Zoological Mythology Volume I Part 15

[374] _Afana.s.sieff_, v. 12, and vi. 2.--Cfr. the chapters on the Goat, the Fox, the Wolf, and the Duck, where other episodes of this legend are found again.--In the twelfth story of the fifth book of _Afana.s.sieff_, the old man goes up to heaven to call G.o.d to account for the peas that He has taken from the top of the pea-plant; G.o.d gives him in exchange stockings of gold and garters of silver.

[375] Cfr. also v. 24.

[376] v. 55.--Cfr. also vi. 22.--Cfr. the _Contes et Proverbes Populaires recueillis en Armagnac_, par Blade (Paris, 1867), where the foolish and lazy one occurs again under the name of Joan Lou Pigre.

[377] Cfr. also the two variations in _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 25.

[378]

Po malu, malu, sestritze, grai Nie vraszi ti mavo serdienka vkrai!

Ti-sz mini szradila Sza krasni yaG.o.dki, sza corvonni cobotki!

Also cfr. the chapter on the Peac.o.c.k.

[379] In the Festival of the Epiphany, which is also a festival of the husband and wife, the good fairy is accustomed to bring to the child, husband, and wife, a boot or a stocking full of presents. This nuptial boot occurs again in the English custom of throwing a slipper after a newly-married couple. Another meaning was also given to the slippers which are thrown away in the popular belief. Instead of being the heroine's shoes which, having been abandoned, serve to attract and guide the predestined husband, they are also considered as the old shoes which the devil leaves behind him when he flees (his tail, which betrays itself). The Germanic wild huntress Gueroryssa, another form of the Frau Holle--the phantom of winter expelled at Epiphany--is represented with a serpent's tail. Hence in the German carnival the use of the _Schuh-teufel laufen_, or running in the devil's slippers.

[380] Cfr. _Afana.s.sieff_, v. 4, and the chapter on the Stork.

[381] Cfr. _Afana.s.sieff_, ii. 25, ii. 28, iv. 47, v. 37.

[382] The _mere sotte_ has become proverbial in France, where, in the sixteenth century, Pierre Gringore wrote a satirical comedy with the t.i.tle of _Le Jeu de Mere Sotte_, in which the Mere Sotte is the Catholic Church.

[383] A similar story, which, on account of its indecent details, I was not able to publish in my collection of the _Novelline di Santo Stefano di Calcinaia_, is narrated upon the hills of Signa, near Florence. It is also told, with some variations, in Piedmont.--Cfr. a Russian variety of the same story in the chapter on the Hen.

[384] _Novelline di Santo Stefano di Calcinaia_, 22.

[385] Cfr. the chapter on the Fishes.

[386] _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 59.--But in the tale v. 11, he knows how to fight well.

[387] In England the monster smells the blood of an Englishman, as in the familiar lines in _Jack the Giant-Killer_--

"Fe fo fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman; Be he alive or be he dead, I'll grind his bones to make my bread."

[388] Cfr. Teza, _The Three Golden Hairs of the Grandfather Know-all_, a Bohemian tale (_I tre Capelli d'oro del Nonno Satutto_, Bologna, 1866).

[389] _Afana.s.sieff_, ii. 7.

[390] v. 11.

[391] _Afana.s.sieff_, v. 7, 8.

[392] iv. 46.

[393] v. 6; _Erlenwein_, 7.

[394] _Erlenwein_, 5.--In the first story of _Erlenwein_, the last-born, Vaniusha (Little John), takes from disputing peasants, by a stratagem, first a marvellous arrow, then a hat which makes the wearer invisible, and, finally, a mantle which flies of itself. He promises to divide them equitably, and for this service makes them pay him beforehand, each of the three times, a hundred roubles; he then throws the objects far away and says, that he who is able to find them will have them; all search, but he alone finds them. (Thus Ar?unas, in the _Mahabharatam_, hides his wonderful arms in the trunk of a tree, in which he alone can find them.)

[395] Cfr. Schiefner, _Zur Russischen Heldensage_, Petersburg, 1861.

This is how the hero Svyatogor is described in a Russian popular epic song cited by Ralston (_The Songs of the Russian people_): "There comes a hero taller than the standing woods, whose head reaches to the fleeting clouds, bearing on his shoulders a crystal coffer."

[396] _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 41.

[397] v. 31, and _Erlenwein_, 16.

[398] v. 32.

[399] vi. 27.

[400] cadis v nievo, i leti kuda nadobno; da po daroghie zabirai k sebie vsiakavo vstriecnavo.

[401] Na karablie niet ni adnavo pana, a vsio cornie ludi.

[402] Cfr. _Afana.s.sieff_, v. 23.--Ice, in the form of an old man, comes to try the boiling bath into which the king of the sea wishes to throw the young hero; when Ice has tried the bath, the youth enters it without suffering any harm.--The trial of drinking occurs again in a grandiose form in the combat between Loki and Thor to empty the cup in the Edda of Snorri, a different form of the Hindoo legend of Agastyas, who dries up the sea.--Odin, too, as Indras and as Bhimas, at three gulps dries up three lakes of mead.

[403] _Afana.s.sieff_, v. 42.

[404] Cfr. the chapters on the Hare and the Quail.

[405] _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 28, and ii. 31.

[406] _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 20.--Cfr. i. 3, and ii. 31, where we have the same particular of the prince who strikes three times the disguised girl who serves him, as in the Tuscan story of the Wooden Top (the puppet), the third in my collection of the _Novelline di Santo Stefano di Calcinaia_.

[407] iv. 44.

[408] Cfr. next chapter.

[409] Cfr. the chapter on the Spider.

[410] _Afana.s.sieff_, ii. 29, and iv. 45.

[411] v. 23.

[412] v. 42.

[413] _Afana.s.sieff_, v. 27.

[414] Cfr. the chapter which treats of the Eagle, the Vulture, and the Falcon.

[415] _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 52.

[416] _Afana.s.sieff_, vi. 63.

[417] vi. 51.

[418] In the story, vi. 52, Ivan, by playing in a marvellous manner on a flute, is recognised by the princess whom he had delivered from the monster.

[419] Cf. next chapter.