough for this, while quite inadequate to record

the later legendary exploits of Gelert. Jones found an _englyn_

devoted to _an_ exploit of a dog named Cylart, and chose to interpret

it in his second edition, 1794, as _the_ exploit of a greyhound with

which all the world (in Wales) were acquainted. Mr. Spencer took the

legend from Jones (the reference to the date 1205 proves that),

enshrined it in his somewhat _banal_ verses, which were lucky enough

to be copied into several reading-books, and thus became known to all

English-speaking folk.

It remains only to explain why Jones connected the legend with

Llewelyn. Llewelyn had local connection with Bedd Gellert, which was

the seat of an Augustinian abbey, one of the oldest in Wales. An

inspeximus of Edward I. given in Dugdale, _Monast. Angl._, ed. pr.

ii., 100a, quotes as the earliest charter of the abbey "Cartam

Lewelini magni." The name of the abbey was "Beth Kellarth"; the name

is thus given by Leland, _l. c._, and as late as 1794 an engraving at

the British Museum is entitled "Beth Kelert," while Carlisle gives it

as "Beth Celert." The place was thus named after the abbey, not after

the cairn or rock. This is confirmed by the fact of which Prof. Rhys

had informed me, that the collocation of letters _rt_ is un-Welsh.

Under these circumstances it is not impossible, I think, that the

earlier legends of the marvellous run of "Cylart" from Carnarvon was

due to the etymologising fancy of some English-speaking Welshman who

interpreted the name as Kill-hart, so that the simpler legend would be

only a folk-etymology.

But whether Kellarth, Kelert, Cylart, Gelert or Gellert ever existed

and ran a hart from Carnarvon to Bedd Gellert or no, there can be

little doubt after the preceding that he was not the original hero of

the fable of "the man that slew his greyhound," which came to Wales

from Buddhistic India through channels which are perfectly traceable.

It was Edward Jones who first raised him to that proud position, and

William Spencer who securely installed him there, probably for all

time. The legend is now firmly established at Bedd Gellert. There is

said to be an ancient air, "Bedd Gelert," "as sung by the Ancient

Britons"; it is given in a pamphlet published at Carnarvon in the

"fifties," entitled _Gellert's Grave; or, Llewellyn's Rashness: a

Ballad, by the Hon. W. R. Spencer, to which is added that ancient

Welsh air, "Bedd Gelert," as sung by the Ancient Britons_. The air is

from R. Roberts' "Collection of Welsh Airs," but what connection it

has with the legend I have been unable to ascertain. This is probably

another case of adapting one tradition to another. It is almost

impossible to distinguish palaeozoic and cainozoic strata in oral

tradition. According to Murray's _Guide to N. Wales_, p. 125, the only

authority for the cairn now shown is that of the landlord of the Goat

Inn, "who felt compelled by the cravings of tourists to invent a

grave." Some old men at Bedd Gellert, Prof. Rhys informs me, are ready

to testify that they saw the cairn laid. They might almost have been

present at the birth of the legend, which, if my affiliation of it is

correct, is not yet quite 100 years old.

XXII. STORY OF IVAN.

_Source._--Lluyd, _Archaeologia Britannia, 1707_, the first comparative

Celtic grammar and the finest piece of work in comparative philology

hitherto done in England, contains this tale as a specimen of Cornish

then still spoken in Cornwall. I have used the English version

contained in _Blackwood's Magazine_ as long ago as May, 1818. I have

taken the third counsel from the Irish version, as the original is not

suited _virginibus puerisque_ though harmless enough in itself.

_Parallels._--Lover has a tale, _The Three Advices_. It occurs also in

modern Cornwall _ap._ Hunt, _Drolls of West of England_, 344, "The

Tinner of Chyamor." Borrow, _Wild Wales_, 41, has a reference which

seems to imply that the story had crystallised into a Welsh proverb.

Curiously enough, it forms the chief episode of the so-called "Irish

Odyssey" (_Merugud Uilix maice Leirtis_--"Wandering of Ulysses

M'Laertes"). It was derived, in all probability, from the _Gesta

Romanorum_, c. 103, where two of the three pieces of advise are "Avoid

a byeway," "Beware of a house where the housewife is younger than her

husband." It is likely enough that this chapter, like others of the

_Gesta_, came from the East, for it is found in some versions of "The

Forty Viziers," and in the _Turkish Tales_ (see Oesterley's parallels

and _Gesta_, ed. Swan and Hooper, note 9).

XXIII. ANDREW COFFEY.

_Source._--From the late D. W. Logie, written down by Mr. Alfred Nutt.

_Parallels._--Dr. Hyde's "Teig O'Kane and the Corpse," and Kennedy's

"Cauth Morrisy," _Legend Fict._, 158, are practically the same.

_Remarks._--No collection of Celtic Folk-Tales would be representative

that did not contain some specimen of the gruesome. The most effective

ghoul story in existence is Lover's "Brown Man."

