"... devant qu'il fût nuitIl arriva nouvel encombre;Un loup parut, tout le troupeau s'enfuitCe n'était pas un loup, ce n'en était que l'ombre."The sheep were right, however, to flee. In theEdda, the fourth swallow says, "When I see the wolf's ears, I think that the wolf is not far off." The twilight is the shadow or ear of the wolf.[233]Lous loups-garous soun gens coumo nous autes; mès an heyt un countrat dab lou diable, e cado sé soun fourçatz de se cambia en bestios per ana au sabbat e courre touto la neyt. Y a per aco un mouyén de lous goari. Lous can tira sang pendent qu' an perdut la forme de l'home, e asta leu la reprengon per toutjour; Bladé,Contes et Proverbes Populaires recueillis en Armagnac, Paris, 1867, p. 51.[234]We ought perhaps to add here the tradition cited by Cæsarius Heisterbacensis of a wolf who, biting the arm of a girl, drags her to a place where there is another wolf; the more she cries the more fiercely the wolf bites her. The other wolf has a bone in his throat, which the girl extracts; here the girl takes the place of the crane or stork of the fable; the bone may be now the moon, now the sun.[235]In another passage in theEdda, the eagle sits upon the wolf. According to the Latin legend of the foundation of Lavinium, the Trojans saw a singular prodigy. A fire arises in the woods; the wolf brings dry twigs in his mouth to make it burn better, and the eagle helps him by fanning the flames with his wings. The fox, on the other hand, dips its brush in the river to put out the fire with it, but does not succeed.[236]Cfr.Afanassieff, iii. 19.[237]Les loups, qui ont très peu d'amis en France, et qui sont obligés d'apporter dans toutes leurs démarches une excessive prudence, chassent presque toujours à la muette. J'ai été plusieurs fois en position d'admirer la profondeur de leurs combinaisons stratégiques; c'est effrayant de sagacité et de calcul; Toussenel,L'Esprit des Bêtes, ch. i.—And Aldrovandi,De Quadrup. Dig. Viv.ii. "Lupi omnem vim ingenii naturalem in ovibus insidiando exercent; noctu enim ovili appropinquantes, pedes lambunt, ne strepitum in gradiendo edant, et foliis obstrepentibus pedes quasi reos mordent."[238]In Piedmont it is also said in jest, that a man once met a wolf and thrust his hand down its throat, so far down that it reached its tail on the other side; he then pulled the tail inside the wolf's body and out through its throat, so that the wolf, turned inside out, expired.[239]In an unpublished, though very popular Piedmontese story, Piccolino is upon a tree eating figs; the wolf passes by and asks him for some, threatening him thus: "Piculin, dame ün fig, dass no, i t mangiu." Piccolino throws him down two, which are crushed upon the wolf's nose. Then the wolf threatens to eat him if he does not bring him a fig down; Piccolino comes down, and the wolf puts him in a sack and carries him towards his house, where the mother-wolf is waiting for him. But on the way the wolf is pressed by a corporeal necessity, and is obliged to go on the roadside; meanwhile, Piccolino makes a hole in the sack, comes out and puts a stone in his place. The wolf returns, shoulders the sack, but thinks that Piccolino has become much heavier. He goes home and tells the she-wolf to be glad, and prepare the cauldron full of hot water; he then empties the sack into the cauldron; the stone makes the boiling water spurt out upon the wolf's head, and he is scalded to death.[240]Cfr. the well-known English fairy-tales ofTom ThumbandHop-o'-my-Thumb.[241]Inferno, c. i.[242]Hêraklês, Hektor, Achilles, among the Greek heroes; Wolfdieterich, and several other heroes of Germanic tradition, have these animals for their ensigns; the lion is the steed of the hero Hildebrand. Cfr.Die Deutsche Heldensagevon Wilhelm Grimm, Berlin, Dümmler, 1867.—When Agarista and Philip dreamed of a lion, it was considered an augury, the one of the birth of Pericles, and the other of that of Alexander the Great.[243]Ubhe tvashá¹ur bibhyatur ǵâyamânât pratîćî sinham prati ǵoshayete;Ṛigv.i. 95, 5.[244]v.[245]Te svânino rudriyâ varshanirṇiǵah siá¹…hâ na heshakratavaḥ sudânavaḥ;Ṛigv.iii. 26, 5.—In the Bohemian story of grandfatherVsievedas, the young hero is sent by the prince who wishes to ruin him to take the three golden hairs of this grandfather (the sun).[246]Siá¹…ho na bhîma âyudhâni bibhrat;Ṛigv.iv. 16, 14. Cfr. i. 174, 3.[247]Siá¹…haá¹ nasanta madhvo ayâsaá¹ harim aru haá¹ divo asya patim;Ṛigv.ix. 89, 3.[248]In the Greek apologue, Ptolemy, king of Egypt, wishes to send some money to Alexander in homage to him; the mule, the horse, the ass, and the camel offer themselves of their own accord to carry the sacks. On the way, they meet the lion, who wishes to join the party, saying that he too carries money; but not being accustomed to such work, he modestly begs the other four to divide his load among themselves. They consent; soon afterwards, passing through a country rich in herds, the lion feels inclined to stay, and demands his portion of the money, but as his money resembles that of the others, not to mistake, he takes by force both his own and theirs.[249]ii. 62.[250]vi. 5, 35.[251]v. 43.[252]i. 229.[253]The anecdote of Androkles and the lion grateful for having a thorn extracted from his foot, is also related in almost the same words of Mentor the Syracusan, Helpis of Samos, the Abbot Gerasimos, St Jerome and (as to the blinded lion whose sight is given back to him) of Macharios, the confessor. The thorn in the lion's foot is a zoological form of the hero who is vulnerable in his feet. In the sixth of the Sicilian stories published by Signora Gonzenbach, the boy Giuseppe takes a thorn out of a lion's foot; the grateful lion gives him one of his hairs; by means of this hair, the young man can, in case of necessity, become a terrible lion, and as such, he bites off the head of the king of the dragons.[254]Thus, the ancients attributed to the lion a particular antipathy to strong smells, such as garlic, and the pudenda of a woman. But this superstition must be classed with that which ascribes sterility to the lioness. The women of antiquity, when they met a lioness, considered it as an omen of sterility. In the Æsopian fable, the foxes boast of their fruitfulness before the lioness, whom they laugh at because she gives birth to only one cub. "Yes," she answers, "but it is a lion;" under the sign of the lion, the earth also becomes arid, and consequently unfruitful.[255]Horace,Carm.i. 16.[256]Sculpebant Ethnici auro vel argento leonis imaginem, et ferentes hujusmodi simulacra generosiores et audaciores evadere dicebantur; idcirco non est mirum si Aristoteles (in lib. de Secr. Secr.) scripserit annulum ex auro vel argento, in quo cÅ“lata sit icon puellæ equitantis leonem die et hora solis vagantis in domicilio leonis gestantes, ab omnibus honorari; Aldrovandi,De Quadrup. Dig. Viv.i.—In the signs of the Zodiac, Virgo comes after upon Leo; Christians also celebrate the assumption of the Virgin into heaven towards the middle of August, when the sun passes from the sign of the lion into that of the virgin.[257]Cfr. Böhtlingk,Indische Sprüche, 2te Auflage, i. 1.