Part 14

But their very familiarity and colloquialism make them remarkably effective with English-speaking little ones. The rhythmical phrases stick in their memories; they can remember the exact phraseology of the English tales much better, I find, than that of the Grimms' tales, or even of the Celtic stories. They certainly have the quality of coming home to English children. Perhaps this may be partly due to the fact that a larger proportion of the tales are of native manufacture. If the researches contained in my Notes are to be trusted only i.-ix., xi., xvii., xxii., xxv., xxvi., xxvii., xliv., l., liv., lv., lviii., lxi., lxii., lxv., lxvii., lxxviii., lxxxiv., lxxxvii. were imported; nearly all the remaining sixty are home produce, and have their roots in the hearts of the English people which naturally respond to them.

In the following Notes, I have continued my practice of giving (1) _Source_ where I obtained the various tales. (2) _Parallels_, so far as possible, in full for the British Isles, with bibliographical references when they can be found; for occurrences abroad I generally refer to the list of incidents contained in my paper read before the International Folk-Lore Congress of 1891 and republished in the _Transactions_, 1892, pp. 87-98. (3) _Remarks_ where the tale seems to need them. I have mainly been on the search for signs of diffusion rather than of "survivals" of antiquarian interest, though I trust it will be found I have not neglected these.

XLIV. THE PIED PIPER

_Source._--Abraham Elder, _Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight_ (London, 1839), pp. 157-164. Mr. Nutt, who has abridged and partly rewritten the story from a copy of Elder's book in his possession, has introduced a couple of touches from Browning.

_Parallels._--The well-known story of the Pied Piper of Hameln (Hamelin), immortalised by Browning, will at once recur to every reader's mind. Before Browning, it had been told in English in books as well known as Verstegan's _Restitution of Decayed Intelligence_, 1605; Howell's _Familiar Letters_ (see my edition, p. 357, _n._); and Wanley's _Wonders of the Little World_. Browning is said to have taken it from the last source (Furnivall, _Browning Bibliography_, 158), though there are touches which seem to me to come from Howell (see my note _ad loc._), while it is not impossible he may have come across Elder's book, which was illustrated by Cruikshank. The Grimms give the legend in their _Deutsche Sagen_ (ed. 1816, 330-33), and in its native land it has given rise to an elaborate poem _à la_ Scheffel by Julius Wolff, which has in its turn been the occasion of an opera by Victor Nessler. Mrs. Gutch, in an interesting study of the myth in _Folk-Lore_ iii., pp. 227-52, quotes a poem, _The Sea Piece_, published by Dr. Kirkpatrick in 1750, as showing that a similar legend was told of the Cave Hill, Belfast.

Here, as Tradition's hoary legend tells, A blinking Piper once with magic Spells And strains beyond a vulgar Bagpipe's sounds Gathered the dancing Country wide around. When hither as he drew the tripping Rear (Dreadful to think and difficult to swear!) The gaping Mountain yawned from side to side, A hideous Cavern, darksome, deep, and wide; In skipt th' exulting Demon, piping loud, With passive joy succeeded by the Crowd.

* * * * *

There firm and instant closed the greedy Womb, Where wide-born Thousands met a common Tomb.

_Remarks._--Mr. Baring-Gould, in his _Curious Myths of the Middle Ages_, has explained the Pied Piper as a wind myth. Mrs. Gutch is inclined to think there may be a substratum of fact at the root of the legend, basing her conclusions on a pamphlet of Dr. Meinardus, _Der historische Kern_, which I have not seen. She does not, however, give any well-authenticated historical event at Hameln in the thirteenth century which could have plausibly given rise to the legend, nor can I find any in the _Urkundenbuch_ of Hameln (Luneberg, 1883). The chief question of interest attaching to the English form of the legend as given in 1839 by Elder, is whether it is independent of the German myth. It does not occur in any of the local histories of the Isle of Wight which I have been able to consult of a date previous to Elder's book--_e.g._, J. Hassel, _Tour of the Isle of Wight_, 1790. Mr. Shore, in his _History of Hampshire_, 1891, p. 185, refers to the legend, but evidently bases his reference on Elder, and so with all the modern references I have seen. Now Elder himself quotes Verstegan in his comments on the legend, pp. 168-9 and note, and it is impossible to avoid conjecturing that he adapted Verstegan to the locality. Newtown, when Hassel visited it in 1790, had only six or seven houses (_l.c._, i., 137-8), though it had the privilege of returning two members to Parliament; it had been a populous town by the name of Franchville before the French invasion of the island of _temp._ Ric. II. It is just possible that there may have been a local legend to account for the depopulation by an exodus of the children. But the expression "pied piper" which Elder used clearly came from Verstegan, and until evidence is shown to the contrary the whole of the legend was adapted from him. It is not without significance that Elder was writing in the days of the _Ingoldsby Legends_, and had possibly no more foundation for the localisation of his stories than Barham.