XXIV. BATTLE OF BIRDS.

_Source._--Campbell (_Pop. Tales, W. Highlands_, No. ii.), with

touches from the seventh variant and others, including the casket and

key finish, from Curtin's "Son of the King of Erin" (_Myths, &c., 32

seq._). I have also added a specimen of the humorous end pieces added

by Gaelic story-tellers; on these tags see an interesting note in

MacDougall's _Tales_, note on p. 112. I have found some difficulty in

dealing with Campbell's excessive use of the second person singular,

"If thou thouest him some two or three times, 'tis well," but beyond

that it is wearisome. Practically, I have reserved _thou_ for the

speech of giants, who may be supposed to be somewhat old-fashioned. I

fear, however, I have not been quite consistent, though the _You's_

addressed to the apple-pips are grammatically correct as applied to

the pair of lovers.

_Parallels._--Besides the eight versions given or abstracted by

Campbell and Mr. Curtin, there is Carleton's "Three Tasks," Dr. Hyde's

"Son of Branduf" (MS.); there is the First Tale of MacInnes (where see

Mr. Nutt's elaborate notes, 431-43), two in the _Celtic Magazine_,

vol. xii., "Grey Norris from Warland" (_Folk-Lore Journ._ i., 316),

and Mr. Lang's Morayshire Tale, "Nicht Nought Nothing" (see _Eng Fairy

Tales_, No. vii.), no less than sixteen variants found among the

Celts. It must have occurred early among them. Mr. Nutt found the

feather-thatch incident in the _Agallamh na Senoraib_ ("Discourse of

Elders"), which is at least as old as the fifteenth century. Yet the

story is to be found throughout the Indo-European world, as is shown

by Prof. Kohler's elaborate list of parallels attached to Mr. Lang's

variant in _Revue Celtique_, iii., 374; and Mr. Lang, in his _Custom

and Myth_ ("A far-travelled Tale"), has given a number of parallels

from savage sources. And strangest of all, the story is practically

the same as the classical myth of Jason and Medea.

_Remarks._--Mr. Nutt, in his discussion of the tale (MacInnes,

_Tales_, 441), makes the interesting suggestion that the obstacles to

pursuit, the forest, the mountain, and the river, exactly represent

the boundary of the old Teutonic Hades, so that the story was

originally one of the Descent to Hell. Altogether it seems likely that

it is one of the oldest folk-tales in existence, and belonged to the

story-store of the original Aryans, whoever they were, was passed by

them with their language on to the Hellenes and perhaps to the

Indians, was developed in its modern form in Scandinavia (where its

best representative "The Master-Maid" of Asbjornsen is still found),

was passed by them to the Celts and possibly was transmitted by these

latter to other parts of Europe, perhaps by early Irish monks (see

notes on "Sea-Maiden"). The spread in the Buddhistic world, and

thence to the South Seas and Madagascar, would be secondary from

India. I hope to have another occasion for dealing with this most

interesting of all folk-tales in the detail it deserves.

XXV. BREWERY OF EGGSHELLS.

_Source._--From the _Cambrian Quarterly Magazine, 1830_, vol. ii., p.

86; it is stated to be literally translated from the Welsh.

_Parallels._--Another variant from Glamorganshire is given in _Y

Cymmrodor_, vi., 209. Croker has the story under the title I have

given the Welsh one in his _Fairy Legends_, 41. Mr. Hartland, in his

_Science of Fairy Tales_, 113-6, gives the European parallels.

XXVI. LAD WITH THE GOAT-SKIN.

_Source._--Kennedy, _Legendary Fictions_, pp. 23-31. The Adventures of

"Gilla na Chreck an Gour'."

_Parallels._--"The Lad With the Skin Coverings" is a popular Celtic

figure, _cf._ MacDougall's Third Tale, MacInnes's Second, and a

reference in Campbell, iii., 147. According to Mr. Nutt (_Holy Grail_,

134), he is the original of Parzival. But the adventures in these

tales are not the "cure by laughing" incident which forms the centre

of our tale, and is Indo-European in extent (_cf._ references in

_English Fairy Tales_, notes to No. xxvii.). "The smith who made hell

too hot for him is Sisyphus," says Mr. Lang (Introd. to Grimm, p.

xiii); in Ireland he is Billy Dawson (Carleton, _Three Wishes_). In

the Finn-Saga, Conan harries hell, as readers of _Waverley_ may

remember "'Claw for claw, and devil take the shortest nails,' as Conan

said to the Devil" (_cf._ Campbell, _The Fians_, 73, and notes, 283).

Red-haired men in Ireland and elsewhere are always rogues (see Mr.

Nutt's references, MacInnes's _Tales_, 477; to which add the case in

"Lough Neagh," Yeats, _Irish Folk Tales_, p. 210).

* * * * *

Folk and Fairy Tales from Many Lands

ENGLISH FOLK AND FAIRY TALES . Joseph Jacobs