[258]Ktesias explains this word as "devourer of men," but by means of Sanská¹›it it can only be explained by substituting to the initialmone of the words that signify man, such asnara,ǵana,manava,mânusha, &c.Antikorawould seem to be derived from the Sanská¹›itantakara= destroyer, who puts an end to, killer.[259]Ṛigv.ii. 38, 4.—In the fifty-fourth story of the fourth book ofAfanassieff, the king who has no children makes the maiden seven years old manufacture a fisherman's net in the space of only one night.[260]In the German legend we have the spinner in the moon. "Die Altmärkische Sage bei Temme 49, 'die Spinnerin im Monde,' wo ein Mädchen von seiner Mutter verwünscht wird, im Monde zu sitzen und zu spinnen, scheint entstellt, da jener Fluch sie nicht wegen Spinnens, sondern Tanzens im Mondschein trifft;" Simrock,Deutsche Mythologie, 2te Aufl. p. 23.—Cfr. also the first chapter of this work, and that on the bear, where we read of a girl dancing with the bear in the night.—Perhaps there is also some correspondence between the Vedic wordrâkâanda-rachnê.[261]Vy ućhâ duhitar divo mâ ćiraá¹ tanutha apaḥ net tvâ stenaá¹ yathâ ripuá¹ tapâti sûro arćishâ;Ṛigv.v. 79, 9.[262]Vritram avâbhinad dânum âurṇavâbham;Ṛigv.ii. 11, 18.—Ǵaǵńâno nu çatakratur vi pá¹›ićhad iti mâtaram ka ugrâḥ ke ha çṛiṇvire âd îm çavasy abravîd âurṇavâbham ahîçuvam te putra santu nishá¹uraḥ;Ṛigv.viii. 66, 1, 2.[263]i. 802, 825.[264]I observe, moreover, how in the Russian fables of Kriloff the same part is attributed to the spider as in the West to the wren (the regulus) and to the beetle. The eagle carries, without knowing it, a spider in its tail upon a tree; the spider then makes its web over it. Bird and spider therefore exchange places.[265]Ṛigv.i. 72, 9.[266]Vir na parṇâiḥ;Ib.i. 183, 1.[267]Aruṇaḥ suparṇaḥ;Ib.x. 55, 6.[268]Vayo na sîdann adhi barhishi priye;Ib.i. 85, 7.[269]Manmasâdhano veḥ;Ib.i. 96, 6.[270] te suparṇâ aminantaá¹… evâiḥ ká¹›ishṇo nonâva vá¹›ishabho yadîdam;Ib.i. 79, 2.[271]Vanâni vibhyo nakir asya tâni vratâ devasya savitar minanti;Ib.ii. 38, 7.[272]Ut te vayaçćid vasater apaptan;Ib.i. 124, 12.—In the twenty-third story of the second book ofAfanassieff, when the beautiful girl Helen, another form of the aurora, is at the king's ball, she throws bones with one hand, when birds spring up, and water with the other, when gardens and fountains spring up.[273]Abhi no devîr avasâ mahaḥ çarmaṇâ ná¹›ipatnîḥ aćhinnapatrâḥ saćantâm;Ṛigv.i. 22, 11.—If the goddesses are here the same as the nymphs, they may be the same as the clouds, and I should refer to this passage, the legend of theRâmâyaṇam(v. 56), according to which the lofty mountains were once winged (the clouds) and wandered about the earth at pleasure; Indras, with his thunderbolt, cut their wings, and they fell down.[274]Dvâ suparṇâ sayuǵâ sakhâyâ samânaá¹ vá¹›iksham pari shasvaǵâte tayor anyaḥ pippalaá¹ svâdv atty anaçnann anyo abhi ćâkaçîtî—Yatrâ suparṇâ amá¹›itasya bhâgam animeshaá¹ vidathâbhisvaranti;Ṛigv.i. 164, 20.—Perhaps we should compare to this legend the two birds Amru and Ćamru of theKhorda-Avesta, of which one makes the seeds of the three mythical trees fall, and the other scatters them about.[275]Calcutta, 1851.[276]i. 4305.[277]Sixth canto.[278]Professor Spiegel says in a note,Khorda-Avesta, p. 147: "Die Beschwörung vormittelst einer Feder ist gewiss eine alteranische Vorstellung."—In a story, hitherto unpublished, of the Monferrato, communicated to me by Signor Ferraro, a woman, who had gone to eat parsley in the garden of a sorceress, was obliged to give her daughter up to her as a penalty for the offence. The girl was afterwards subjected to three difficult trials; to sunder in one day a mountain of wheat and millet into the grains composing it, to eat in one day a mountain of apples, and to wash, dry, and iron in one hour all the linen of a year. In the first trial, by means of two bird's feathers, she calls up a thousand birds, who separate the grain from the millet.—In the fourth story of the fifth book of thePentamerone, the birds strip themselves of their feathers to fill a mattress which the witch has ordered the young Permetella to make. In a Tuscan story, for the possession of a peacock's feather, the young brother is killed.[279]InAfanassieff, v. 38, a similar little bird ravages during the night the field of a lord; the youngest of the three brothers, who is believed to be foolish, catches it and sells it to the king, who shuts it in a room under lock and key. The king's son releases the little bird, which in gratitude gives him a horse that wins battles, and a golden apple, by means of which he is able to wed a princess.—In the story v. 22, the young man who has been instructed by the devil transforms himself into a bird and tells his father to sell him, but not to give up the cage. The devil buys the bird, but does not obtain the cage; he puts the bird into a handkerchief to take it to his daughter, but when he comes home the bird has disappeared.—In the story v. 42, the king of birds releases Ivan from the witch who wishes to eat him, and takes him to his betrothed. The witch tears a few feathers off the king of birds, but does not succeed in stopping him.—In the story v. 46, the devil teaches the language of birds to the young hero.—In the story vi. 69, the wise maiden goes to take into the kingdom of darkness the bird that speaks, the tree that sings, and the water of life, with which she brings to life her two brothers, born before her, whom a witch had thrown into a fountain (the aurora delivers the Açvinâu).—In the fifth Sicilian story of Signora Gonzenbach, brother and sister go into the witch's castle to take the water that dances and the bird that speaks. The bird tells the water, in the king's presence, the story of the two young people.—In the fifth story of the second book of thePentamerone, the fox teaches the young Grannonia what birds say.—In the seventh story of the fifth book of thePentamerone, it is the youngest of the five brothers that acquires the faculty of understanding the language of birds.—In Pietro de Crescenzi (x. 1), we find a "rex Daucus (Dacus?) qui divino intellectu novit naturam accipitrum et falconum et eos domesticare ad prædam instruere, et ab ægritudinibus liberare."—In the legend of St Francis of Assisi, the great saint was able to make himself understood to birds, and to make the swallows be silent; the same saint made a wolf mild and tame; the miracle of Orpheus is repeated in numerous other legends.—In the sixteenth Mongol story of Siddhikür, a wise dwarf, who understands the language of birds, hears two birds, father and son, speak to each other on the summit of a tree about the king's son, who had been assassinated by the son of the minister.—In theEdda, Atli has a long dialogue with a bird whose language he understands.—Finally, the whole of the comedy of Aristophanes entitledThe Birds(Ornithes) shows the wisdom and divining power of birds, and, as animals of presage, their intimate relation with the thunderbolts of Zeus.—According to the German belief, the fat of a serpent teaches how to understand the language of birds. Cfr. Simrock, the work previously quoted, p. 457.[280]"Die zwei Cypressen sind die Himmelsseiten,Die beiden, die uns Glück und Leid bereiten;Der Vogel, der drin nistet, ist die Sonne,Sie giebt beim Schneiden Schmerz, beim Kommen Wonne."—Schack,Heldensagen von Firdusi, p. 122.