There still remains the curious parallel from Belfast to which Mrs. Gutch has drawn attention. Magic pipers are not unknown to English folk-lore, as in the Percy ballad of _The Frere and the Boy_, or in the nursery rhyme of Tom the Piper's son in its more extended form. But beguiling into a mountain is not known elsewhere except at Hameln, which was made widely known in England by Verstegan's and Howell's accounts, so that the Belfast variant is also probably to be traced to the _Rattenfänger_. Here again, as in the case of Beddgellert (_Celtic Fairy Tales_, No. xxi.), the Blinded Giant and the Pedlar of Swaffham (_infra_, Nos. lxi., lxiii.), we have an imported legend adapted to local conditions.

XLV. HEREAFTERTHIS

_Source._--Sent me anonymously soon after the appearance of _English Fairy Tales_. From a gloss in the MS. "vitty" = Devonian for "decent," I conclude the tale is current in Devon. I should be obliged if the sender would communicate with me.

_Parallels._--The latter part has a certain similarity with "Jack Hannaford" (No. viii.). Halliwell's story of the miser who kept his money "for luck" (p. 153) is of the same type. Halliwell remarks that the tale throws light on a passage in Ben Jonson:

Say we are robbed, If any come to borrow a spoon or so I will not have Good Fortune or God's Blessing Let in, while I am busy.

The earlier part of the tale has resemblance with "Lazy Jack" (No. xxvii), the European variants of which are given by M. Cosquin, _Contes de Lorraine_, i., 241. Jan's satisfaction with his wife's blunders is also European (Cosquin, _l.c._, i., 157). On minding the door and dispersing robbers by its aid see "Mr. Vinegar" (No. vi.).

_Remarks._--"Hereafterthis" is thus a _mélange_ of droll incidents, yet has characteristic folkish touches ("can you milk-y, bake-y," "when I lived home") which give it much vivacity.

XLVI. THE GOLDEN BALL

_Source._--Contributed to the first edition of Henderson's _Folk-Lore of the Northern Counties_, pp. 333-5, by Rev. S. Baring-Gould.

_Parallels._--Mr. Nutt gave a version in _Folk-Lore Journal_, vi., 144. The man in instalments occurs in "The Strange Visitor" (No. xxxii.). The latter part of the tale has been turned into a game for English children, "Mary Brown," given in Miss Plunket's _Merry Games_, but not included in Newell, _Games and Songs of American Children_.

_Remarks._--This story is especially interesting as having given rise to a game. Capture and imprisonment are frequently the gruesome _motif_ of children's games, as in "Prisoner's base." Here it has been used with romantic effect.

XLVII. MY OWN SELF

_Source._--Told to Mrs. Balfour by Mrs. W., a native of North Sunderland, who had seen the cottage and heard the tale from persons who had known the widow and her boy, and had got the story direct from them. The title was "Me A'an Sel'," which I have altered to "My Own Self."

_Parallels._--Notwithstanding Mrs. Balfour's informant, the same tale is widely spread in the North Country. Hugh Miller relates it, in his _Scenes from my Childhood_, as "Ainsel"; it is given in Mr. Hartland's _English Folk and Fairy Tales_; Mr. F.B. Jevons has heard it in the neighbourhood of Durham; while a further version appeared in _Monthly Chronicle of North Country Folk-Lore_. Further parallels abroad are enumerated by Mr. Clouston in his _Book of Noodles_, pp. 184-5, and by the late Prof. Köhler in _Orient und Occident_, ii., 331. The expedient by which Ulysses outwits Polyphemus in the Odyssey by calling himself [Greek: outis] is clearly of the same order.

_Remarks._--The parallel with the Odyssey suggests the possibility that this is the ultimate source of the legend, as other parts of the epic have been adapted to local requirements in Great Britain, as in the "Blinded Giant" (No. lxi.), or "Conall Yellowclaw" (_Celtic Fairy Tales_, No. v.). The fact of Continental parallels disposes of the possibility of its being a merely local legend. The fairies might appear to be in a somewhat novel guise here as something to be afraid of. But this is the usual attitude of the folk towards the "Good People," as indeed their euphemistic name really implies.

XLVIII. THE BLACK BULL OF NORROWAY

_Source._--Chambers's _Popular Rhymes of Scotland_, much Anglicised in language, but otherwise unaltered.

