BOOK
us into the more strictly mythical regions of Aryan folk-lore, it is
necessary to show how large is that class of stories to which the tale
of the Dancing Girl and the Woodcutter belongs. There are some
which are even more remarkable for their agreement in the general
scheme with thorough divergence in detail.
the aI? entitled "The Table, the Ass, and the Stick," in and the* Grimm's collection, a goat, whose appetite cannot be satisfied, brings a tailor into grievous trouble by leading him to drive his three sons away from their home on groundless charges. At last, finding that he had been cheated, he scourges the goat, which makes the best of its way from his dwelling. Meanwhile, the three sons had each been learning a trade, and each . received his reward. To the eldest son was given a table, which at the Avords " Cover thyself," at once pre- sented a magnificent banquet ; the second received a donkey, which on hearing the word " Bricklebrit" rained down gold pieces,^ and both were deprived of their gifts by a thievish innkeeper, to whom they had in succession revealed their secret. On reachmg home, the eldest son, boasting to his father of his inexhaustible table, was discomfited by finding that some common table had been put in its place ; and the second in like manner, in making trial of his ass, found himself in possession of a very ordinary donkey. But the youngest son had not yet returned, and to him they sent word of the scurvy behaviour of the innkeeper. Vlien the time of the third son's departure came, his master gave him a sack, adding, " In it there lies a stick." The young man took the sack as a thing that might do him good service, but asked why he should take the stick, as it only made
' This donkey is, in fact, Midas, at they grant to her the power of becoming whose touch everything turns to gold — more beautiful every day, and that a a myth which reappears in the Irish piece of gold shall fall out of her mouth tradition of Lavra Loingsech, who had every word that she speaks. But she horse's ears, as Midas had those of an has a step-sister, the winter, who, not ass. The reeds betrayed the secret in having her kindly feelings, refuses to the case of Midas ; the barber of Lavra share her bread with the dwarfs, who whispered the secret in the Irish story decree that she shall grow more ugly to a willow ; the willow was cut down every day, and that toads shall spring and the harp made of the wood mur- from her mouth whenever she speaks, mured "Lavra Loingsech has horse's This is the story of "Bushy Bride" ears." (Fergusson, 'J he Irisli before the in Dasent's A'orse Tales. The dawn- Conqucst.) The horse and the ass children reappear in the story of Hansel doubtless represent the ITarits of Hindu and Grethcl, who, wandering into the mythology; the production of gold (the forest (of night or winter), come upon golden light) by the sun or the dawn a house with windows made of clear recurs again and again in Aryan legends. sugar (ice), where they fall into the In Grimm's story of the "Three Little power of a witch (Hades), who, like Men in the Wood," the kindly dawn- the dwarfs, guards the hoard of treasure, child shares her bread with the dwarfs. The old witch is destroyed by Grcthel who, as in the Volsung tale, guard the after the fashion of the cannibal in the treasures of the earth, and in return Zulu tale. (Max Midler, C/.//ij, ii. 214. )