[281]A variety of the myth of Priapos, mentioned in the chapter on the Ass.[282]Sinićka letat i gavarÃt: Sin da charosh.—The dark-blue bird is a symbol of the azure sky of night or winter, whilst, on the other hand, the wooden bird, at which the maidens of Westphalia throw sticks on St John's Day, seems to be a phallical symbol; she who hits the bird is queen. The bird is a well-known phallical symbol; and a phallical origin must be ascribed to the popular superstition that a bird may be rendered helpless by putting salt upon its tail. The salacitas of an animal, when given way to, takes every energy from it; the ûrdhvaretas alone is strong. It was perhaps for a similar reason that in the Middle Ages, when a city was destroyed to its foundations, it was the custom to throw salt upon it, in order that it might never rise again. Salt thrown away is like seed sown in the desert, where it is fruitless.[283]It is a mountaineer of the province of Siena that speaks: "I perceived by the song of the birds that the weather was about to change; their voice told me, it was so merry;" Giuliani,Moralità e Poesia del Vivente Linguaggio della Toscana, p. 149.[284]Cfr. among others, the wordsalbanellus(haubereau)avis auguralis species, andaucellus.[285]De PrÅ“parat. Evang.lib. ix.[286]i. 76.[287]Amongst the Romans, on the contrary, the flight to the left was an excellent omen; thus Plautus in theEpidicus: "Tacete, habete animum bonum, liquido exeo foras auspicio, ave sinistra." (But this change from right to left may depend upon the various positions taken by the observer in placing himself.) In the mediæval legend of Alexander, a bird with a human face (a harpy) meets Alexander and advises him to turn to the right, when he will see marvellous things.—Cfr. Zacher,Pseudo-Callisthenes, Halle, 1867, p. 142.[288]Râmây.iii. 64.[289]Pra çyenaḥ çyenebhya âçupâtvâ—Aćakrayâ yat svadhayâ suparṇo havyam bharan manave devaǵushá¹am;Ṛigv.iv. 26, 4.—The somaḥ çyenâbhá¹›itaḥ is also mentioned in theṚigv.i. 80, 2, iv. 27, ix. 77, and other passages.[290]Çatam mâ pura âyasîr arakshann adha çyeno ǵavasâ nir adîyam;Ṛigv.iv. 27, 1.[291]Yam te çyenaç ćârum avá¹›ikaá¹ padâbharad aruṇam mânam andhasaḥ—enâ vayo vi târy âyur ǵivasa enâ ǵagâra bandhutâ;Ṛigv.x. 144, 5.[292]In theMahâbhâratam(i. 2383), the ambrosia takes the shape of sperm. A king, far from his wife Girikâ, thinks of her; the sperm comes from him and falls upon a leaf. A hawk carries the leaf away; another hawk sees it and disputes with it for the possession of the leaf; they fight with one another and the leaf falls into the waters of the Yamunâ, where the nymph Adrikâ (equivalent to Girikâ), changed by a curse into a fish, sees the leaf, feeds upon the sperm, becomes fruitful, and is delivered; cfr. the chapter on the Fishes.[293]Çyeno 'yopâshá¹ir hanti dasyûn;Ṛigv.x. 99, 8.—In the Russian stories the hawk and the dog are sometimes the most powerful helpers of the hero.[294]Ghá¹›ishuḥ çyenâya ká¹›itvana âsuḥ;Ṛigv.x. 144, 3.—Yam suparṇaḥ parâvataḥ çyenasya putra âbharat çataćakram;Ṛigv.x. 144, 1.[295]Sa pûrvyaḥ pavate yaá¹ divas pari çyeno mathâyad ishitas tiro raǵaḥ sa madhva â yuvate yeviǵâna it ká¹›içânor astur manasâha bibhyushâ;Ṛigv.ix. 77, 2.[296]iii. 3, 26.[297]Antaḥ patat patatry asya parṇam;Ṛigv.iv. 27, 4.—Cfr. for this mythical episode the texts given by Prof. Kuhn and the relative discussions,Die Herabkunft d. F. u. d. S., pp. 138seq.and 180seq.[298]Çyeno na bhîtaḥ;Ṛigv.i. 32, 14.[299]Anyaá¹ divo mâtariçvâ ǵabhârâmathnâd anyam pari çyeno adreḥ;Ṛigv.i. 93, 6.[300] vâṠçyenâso açvinâ vahantu—ye apturo divyâso na gá¹›idhrâh;Ṛigv.i. 118, 4.[301]Gá¹›idhreva vá¹›ikshaá¹ nidhimantam aćha;Ṛigv.ii. 39, 1.[302]Ṛigv.i. 88, 4.—In fact, in the hymn i. 165, 2, the Marutas are explicitly compared to hawks that fly through the air (çyenâṅ iva dhraǵato antarikshe).[303]Drapsaḥ samudram abhi yaǵ ǵigâti paçyan gá¹›idhrasya ćakshasâ;Ṛigv.x. 123, 8.[304]i. 1078,seq.[305]Mbh.i. 1495.[306]Ib.i. 1496,seq.[307]Râmây.vii. 6.[308]Ib.vii. 7.[309]Ib.vi. 26.[310]Mbh.i. 1337,seq.[311]iii. 20.[312]iii. 29.[313]Râmây.iv. 58, 59.[314]For the numerous Eastern varieties of this legend, cfr. the Einleitung to thePańćatantram, of Prof. Benfey, p. 388,seq.—In the fifth story of the first book ofAfanassieff(cfr. the sixth of the same book), Little John is carried back from the bottom of the earth into Russia upon the wings of an eagle. When the eagle is hungry it turns its head, and Johnny gives it food; when the provisions come to an end, Johnny feeds it with his own flesh.—In the twenty-seventh story of the second book, the two young people are carried from the world of darkness into that of light on the wings of the bird Kolpalitza; when the provisions come to an end, it is the girl that gives flesh, cut off her thigh, to the bird. But the youth, who has with him the water of life, heals the amorous maiden; cfr. alsoAfanassieff, v. 23, and v. 28, where, instead of the eagle, we find the hawk.—The same sacrifice of himself is made in a Piedmontese story, recorded by me in first number of theRivista Orientale, by a young prince, who wishes to cross the sea in order to see the princess that he loves; the same is done by the young hero of the following unpublished Tuscan story, which I heard from a certain Martino Nardini of Prato:—"A three-headed dragon steals during the night the golden apples in the garden of the king of Portugal; the three sons of the king watch during the night: the first two fall asleep, but the third discovers the thief and wounds him. The day after, the three brothers follow the track caused by the robber's blood: they come to a beautiful palace, in which there is a cistern, into which the third brother is lowered down, taking a trumpet with him to sound when he wishes to be taken up. Following a dark path he comes to a fine meadow, where there are three splendid palaces, one of bronze, one of silver, and one of gold; following the trace of blood, he goes to the palace of bronze; a beautiful maiden opens the gate to him, and wonders why he has come down to the world underground; the young couple are pleased with each other, and promise to marry one another; the maiden has a crown of brilliants, of which she gives him half as a pledge. The dragon comes back home, and says:—"Ucci, ucciO che puzzo di Cristianucci,O ce n' è, o ce n' è stati,O ce n' è di rimpiattati."The maiden, who has concealed the young hero, caresses the dragon and makes him fall asleep. When he is asleep, she brings the young man out of his concealment, gives him a sword and tells him to cut the three heads off at one blow. Helped by a second maiden, the young hero prepares to accomplish a second undertaking in the silver palace of the five-headed dragon. He must cut the five heads off at a blow, for if one remains, it is as if he had cut none off. After having killed the dragon, he promises to marry the second maiden too. Finally, he knocks at the gate of the golden palace, which is opened by a third maiden; she too asks, "What ever induced you to come to lose your life in the lower world? The seven-headed dragon lives here." He promises to marry her; the dragon does not wish to go to rest this night; but the maiden persuades him to do so, upon which the youth cuts off the seven heads in two strokes. The