_Parallels._--Chambers, _l.c._, gave a variant with the title "The Red Bull o' Norroway." Kennedy, _Legendary Fictions_, p. 87, gives a variant with the title "The Brown Bear of Norway." Mr. Stewart gave a Leitrim version, in which "Norroway" becomes "Orange," in _Folk-Lore_ for June, 1893, which Miss Peacock follows up with a Lincolnshire parallel (showing the same corruption of name) in the September number. A reference to the "Black Bull o' Norroway" occurs in Sidney's _Arcadia_, as also in the _Complaynt of Scotland_, 1548. The "sale of bed" incident at the end has been bibliographised by Miss Cox in her volume of variants of _Cinderella_, p. 481. It probably existed in one of the versions of _Nix Nought Nothing_ (No. vii.).

_Remarks._--The Black Bull is clearly a Beast who ultimately wins a Beauty. But the tale as is told is clearly not sufficiently motivated. Miss Peacock's version renders it likely that a fuller account may yet be recovered in England.

XLIX. YALLERY BROWN

_Source._--Mrs. Balfour's "Legends of the Lincolnshire Fens," in _Folk-Lore_, ii. It was told to Mrs. Balfour by a labourer, who professed to be the hero of the story, and related it in the first person. I have given him a name, and changed the narration into the oblique narration, and toned down the dialect.

_Parallels._--"Tiddy Mun," the hero of another of Mrs. Balfour's legends (_l.c._, p. 151) was "none bigger 'n a three years old bairn," and had no proper name.

_Remarks._--One might almost suspect Mrs. Balfour of being the victim of a piece of invention on the part of her autobiographical informant. But the scrap of verse, especially in its original dialect, has such a folkish ring that it is probable he was only adapting a local legend to his own circumstances.

L. THE THREE FEATHERS

_Source._--Collected by Mrs. Gomme from some hop-pickers near Deptford.

_Parallels._--The beginning is _à la_ Cupid and Psyche, on which Mr. Lang's monograph in the Carabas series is the classic authority. The remainder is an Eastern tale, the peregrinations of which have been studied by Mr. Clouston in his _Pop. Tales and Fictions_, ii., 289, _seq._ _The Wright's Chaste Wife_ is the English _fabliau_ on the subject. M. Bédier, in his recent work on _Les Fabliaux_, pp. 411-13, denies the Eastern origin of the _fabliau_, but in his Indiaphobia M. Bédier is _capable de tout_. In the Indian version the various messengers are sent by the king to test the chastity of a peerless wife of whom he has heard. The incident occurs in some versions of the "Battle of the Birds" story (_Celtic Fairy Tales_, No. xxiv.), and considering the wide spread of this in the British Isles, it was possibly from this source that it came to Deptford.

LI. SIR GAMMER VANS

_Source._--Halliwell's _Nursery Rhymes and Tales._

_Parallels._--There is a Yorkshire Lying Tale in Henderson's _Folk-Lore_, first edition, p. 337, a Suffolk one, "Happy Borz'l," in _Suffolk Notes and Queries_, while a similar jingle of inconsequent absurdities, commencing "So he died, and she unluckily married the barber, and a great bear coming up the street popped his head into the window, saying, 'Do you sell any soap'?" is said to have been invented by Charles James Fox to test Sheridan's memory, who repeated it after one hearing. (Others attribute it to Foote.) Similar _Lugenmärchen_ are given by the Grimms, and discussed by them in their Notes, Mrs. Hunt's translation, ii., pp. 424, 435, 442, 450, 452, _cf._ Crane, _Ital. Pop. Tales_, p. 263.

_Remarks._--The reference to venison warrants, and bows and arrows seems to argue considerable antiquity for this piece of nonsense. The honorific prefix "Sir" may in that case refer to clerkly qualities rather than to knighthood.

LII. TOM HICKATHRIFT

_Source._--From the Chap-book, _c._ 1660, in the Pepysian Library, edited for the Villon Society by Mr. G.L. Gomme. Mr. Nutt, who kindly abridged it for me, writes, "Nothing in the shape of incident has been omitted, and there has been no rewriting beyond a phrase here and there rendered necessary by the process of abridgment. But I have in one case altered the sequence of events putting the fight with the giant last."

_Parallels._--There are similar adventures of giants in Hunt's Cornish _Drolls_. Sir Francis Palgrave (_Quart. Rev._, vol. xxi.), and after him, Mr. Gomme, have drawn attention to certain similarities with the Grettir Saga, but they do not extend beyond general resemblances of great strength. Mr. Gomme, however, adds that the cartwheel "plays a not unimportant part in English folk-lore as a representative of old runic faith" (Villon Soc. edition, p. xv.).

