Note 50 — INTRODUCTION.

In No. 10, also, we are taken away from the region of folk-tales, but this time into that of such literary fictions as form a part of the “Thousand and One Nights.” It, also, is not of a very edifying nature; but it is valuable as showing what utter nonsense many of the corrupted Buddhistic legends contain, and illustrating the custom prevalent among literary Buddhists (one in which they were perhaps surpassed by the Christian compilers of such works as the “Gesta Romanorum”) of appending an unexceptionable moral to a tale of an unsavoury nature. The rapidity with which the narrator, at the close of the story of Utpalavarṇā, passes from the record of her dissoluteness to the account of her conversion is somewhat startling. The same remark applies also to the close of the history of Kṛiśā Gautamī (No. 11). That narrative is as little edifying, for the most part, as the legend which precedes it. One of the tricks resorted to in it, the lengthening at will, by means of some magical substance, of the nose of an obnoxious individual, frequently figures in popular tales. In one of the stories from Central Asia (Jülg, “Mongolische Märchen,” No. 14), the fairies elongate an intruder’s nose to such an extent that they are able to tie seven knots in it. But they perform that operation by sheer force. In European folk-tales the abnormal growth of the nose, or the sudden appearance of horns or the like, is generally caused by the magical properties of some fruit or other apparently harmless substance (Grimm, No. 122, iii., 204, Hahn, No. 44). In the present case, the means employed for the lengthening of the nose is a piece of wood, and a piece of another kind of wood reverses the operation. In the folk-tales the magical substance which produces the wished-for result is generally discovered by accident. In the Tibetan legend its discovery is due to its employer’s observation of a raven, which lengthened its beak by rubbing it on a piece of wood when it wanted to get at a corpse otherwise out of its reach, and afterwards reduced it to its normal proportions when it had finished its meal. The magic lute which plays so important a part in the story of Suśroṇī (No. 12) is of course closely related to all the musical instruments of magic power which both literature and folk-lore have rendered familiar, from the harp or lyre of Orpheus or Amphion to the pipe of the Piper of Hameln, the dance-inspiring fiddle of the German tales of “Roland” and “The Jew in Thorns” (Grimm, Nos. 56 and 110), the magic flute which an angel gives to the strong fool of the modern Greek story of Bakala (Hahn, No. 34), and a number of similar instruments capable of making trees and rocks reel and men and women wildly skip. In these dance-compelling instruments many mythologists recognise symbols of the wind.50 One of the most interesting of the European folk-tales in which such instruments occur is the Esthonian story of “Pikne’s Bagpipes,” of which a full account is given by A. de Gubernatis in his “Zoological Mythology” (i. 159–161), taken from Dr. Löwe’s excellent translation of Kreutzwald’s collection (“Ehstnische Märchen,” No. 9). In it the thunder-god is robbed of his bagpipes (toru-pil, “Röhreninstrument”) by the devil, who hides it away in hell, keeping it in an iron chamber guarded by seven locks. The consequence is that the clouds no longer yield a drop of rain. The thunder-god, under the form of a boy, obtains access to hell, and persuades the devil to let him play on the magic bagpipes. Thereupon “the walls of hell quaked, and the devil and his associates fainted away and fell to the ground as though dead.” Returning home, the thunder-god “blew into his thunder-instrument till the rain-gates opened and gave the earth to drink.” The termination of the history of Suśroṇī is closely akin to that with which all complete variants of the “Puss in Boots” story should end. They ought always to conclude with the ingratitude of the hero or heroine of the tale to the cat or fox or other animal which has made itself useful. The Marquis de Carabas ought to have proved ungrateful to the Booted Cat, just as Suśroṇī neglected to give her benefactor, the jackal, the daily meat which she had promised it. The asseverations of the king’s wives in this story, and those of the hero and heroine of No. 18, may be compared with the similar affirmations of the heroine of the 26th of M. Legrand’s “Contes Populaires Grecs.” In it a king suffers from a strange malady, three branches having grown over his heart. His disguised sister tells him her story, and adds, “If I tell the truth, O my king, may one of the branches break which is over your heart!” By three such asseverations she breaks all three branches.