three girls, who were three princesses carried off by the dragons, are released, and take all the riches that they can find in order to carry them into the upper world. They come to the cistern, the hero sounds the trumpet, and the two brothers draw up all the riches, the three maidens, shutting up the entrance with a stone, and leaving their young brother alone in the subterranean world. The two elder brothers force the three princesses to declare that they had delivered them; they then go to the King of Portugal and boast of this feat, saying, that the third brother is lost. The three princesses are sad, at which the King of Portugal wonders. The elder brothers wish to marry the maiden who was in the bronze palace; but she declares that she will only marry him who brings to her the other half of the crown of brilliants. They send to all the goldsmiths and jewellers to find one who can make it. Meanwhile, the third brother, abandoned underground, cries out for aid; an eagle approaches the tomb, and promises to carry him into the world above, if he will allay its hunger. The young hero, by the eagle's advice, puts lizards and serpents into a sack, and calls the eagle after having made a plentiful provision of food. He fastens the sack round his neck in order to give an animal to the eagle each time that it asks for food. When they are a few arms' length distant from the upper world, the sack is empty; the youth cuts his flesh off with a knife and gives it to the eagle, which carries him into the world, when the young man asks him how he can return home. The bird directs him to follow the high road. A charcoal-seller passes by; the young man proposes himself as his assistant, on condition that he give him some food. The charcoal-seller takes him with himself for some time, and then recommends him to an old man, his friend, who is a silversmith. Meanwhile, the king's servants have been six months wandering towards the sunset, searching for a silversmith capable of making the other half of the crown, but in vain; they then wander for six months towards the sunrise till they come to the dwelling of the poor silversmith where the third brother serves as an assistant. The old man says he is not able to make the half crown; but the young man asks to see the other half, recognises it, and promises to give it back entire in eight days. At the expiration of this time, the king sends for the crown and the manufacturer, but the youth sends his master instead of himself. The princess, however, insists upon seeing the young assistant too; he is sent for and brought to the palace; the king does not recognise him, and asks what reward he wants; he answers that he wishes for what the crown cost to the princess. The latter recognises him, after which his father does so too. The young hero weds the princess to whom he had promised himself; and the two brothers are covered with inflammable gums, and used as lamps to light up the wedding.[315]In a hitherto unpublished story of the Monferrato, communicated to me by Signor Ferraro, a king with three sons is blind; he would be cured if he could bathe his eyes in oil with a feather of the griffon-bird, which lives upon a high mountain. The third brother succeeds in catching one, having been kind to an old woman; he brings the griffon-bird to his father, who recovers his sight and his youth.—Cfr. the third story of the fourth book of thePentamerone, in which a hawk that is a princess transformed, also gives to the brother of his wife one of his feathers, which he is to throw to the ground in case of necessity; indeed, when young Tittone requires it, a battalion of hawks appear in order to free the imprisoned maiden loved by Tittone.—In the fifth story of the fifth book of thePentamerone, the hawk serves as a guide to a young king to find a beautiful princess whom a witch has put to sleep, and who is believed to be dead. This princess becomes the mother of two sons, who are called Sun and Moon.—In the sixth Sicilian story of Signora Gonzenbach, a young man releases an eagle that was entangled in the branches of a tree; the grateful eagle gives him one of its feathers; letting it fall to the ground, the youth can become an eagle at pleasure.[316]In the ninth Esthonian story it is the eagle that takes the message to the thunder-god to enable him to recover his weapon, which the devil had carried off.—In the first Esthonian story, the eagle also appears as the propitious messenger of the young prince.[317]In the story of Santo Stefano,La Principessa che non ride, the eaglets have the same faculty of drawing after themselves everything that they touch; and, as forms of the winds (or the clouds), in which character they sometimes appear, we can understand this property of theirs; the wind, too, draws after itself everything that comes in its way, and especially the violent north wind (aquilo).—In Russian stories we have, instead, now the funereal storks, now the marvellous goose taking the place of the eagle that drags things behind it.[318]In the tenth Sicilian story of Signora Gonzenbach, it is in the shape of a silver eagle that the king of the assassins penetrates into the room where the young wife of the king sleeps, upon whom he wishes to avenge himself.—Stephanus Stephanius, the interpreter ofSaxo Grammaticus, writes, that among the English, the Danes, and other Northern nations, it was the custom when an enemy was defeated, to thrust a sword, as a greater mark of ignominy, into his back, in such a manner as to separate the backbone on both sides by a longitudinal wound; thence stripes of flesh having been cut off, they were fastened to the sides, so as to represent eagle's wings. (In Russian popular stories, when heroes and monsters fight, we find frequent reference to a similar custom.)[319]PanravÃlas sataná lućshe yasnavo sakalá,Afanassieff, vi. 16.—The proverb, however, may have another sense, viz., better the devil in person than a beautiful but diabolical shape. The devil sometimes assumed the form of a hawk, as we learn from the legend of Endo, an English man-at-arms, who became enamoured of one into which the devil had transformed himself, in Guillelmus Neubrigensis,Hist. Angl.i. 19.[320]In Plato'sPhædon, rapacious men are transformed into wolves and kites.[321]Cfr. Aldrovandi,Ornith.v.—And, moreover, in the same Aldrovandi:—"Narrant qui res Africanas literis mandarunt Aquilam marem aliquando cum Lupa coire ... producique ac edi Draconem, qui rostro et alis avis speciem referat, cauda serpentem, pede Lupum, cute esse versicolorem, nec supercilia posse attollere."[322]I recommend, to whoever wishes to find all these circumstances united, the perusal of the first volume of theOrnithologiaof Aldrovandi, who dedicated in it to birds of prey a long and detailed study.—Cfr. also Bachofen.Die Sage von Tanaquil, Heidelberg, 1870.[323]Comparative popular medicine might be the subject of a special work which could not fail to be instructive and interesting.[324]
"... devant qu'il fût nuitIl arriva nouvel encombre;Un loup parut, tout le troupeau s'enfuitCe n'était pas un loup, ce n'en était que l'ombre."
"... devant qu'il fût nuitIl arriva nouvel encombre;Un loup parut, tout le troupeau s'enfuitCe n'était pas un loup, ce n'en était que l'ombre."