_Remarks._--Mr. Gomme, in his interesting Introduction, points out several indications of considerable antiquity for the legend, various expressions in the Pepysian Chap-book ("in the marsh of the Isle of Ely," "good ground"), indicating that it could trace back to the sixteenth century. On the other hand, there is evidence of local tradition persisting from that time onward till the present day (Weaver, _Funerall Monuments_, 1631, pp. 866-7; Spelman, _Icenia_, 1640, p. 138; Dugdale, _Imbanking_, 1662 (ed. 1772, p. 244); Blomefield, _Norfolk_, 1808, ix., pp. 79, 80). These refer to a sepulchral monument in Tylney churchyard which had figured on a stone coffin an axle-tree and cart-wheel. The name in these versions of the legend is given as Hickifric, and he is there represented as a village Hampden who withstood the tyranny of the local lord of the manor. Mr. Gomme is inclined to believe, I understand him, that there is a certain amount of evidence for Tom Hickathrift being a historic personality round whom some of the Scandinavian mythical exploits have gathered. I must refer to his admirable Introduction for the ingenious line of reasoning on which he bases these conclusions. Under any circumstances no English child's library of folk-tales can be considered complete that does not present a version of Mr. Hickathrift's exploits.

LIII. THE HEDLEY KOW

_Source._--Told to Mrs. Balfour by Mrs. M. of S. Northumberland. Mrs. M.'s mother told the tale as having happened to a person she had known when young: she had herself seen the Hedley Kow twice, once as a donkey and once as a wisp of straw. "Kow" must not be confounded with the more prosaic animal with a "C."

_Parallels._--There is a short reference to the Hedley Kow in Henderson, _l.c._, first edition, pp. 234-5. Our story is shortly referred to thus: "He would present himself to some old dame gathering sticks, in the form of a truss of straw, which she would be sure to take up and carry away. Then it would become so heavy that she would have to lay her burden down, on which the straw would become 'quick,' rise upright and shuffle away before her, till at last it vanished from her sight with a laugh and shout." Some of Robin Goodfellow's pranks are similar to those of the Hedley Kow. The old woman's content with the changes is similar to that of "Mr. Vinegar." An ascending scale of changes has been studied by Prof. Crane, _Italian Popular Tales_, p. 373.

LIV. GOBBORN SEER

_Source._--Collected by Mrs. Gomme from an old woman at Deptford. It is to be remarked that "Gobborn Seer" is Irish (Goban Saor = free carpenter), and is the Irish equivalent of Wayland Smith, and occurs in several place names in Ireland.

_Parallels._--The essence of the tale occurs in Kennedy, _l.c._, p. 67, _seq._ Gobborn Seer's daughter was clearly the clever lass who is found in all parts of the Indo-European world. An instance in my _Indian Fairy Tales_, "Why the Fish Laughed" (No. xxiv.). She has been made a special study by Prof. Child, _English and Scotch Ballads_, i., 485, while an elaborate monograph by Prof. Benfey under the title "Die Kluge Dirne" (reprinted in his _Kleine Schriften_, ii., 156, _seq._), formed the occasion for his first presentation of his now well-known hypothesis of the derivation of all folk-tales from India.

_Remarks._--But for the accident of the title being preserved there would have been nothing to show that this tale had been imported into England from Ireland, whither it had probably been carried all the way from India.

LV. LAWKAMERCYME

_Source._--Halliwell, _Nursery Rhymes_.

_Parallels._--It is possible that this is an Eastern "sell": it occurs at any rate as the first episode in Fitzgerald's translation of Jami's _Salámán and Absál_. Jami, _ob._ 1492, introduces the story to illustrate the perplexities of the problem of individuality in a pantheistic system.

Lest, like the simple Arab in the tale, I grow perplext, O God! 'twixt ME and THEE, If I--this Spirit that inspires me whence? If THOU--then what this sensual impotence?

In other words, M. Bourget's _Cruelle Enigme_. The Arab yokel coming to Bagdad is fearful of losing his identity, and ties a pumpkin to his leg before going to sleep. His companion transfers it to his own leg. The yokel awaking is perplexed like the pantheist.

If I--the pumpkin why on YOU? If YOU--then where am I, and WHO?

LVI. TATTERCOATS

_Source._--Told to Mrs. Balfour by a little girl named Sally Brown, when she lived in the Cars in Lincolnshire. Sally had got it from her mother, who worked for Mrs. Balfour. It was originally told in dialect, which Mrs. Balfour has omitted.

