Note 97.1 — Chapter IV · THE INCIDENT OF THE SUPERNATURAL BIRTH IN MÄRCHEN.

But it is not only flowers and herbs that possess the magical virtue of causing conception by the touch. In an Eskimo tradition a man who longs for offspring is advised to set off in his kayak to the open sea. When he hears a voice like that of a child crying, he must go towards it; and he will then find a worm, which he must bring home and throw on his wife’s body. Having followed this counsel, he beholds the worm disappear in the woman’s body; and soon afterward she gives birth to a son, who becomes a seal-fisher of marvellous powers.97.1 According to a story given by Dr. von Wlislocki as current among the Armenian settlers at the foot of the Carpathians, a childless queen picked up in her garden a half-dead bird. She restored it to life, putting its bill between her lips to give it breath. Her saliva touched its tongue and gave it human speech. By its directions she hid in the garden at midnight and watched until a Luckwife—that is to say, a Fate or Norn—came to bathe in the pool. Then she caught up the golden veil left by the Luckwife lying on the margin, and ran off with it. Binding it round her body, she wore it next her skin for nine months, until she at length brought forth a lovely daughter.97.2