The sheep were right, however, to flee. In theEdda, the fourth swallow says, "When I see the wolf's ears, I think that the wolf is not far off." The twilight is the shadow or ear of the wolf.
[233]Lous loups-garous soun gens coumo nous autes; mès an heyt un countrat dab lou diable, e cado sé soun fourçatz de se cambia en bestios per ana au sabbat e courre touto la neyt. Y a per aco un mouyén de lous goari. Lous can tira sang pendent qu' an perdut la forme de l'home, e asta leu la reprengon per toutjour; Bladé,Contes et Proverbes Populaires recueillis en Armagnac, Paris, 1867, p. 51.
[234]We ought perhaps to add here the tradition cited by Cæsarius Heisterbacensis of a wolf who, biting the arm of a girl, drags her to a place where there is another wolf; the more she cries the more fiercely the wolf bites her. The other wolf has a bone in his throat, which the girl extracts; here the girl takes the place of the crane or stork of the fable; the bone may be now the moon, now the sun.
[235]In another passage in theEdda, the eagle sits upon the wolf. According to the Latin legend of the foundation of Lavinium, the Trojans saw a singular prodigy. A fire arises in the woods; the wolf brings dry twigs in his mouth to make it burn better, and the eagle helps him by fanning the flames with his wings. The fox, on the other hand, dips its brush in the river to put out the fire with it, but does not succeed.
[236]Cfr.Afanassieff, iii. 19.
[237]Les loups, qui ont très peu d'amis en France, et qui sont obligés d'apporter dans toutes leurs démarches une excessive prudence, chassent presque toujours à la muette. J'ai été plusieurs fois en position d'admirer la profondeur de leurs combinaisons stratégiques; c'est effrayant de sagacité et de calcul; Toussenel,L'Esprit des Bêtes, ch. i.—And Aldrovandi,De Quadrup. Dig. Viv.ii. "Lupi omnem vim ingenii naturalem in ovibus insidiando exercent; noctu enim ovili appropinquantes, pedes lambunt, ne strepitum in gradiendo edant, et foliis obstrepentibus pedes quasi reos mordent."
[238]In Piedmont it is also said in jest, that a man once met a wolf and thrust his hand down its throat, so far down that it reached its tail on the other side; he then pulled the tail inside the wolf's body and out through its throat, so that the wolf, turned inside out, expired.
[239]In an unpublished, though very popular Piedmontese story, Piccolino is upon a tree eating figs; the wolf passes by and asks him for some, threatening him thus: "Piculin, dame ün fig, dass no, i t mangiu." Piccolino throws him down two, which are crushed upon the wolf's nose. Then the wolf threatens to eat him if he does not bring him a fig down; Piccolino comes down, and the wolf puts him in a sack and carries him towards his house, where the mother-wolf is waiting for him. But on the way the wolf is pressed by a corporeal necessity, and is obliged to go on the roadside; meanwhile, Piccolino makes a hole in the sack, comes out and puts a stone in his place. The wolf returns, shoulders the sack, but thinks that Piccolino has become much heavier. He goes home and tells the she-wolf to be glad, and prepare the cauldron full of hot water; he then empties the sack into the cauldron; the stone makes the boiling water spurt out upon the wolf's head, and he is scalded to death.
[240]Cfr. the well-known English fairy-tales ofTom ThumbandHop-o'-my-Thumb.
[241]Inferno, c. i.
[242]Hêraklês, Hektor, Achilles, among the Greek heroes; Wolfdieterich, and several other heroes of Germanic tradition, have these animals for their ensigns; the lion is the steed of the hero Hildebrand. Cfr.Die Deutsche Heldensagevon Wilhelm Grimm, Berlin, Dümmler, 1867.—When Agarista and Philip dreamed of a lion, it was considered an augury, the one of the birth of Pericles, and the other of that of Alexander the Great.
[243]Ubhe tvashá¹ur bibhyatur ǵâyamânât pratîćî sinham prati ǵoshayete;Ṛigv.i. 95, 5.
[244]v.
[245]Te svânino rudriyâ varshanirṇiǵah siṅhâ na heshakratavaḥ sudânavaḥ;Ṛigv.iii. 26, 5.—In the Bohemian story of grandfatherVsievedas, the young hero is sent by the prince who wishes to ruin him to take the three golden hairs of this grandfather (the sun).
[246]Siṅho na bhîma âyudhâni bibhrat;Ṛigv.iv. 16, 14. Cfr. i. 174, 3.
[247]SiṅhaṠnasanta madhvo ayâsaṠharim aru haṠdivo asya patim;Ṛigv.ix. 89, 3.
[248]In the Greek apologue, Ptolemy, king of Egypt, wishes to send some money to Alexander in homage to him; the mule, the horse, the ass, and the camel offer themselves of their own accord to carry the sacks. On the way, they meet the lion, who wishes to join the party, saying that he too carries money; but not being accustomed to such work, he modestly begs the other four to divide his load among themselves. They consent; soon afterwards, passing through a country rich in herds, the lion feels inclined to stay, and demands his portion of the money, but as his money resembles that of the others, not to mistake, he takes by force both his own and theirs.
[249]ii. 62.
[250]vi. 5, 35.
[251]v. 43.
[252]i. 229.
[253]The anecdote of Androkles and the lion grateful for having a thorn extracted from his foot, is also related in almost the same words of Mentor the Syracusan, Helpis of Samos, the Abbot Gerasimos, St Jerome and (as to the blinded lion whose sight is given back to him) of Macharios, the confessor. The thorn in the lion's foot is a zoological form of the hero who is vulnerable in his feet. In the sixth of the Sicilian stories published by Signora Gonzenbach, the boy Giuseppe takes a thorn out of a lion's foot; the grateful lion gives him one of his hairs; by means of this hair, the young man can, in case of necessity, become a terrible lion, and as such, he bites off the head of the king of the dragons.
[254]Thus, the ancients attributed to the lion a particular antipathy to strong smells, such as garlic, and the pudenda of a woman. But this superstition must be classed with that which ascribes sterility to the lioness. The women of antiquity, when they met a lioness, considered it as an omen of sterility. In the Æsopian fable, the foxes boast of their fruitfulness before the lioness, whom they laugh at because she gives birth to only one cub. "Yes," she answers, "but it is a lion;" under the sign of the lion, the earth also becomes arid, and consequently unfruitful.
[255]Horace,Carm.i. 16.
[256]Sculpebant Ethnici auro vel argento leonis imaginem, et ferentes hujusmodi simulacra generosiores et audaciores evadere dicebantur; idcirco non est mirum si Aristoteles (in lib. de Secr. Secr.) scripserit annulum ex auro vel argento, in quo cœlata sit icon puellæ equitantis leonem die et hora solis vagantis in domicilio leonis gestantes, ab omnibus honorari; Aldrovandi,De Quadrup. Dig. Viv.i.—In the signs of the Zodiac, Virgo comes after upon Leo; Christians also celebrate the assumption of the Virgin into heaven towards the middle of August, when the sun passes from the sign of the lion into that of the virgin.
[257]Cfr. Böhtlingk,Indische Sprüche, 2te Auflage, i. 1.
[258]Ktesias explains this word as "devourer of men," but by means of Sanskṛit it can only be explained by substituting to the initialmone of the words that signify man, such asnara,ǵana,manava,mânusha, &c.Antikorawould seem to be derived from the Sanskṛitantakara= destroyer, who puts an end to, killer.