_Parallels._--Miss Cox has included "Tattercoats" in her exhaustive collection of parallels of _Cinderella_ (Folk-Lore Society Publications, 1892), No. 274 from the MS. which I had lent her. Miss Cox rightly classes it as "Indeterminate," and it has only the _Menial Heroine_ and _Happy Marriage_ episodes in common with stories of the Cinderella type.

_Remarks._--_Tattercoats_ is of interest chiefly as being without any "fairy" or supernatural elements, unless the magic pipe can be so considered; it certainly gives the tale a fairy-like element. It is practically a prose variant of _King Cophetua and the Beggar Maid_, and is thus an instance of the folk-novel pure and simple, without any admixture of those unnatural incidents which transform the folk-novel into the serious folk-tale as we are accustomed to have it. Which is the prior, folk-novel or tale, it would be hard to say.

LVII. THE WEE BANNOCK

_Source._--Chambers's _Popular Rhymes of Scotland_. I have attempted an impossibility, I fear, in trying to anglicise, but the fun of the original tempted me. There still remain several technical trade terms requiring elucidation. I owe the following to the kindness of the Rev. Mr. Todd Martin, of Belfast. _Lawtrod_ = lap board on which the tailor irons; _tow cards_, the comb with which tow is carded; the _clove_, a heavy wooden knife for breaking up the flax. _Heckling_ is combing it with a _heckle_ or wooden comb; _binnings_ are halters for cattle made of _sprit_ or rushes. _Spurtle_ = spoon; _whins_ = gorse.

_Parallels._--This is clearly a variant of _Johnny-cake_ = journey-cake, No. xxviii., where see Notes.

_Remarks._--But here the interest is with the pursuers rather than with the pursued. The subtle characterisation of the various occupations reaches a high level of artistic merit. Mr. Barrie himself could scarcely have succeeded better in a very difficult task.

LVIII. JOHNNY GLOKE

_Source._--Contributed by Mr. W. Gregor to _Folk-Lore Journal_, vii. I have rechristened "Johnny Glaik" for the sake of the rhyme, and anglicised the few Scotticisms.

_Parallels._--This is clearly _The Valiant Tailor_ of the Grimms: "_x_ at a blow" has been bibliographised. (See my List of Incidents in Trans. Folk-Lore Congress, 1892, _sub voce._)

_Remarks._--How _The Valiant Tailor_ got to Aberdeen one cannot tell, though the resemblance is close enough to suggest a direct "lifting" from some English version of Grimm's _Goblins_. At the same time it must be remembered that _Jack the Giant Killer_ (see Notes on No. xix.) contains some of the incidents of _The Valiant Tailor_.

LIX. COAT O CLAY

_Source._--Contributed by Mrs. Balfour originally to _Longman's Magazine_, and thence to _Folk-Lore_, Sept., 1890.

_Remarks._--A rustic apologue, which is scarcely more than a prolonged pun on "Coat o' Clay." Mrs. Balfour's telling redeems it from the usual dulness of folk-tales with a moral or a double meaning.

LX. THE THREE COWS

_Source._--Contributed to Henderson, _l.c._, pp. 321-2, by the Rev. S. Baring-Gould.

_Parallels._--The incident "Bones together" occurs in _Rushen Coatie_ (_infra_, No. lxx.), and has been discussed by the Grimms, i., 399, and by Prof. Köhler, _Or. und Occ._, ii., 680.

LXI. THE BLINDED GIANT

_Source._--Henderson's _Folk-Lore of Northern Counties_. See also _Folk-Lore_.

_Parallels._--Polyphemus in the Odyssey and the Celtic parallels in _Celtic Fairy Tales_, No. v., "Conall Yellowclaw." The same incident occurs in one of Sindbad's voyages.

_Remarks._--Here we have another instance of the localisation of a well-known myth. There can be little doubt that the version is ultimately to be traced back to the Odyssey. The one-eyed giant, the barred door, the escape through the blinded giant's legs in the skin of a slaughtered animal, are a series of incidents that could not have arisen independently and casually. Yet till lately the mill stood to prove if the narrator lied, and every circumstance of local particularity seemed to vouch for the autochthonous character of the myth. The incident is an instructive one, and I have therefore included it in this volume, though it is little more than an anecdote in its present shape.

LXII. SCRAPEFOOT

_Source._--Collected by Mr. Batten from Mrs. H., who heard it from her mother over forty years ago.

_Parallels._--It is clearly a variant of Southey's _Three Bears_ (No. xviii.).