[259]Ṛigv.ii. 38, 4.—In the fifty-fourth story of the fourth book ofAfanassieff, the king who has no children makes the maiden seven years old manufacture a fisherman's net in the space of only one night.
[260]In the German legend we have the spinner in the moon. "Die Altmärkische Sage bei Temme 49, 'die Spinnerin im Monde,' wo ein Mädchen von seiner Mutter verwünscht wird, im Monde zu sitzen und zu spinnen, scheint entstellt, da jener Fluch sie nicht wegen Spinnens, sondern Tanzens im Mondschein trifft;" Simrock,Deutsche Mythologie, 2te Aufl. p. 23.—Cfr. also the first chapter of this work, and that on the bear, where we read of a girl dancing with the bear in the night.—Perhaps there is also some correspondence between the Vedic wordrâkâanda-rachnê.
[261]Vy ućhâ duhitar divo mâ ćiraṠtanutha apaḥ net tvâ stenaṠyathâ ripuṠtapâti sûro arćishâ;Ṛigv.v. 79, 9.
[262]Vritram avâbhinad dânum âurṇavâbham;Ṛigv.ii. 11, 18.—Ǵaǵńâno nu çatakratur vi pá¹›ićhad iti mâtaram ka ugrâḥ ke ha çṛiṇvire âd îm çavasy abravîd âurṇavâbham ahîçuvam te putra santu nishá¹uraḥ;Ṛigv.viii. 66, 1, 2.
[263]i. 802, 825.
[264]I observe, moreover, how in the Russian fables of Kriloff the same part is attributed to the spider as in the West to the wren (the regulus) and to the beetle. The eagle carries, without knowing it, a spider in its tail upon a tree; the spider then makes its web over it. Bird and spider therefore exchange places.
[265]Ṛigv.i. 72, 9.
[266]Vir na parṇâiḥ;Ib.i. 183, 1.
[267]Aruṇaḥ suparṇaḥ;Ib.x. 55, 6.
[268]Vayo na sîdann adhi barhishi priye;Ib.i. 85, 7.
[269]Manmasâdhano veḥ;Ib.i. 96, 6.
[270]Â te suparṇâ aminantaṅ evâiḥ kṛishṇo nonâva vṛishabho yadîdam;Ib.i. 79, 2.
[271]Vanâni vibhyo nakir asya tâni vratâ devasya savitar minanti;Ib.ii. 38, 7.
[272]Ut te vayaçćid vasater apaptan;Ib.i. 124, 12.—In the twenty-third story of the second book ofAfanassieff, when the beautiful girl Helen, another form of the aurora, is at the king's ball, she throws bones with one hand, when birds spring up, and water with the other, when gardens and fountains spring up.
[273]Abhi no devîr avasâ mahaḥ çarmaṇâ nṛipatnîḥ aćhinnapatrâḥ saćantâm;Ṛigv.i. 22, 11.—If the goddesses are here the same as the nymphs, they may be the same as the clouds, and I should refer to this passage, the legend of theRâmâyaṇam(v. 56), according to which the lofty mountains were once winged (the clouds) and wandered about the earth at pleasure; Indras, with his thunderbolt, cut their wings, and they fell down.
[274]Dvâ suparṇâ sayuǵâ sakhâyâ samânaṠvṛiksham pari shasvaǵâte tayor anyaḥ pippalaṠsvâdv atty anaçnann anyo abhi ćâkaçîtî—Yatrâ suparṇâ amṛitasya bhâgam animeshaṠvidathâbhisvaranti;Ṛigv.i. 164, 20.—Perhaps we should compare to this legend the two birds Amru and Ćamru of theKhorda-Avesta, of which one makes the seeds of the three mythical trees fall, and the other scatters them about.
[275]Calcutta, 1851.
[276]i. 4305.
[277]Sixth canto.
[278]Professor Spiegel says in a note,Khorda-Avesta, p. 147: "Die Beschwörung vormittelst einer Feder ist gewiss eine alteranische Vorstellung."—In a story, hitherto unpublished, of the Monferrato, communicated to me by Signor Ferraro, a woman, who had gone to eat parsley in the garden of a sorceress, was obliged to give her daughter up to her as a penalty for the offence. The girl was afterwards subjected to three difficult trials; to sunder in one day a mountain of wheat and millet into the grains composing it, to eat in one day a mountain of apples, and to wash, dry, and iron in one hour all the linen of a year. In the first trial, by means of two bird's feathers, she calls up a thousand birds, who separate the grain from the millet.—In the fourth story of the fifth book of thePentamerone, the birds strip themselves of their feathers to fill a mattress which the witch has ordered the young Permetella to make. In a Tuscan story, for the possession of a peacock's feather, the young brother is killed.
[279]InAfanassieff, v. 38, a similar little bird ravages during the night the field of a lord; the youngest of the three brothers, who is believed to be foolish, catches it and sells it to the king, who shuts it in a room under lock and key. The king's son releases the little bird, which in gratitude gives him a horse that wins battles, and a golden apple, by means of which he is able to wed a princess.—In the story v. 22, the young man who has been instructed by the devil transforms himself into a bird and tells his father to sell him, but not to give up the cage. The devil buys the bird, but does not obtain the cage; he puts the bird into a handkerchief to take it to his daughter, but when he comes home the bird has disappeared.—In the story v. 42, the king of birds releases Ivan from the witch who wishes to eat him, and takes him to his betrothed. The witch tears a few feathers off the king of birds, but does not succeed in stopping him.—In the story v. 46, the devil teaches the language of birds to the young hero.—In the story vi. 69, the wise maiden goes to take into the kingdom of darkness the bird that speaks, the tree that sings, and the water of life, with which she brings to life her two brothers, born before her, whom a witch had thrown into a fountain (the aurora delivers the Açvinâu).—In the fifth Sicilian story of Signora Gonzenbach, brother and sister go into the witch's castle to take the water that dances and the bird that speaks. The bird tells the water, in the king's presence, the story of the two young people.—In the fifth story of the second book of thePentamerone, the fox teaches the young Grannonia what birds say.—In the seventh story of the fifth book of thePentamerone, it is the youngest of the five brothers that acquires the faculty of understanding the language of birds.—In Pietro de Crescenzi (x. 1), we find a "rex Daucus (Dacus?) qui divino intellectu novit naturam accipitrum et falconum et eos domesticare ad prædam instruere, et ab ægritudinibus liberare."—In the legend of St Francis of Assisi, the great saint was able to make himself understood to birds, and to make the swallows be silent; the same saint made a wolf mild and tame; the miracle of Orpheus is repeated in numerous other legends.—In the sixteenth Mongol story of Siddhikür, a wise dwarf, who understands the language of birds, hears two birds, father and son, speak to each other on the summit of a tree about the king's son, who had been assassinated by the son of the minister.—In theEdda, Atli has a long dialogue with a bird whose language he understands.—Finally, the whole of the comedy of Aristophanes entitledThe Birds(Ornithes) shows the wisdom and divining power of birds, and, as animals of presage, their intimate relation with the thunderbolts of Zeus.—According to the German belief, the fat of a serpent teaches how to understand the language of birds. Cfr. Simrock, the work previously quoted, p. 457.
[280]
"Die zwei Cypressen sind die Himmelsseiten,Die beiden, die uns Glück und Leid bereiten;Der Vogel, der drin nistet, ist die Sonne,Sie giebt beim Schneiden Schmerz, beim Kommen Wonne."—Schack,Heldensagen von Firdusi, p. 122.
"Die zwei Cypressen sind die Himmelsseiten,Die beiden, die uns Glück und Leid bereiten;Der Vogel, der drin nistet, ist die Sonne,Sie giebt beim Schneiden Schmerz, beim Kommen Wonne."—Schack,Heldensagen von Firdusi, p. 122.
[281]A variety of the myth of Priapos, mentioned in the chapter on the Ass.
[282]Sinićka letat i gavarÃt: Sin da charosh.—The dark-blue bird is a symbol of the azure sky of night or winter, whilst, on the other hand, the wooden bird, at which the maidens of Westphalia throw sticks on St John's Day, seems to be a phallical symbol; she who hits the bird is queen. The bird is a well-known phallical symbol; and a phallical origin must be ascribed to the popular superstition that a bird may be rendered helpless by putting salt upon its tail. The salacitas of an animal, when given way to, takes every energy from it; the ûrdhvaretas alone is strong. It was perhaps for a similar reason that in the Middle Ages, when a city was destroyed to its foundations, it was the custom to throw salt upon it, in order that it might never rise again. Salt thrown away is like seed sown in the desert, where it is fruitless.
[283]It is a mountaineer of the province of Siena that speaks: "I perceived by the song of the birds that the weather was about to change; their voice told me, it was so merry;" Giuliani,Moralità e Poesia del Vivente Linguaggio della Toscana, p. 149.
[284]Cfr. among others, the wordsalbanellus(haubereau)avis auguralis species, andaucellus.
[285]De Prœparat. Evang.lib. ix.
[286]i. 76.
[287]Amongst the Romans, on the contrary, the flight to the left was an excellent omen; thus Plautus in theEpidicus: "Tacete, habete animum bonum, liquido exeo foras auspicio, ave sinistra." (But this change from right to left may depend upon the various positions taken by the observer in placing himself.) In the mediæval legend of Alexander, a bird with a human face (a harpy) meets Alexander and advises him to turn to the right, when he will see marvellous things.—Cfr. Zacher,Pseudo-Callisthenes, Halle, 1867, p. 142.
[288]Râmây.iii. 64.
[289]Pra çyenaḥ çyenebhya âçupâtvâ—Aćakrayâ yat svadhayâ suparṇo havyam bharan manave devaǵushá¹am;Ṛigv.iv. 26, 4.—The somaḥ çyenâbhá¹›itaḥ is also mentioned in theṚigv.i. 80, 2, iv. 27, ix. 77, and other passages.
[290]Çatam mâ pura âyasîr arakshann adha çyeno ǵavasâ nir adîyam;Ṛigv.iv. 27, 1.
[291]Yam te çyenaç ćârum avṛikaṠpadâbharad aruṇam mânam andhasaḥ—enâ vayo vi târy âyur ǵivasa enâ ǵagâra bandhutâ;Ṛigv.x. 144, 5.
[292]In theMahâbhâratam(i. 2383), the ambrosia takes the shape of sperm. A king, far from his wife Girikâ, thinks of her; the sperm comes from him and falls upon a leaf. A hawk carries the leaf away; another hawk sees it and disputes with it for the possession of the leaf; they fight with one another and the leaf falls into the waters of the Yamunâ, where the nymph Adrikâ (equivalent to Girikâ), changed by a curse into a fish, sees the leaf, feeds upon the sperm, becomes fruitful, and is delivered; cfr. the chapter on the Fishes.
[293]Çyeno 'yopâshá¹ir hanti dasyûn;Ṛigv.x. 99, 8.—In the Russian stories the hawk and the dog are sometimes the most powerful helpers of the hero.
[294]Ghṛishuḥ çyenâya kṛitvana âsuḥ;Ṛigv.x. 144, 3.—Yam suparṇaḥ parâvataḥ çyenasya putra âbharat çataćakram;Ṛigv.x. 144, 1.
[295]Sa pûrvyaḥ pavate yaṠdivas pari çyeno mathâyad ishitas tiro raǵaḥ sa madhva â yuvate yeviǵâna it kṛiçânor astur manasâha bibhyushâ;Ṛigv.ix. 77, 2.
[296]iii. 3, 26.
[297]Antaḥ patat patatry asya parṇam;Ṛigv.iv. 27, 4.—Cfr. for this mythical episode the texts given by Prof. Kuhn and the relative discussions,Die Herabkunft d. F. u. d. S., pp. 138seq.and 180seq.
[298]Çyeno na bhîtaḥ;Ṛigv.i. 32, 14.
[299]AnyaṠdivo mâtariçvâ ǵabhârâmathnâd anyam pari çyeno adreḥ;Ṛigv.i. 93, 6.
[300]Â vâṠçyenâso açvinâ vahantu—ye apturo divyâso na gṛidhrâh;Ṛigv.i. 118, 4.
[301]Gṛidhreva vṛikshaṠnidhimantam aćha;Ṛigv.ii. 39, 1.
[302]Ṛigv.i. 88, 4.—In fact, in the hymn i. 165, 2, the Marutas are explicitly compared to hawks that fly through the air (çyenâṅ iva dhraǵato antarikshe).
[303]Drapsaḥ samudram abhi yaǵ ǵigâti paçyan gṛidhrasya ćakshasâ;Ṛigv.x. 123, 8.
[304]i. 1078,seq.
[305]Mbh.i. 1495.
[306]Ib.i. 1496,seq.
[307]Râmây.vii. 6.
[308]Ib.vii. 7.
[309]Ib.vi. 26.
[310]Mbh.i. 1337,seq.
[311]iii. 20.
[312]iii. 29.
[313]Râmây.iv. 58, 59.
[314]For the numerous Eastern varieties of this legend, cfr. the Einleitung to thePańćatantram, of Prof. Benfey, p. 388,seq.—In the fifth story of the first book ofAfanassieff(cfr. the sixth of the same book), Little John is carried back from the bottom of the earth into Russia upon the wings of an eagle. When the eagle is hungry it turns its head, and Johnny gives it food; when the provisions come to an end, Johnny feeds it with his own flesh.—In the twenty-seventh story of the second book, the two young people are carried from the world of darkness into that of light on the wings of the bird Kolpalitza; when the provisions come to an end, it is the girl that gives flesh, cut off her thigh, to the bird. But the youth, who has with him the water of life, heals the amorous maiden; cfr. alsoAfanassieff, v. 23, and v. 28, where, instead of the eagle, we find the hawk.—The same sacrifice of himself is made in a Piedmontese story, recorded by me in first number of theRivista Orientale, by a young prince, who wishes to cross the sea in order to see the princess that he loves; the same is done by the young hero of the following unpublished Tuscan story, which I heard from a certain Martino Nardini of Prato:—"A three-headed dragon steals during the night the golden apples in the garden of the king of Portugal; the three sons of the king watch during the night: the first two fall asleep, but the third discovers the thief and wounds him. The day after, the three brothers follow the track caused by the robber's blood: they come to a beautiful palace, in which there is a cistern, into which the third brother is lowered down, taking a trumpet with him to sound when he wishes to be taken up. Following a dark path he comes to a fine meadow, where there are three splendid palaces, one of bronze, one of silver, and one of gold; following the trace of blood, he goes to the palace of bronze; a beautiful maiden opens the gate to him, and wonders why he has come down to the world underground; the young couple are pleased with each other, and promise to marry one another; the maiden has a crown of brilliants, of which she gives him half as a pledge. The dragon comes back home, and says:—
"Ucci, ucciO che puzzo di Cristianucci,O ce n' è, o ce n' è stati,O ce n' è di rimpiattati."
"Ucci, ucciO che puzzo di Cristianucci,O ce n' è, o ce n' è stati,O ce n' è di rimpiattati."
The maiden, who has concealed the young hero, caresses the dragon and makes him fall asleep. When he is asleep, she brings the young man out of his concealment, gives him a sword and tells him to cut the three heads off at one blow. Helped by a second maiden, the young hero prepares to accomplish a second undertaking in the silver palace of the five-headed dragon. He must cut the five heads off at a blow, for if one remains, it is as if he had cut none off. After having killed the dragon, he promises to marry the second maiden too. Finally, he knocks at the gate of the golden palace, which is opened by a third maiden; she too asks, "What ever induced you to come to lose your life in the lower world? The seven-headed dragon lives here." He promises to marry her; the dragon does not wish to go to rest this night; but the maiden persuades him to do so, upon which the youth cuts off the seven heads in two strokes. The three girls, who were three princesses carried off by the dragons, are released, and take all the riches that they can find in order to carry them into the upper world. They come to the cistern, the hero sounds the trumpet, and the two brothers draw up all the riches, the three maidens, shutting up the entrance with a stone, and leaving their young brother alone in the subterranean world. The two elder brothers force the three princesses to declare that they had delivered them; they then go to the King of Portugal and boast of this feat, saying, that the third brother is lost. The three princesses are sad, at which the King of Portugal wonders. The elder brothers wish to marry the maiden who was in the bronze palace; but she declares that she will only marry him who brings to her the other half of the crown of brilliants. They send to all the goldsmiths and jewellers to find one who can make it. Meanwhile, the third brother, abandoned underground, cries out for aid; an eagle approaches the tomb, and promises to carry him into the world above, if he will allay its hunger. The young hero, by the eagle's advice, puts lizards and serpents into a sack, and calls the eagle after having made a plentiful provision of food. He fastens the sack round his neck in order to give an animal to the eagle each time that it asks for food. When they are a few arms' length distant from the upper world, the sack is empty; the youth cuts his flesh off with a knife and gives it to the eagle, which carries him into the world, when the young man asks him how he can return home. The bird directs him to follow the high road. A charcoal-seller passes by; the young man proposes himself as his assistant, on condition that he give him some food. The charcoal-seller takes him with himself for some time, and then recommends him to an old man, his friend, who is a silversmith. Meanwhile, the king's servants have been six months wandering towards the sunset, searching for a silversmith capable of making the other half of the crown, but in vain; they then wander for six months towards the sunrise till they come to the dwelling of the poor silversmith where the third brother serves as an assistant. The old man says he is not able to make the half crown; but the young man asks to see the other half, recognises it, and promises to give it back entire in eight days. At the expiration of this time, the king sends for the crown and the manufacturer, but the youth sends his master instead of himself. The princess, however, insists upon seeing the young assistant too; he is sent for and brought to the palace; the king does not recognise him, and asks what reward he wants; he answers that he wishes for what the crown cost to the princess. The latter recognises him, after which his father does so too. The young hero weds the princess to whom he had promised himself; and the two brothers are covered with inflammable gums, and used as lamps to light up the wedding.
[315]In a hitherto unpublished story of the Monferrato, communicated to me by Signor Ferraro, a king with three sons is blind; he would be cured if he could bathe his eyes in oil with a feather of the griffon-bird, which lives upon a high mountain. The third brother succeeds in catching one, having been kind to an old woman; he brings the griffon-bird to his father, who recovers his sight and his youth.—Cfr. the third story of the fourth book of thePentamerone, in which a hawk that is a princess transformed, also gives to the brother of his wife one of his feathers, which he is to throw to the ground in case of necessity; indeed, when young Tittone requires it, a battalion of hawks appear in order to free the imprisoned maiden loved by Tittone.—In the fifth story of the fifth book of thePentamerone, the hawk serves as a guide to a young king to find a beautiful princess whom a witch has put to sleep, and who is believed to be dead. This princess becomes the mother of two sons, who are called Sun and Moon.—In the sixth Sicilian story of Signora Gonzenbach, a young man releases an eagle that was entangled in the branches of a tree; the grateful eagle gives him one of its feathers; letting it fall to the ground, the youth can become an eagle at pleasure.
[316]In the ninth Esthonian story it is the eagle that takes the message to the thunder-god to enable him to recover his weapon, which the devil had carried off.—In the first Esthonian story, the eagle also appears as the propitious messenger of the young prince.
[317]In the story of Santo Stefano,La Principessa che non ride, the eaglets have the same faculty of drawing after themselves everything that they touch; and, as forms of the winds (or the clouds), in which character they sometimes appear, we can understand this property of theirs; the wind, too, draws after itself everything that comes in its way, and especially the violent north wind (aquilo).—In Russian stories we have, instead, now the funereal storks, now the marvellous goose taking the place of the eagle that drags things behind it.
[318]In the tenth Sicilian story of Signora Gonzenbach, it is in the shape of a silver eagle that the king of the assassins penetrates into the room where the young wife of the king sleeps, upon whom he wishes to avenge himself.—Stephanus Stephanius, the interpreter ofSaxo Grammaticus, writes, that among the English, the Danes, and other Northern nations, it was the custom when an enemy was defeated, to thrust a sword, as a greater mark of ignominy, into his back, in such a manner as to separate the backbone on both sides by a longitudinal wound; thence stripes of flesh having been cut off, they were fastened to the sides, so as to represent eagle's wings. (In Russian popular stories, when heroes and monsters fight, we find frequent reference to a similar custom.)
[319]PanravÃlas sataná lućshe yasnavo sakalá,Afanassieff, vi. 16.—The proverb, however, may have another sense, viz., better the devil in person than a beautiful but diabolical shape. The devil sometimes assumed the form of a hawk, as we learn from the legend of Endo, an English man-at-arms, who became enamoured of one into which the devil had transformed himself, in Guillelmus Neubrigensis,Hist. Angl.i. 19.
[320]In Plato'sPhædon, rapacious men are transformed into wolves and kites.
[321]Cfr. Aldrovandi,Ornith.v.—And, moreover, in the same Aldrovandi:—"Narrant qui res Africanas literis mandarunt Aquilam marem aliquando cum Lupa coire ... producique ac edi Draconem, qui rostro et alis avis speciem referat, cauda serpentem, pede Lupum, cute esse versicolorem, nec supercilia posse attollere."
[322]I recommend, to whoever wishes to find all these circumstances united, the perusal of the first volume of theOrnithologiaof Aldrovandi, who dedicated in it to birds of prey a long and detailed study.—Cfr. also Bachofen.Die Sage von Tanaquil, Heidelberg, 1870.
[323]Comparative popular medicine might be the subject of a special work which could not fail to be instructive and interesting.
[324]