VOLUME II

NEW YORK

THE UNIVERSITY SOCIETY INC.

Publishers

PARTIAL LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS, ASSISTANT EDITORS AND ADVISERS

HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE Editor

EDWARD EVERETT HALE Associate Editor

NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER, President Columbia University.

WILLIAM R. HARPER, Late President Chicago University.

HON. THEODORE ROOSEVELT, Ex-President of the United States.

HON. GROVER CLEVELAND, Late President of the United States.

JAMES CARDINAL GIBBONS, American Roman Catholic prelate.

ROBERT C. OGDEN, Partner of John Wanamaker.

HON. GEORGE F. HOAR, Late Senator from Massachusetts.

EDWARD W. BOK, Editor "Ladies' Home Journal."

HENRY VAN DYKE, Author, Poet, and Professor of English Literature, Princeton University.

LYMAN ABBOTT, Author, Editor of "The Outlook."

CHARLES G.D. ROBERTS, Writer of Animal Stories.

JACOB A. RIIS, Author and Journalist.

EDWARD EVERETT HALE, Jr., English Professor at Union College.

JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS, Late Author and Creator of "Uncle Remus."

GEORGE GARY EGGLESTON, Novelist and Journalist.

RAY STANNARD BAKER, Author and Journalist.

WILLIAM BLAIKIE, Author of "How to Get Strong and How to Stay So."

WILLIAM DAVENPORT HULBERT, Writer of Animal Stories.

JOSEPH JACOBS, Folklore Writer and Editor of the "Jewish Encyclopedia."

MRS. VIRGINIA TERHUNE ("Marion Harland"), Author of "Common Sense in the Household," etc.

MARGARET E. SANGSTER, Author of "The Art of Home-Making," etc.

SARAH K. BOLTON, Biographical Writer.

ELLEN VELVIN, Writer of Animal Stories.

REV. THEODORE WOOD, F.E.S., Writer on Natural History.

W.J. BALTZELL, Editor of "The Musician."

HERBERT T. WADE, Editor and Writer on Physics.

JOHN H. CLIFFORD, Editor and Writer.

ERNEST INGERSOLL, Naturalist and Author.

DANIEL E. WHEELER, Editor and Writer.

IDA PRENTICE WHITCOMB, Author of "Young People's Story of Music," "Heroes of History," etc.

MARK HAMBOURG, Pianist and Composer.

MME. BLANCHE MARCHESI, Opera Singer and Teacher.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION xiii

MYTHS OF GREECE AND ROME

Baucis and Philemon 1

Adapted by C.E. Smith

Pandora 9

Adapted by C.E. Smith

Midas 15

Adapted by C.E. Smith

Cadmus 22

Adapted by C.E. Smith

Proserpina 30

Adapted by C.E. Smith

The Story of Atalanta 49

Adapted by Anna Klingensmith

Pyramus and Thisbe 51

Adapted by Alice Zimmern

Orpheus 53

Adapted by Alice Zimmern

MYTHS OF SCANDINAVIA

Baldur 57

Adapted from A. and E. Keary's version

Thor's Adventure among the Jotuns 80

Adapted by Hamilton Wright Mabie

The Gifts of the Dwarfs 85

The Punishment of Loki 91

Adapted from A. and E. Keary's version

MYTHS OF INDIA

The Blind Man, The Deaf Man, and the Donkey 96

Adapted by M. Frere

Harisarman 103

Why the Fish Laughed 106

Muchie Lal 111

Adapted by M. Frere

How the Rajah's Son Won the Princess Labam 119

Adapted by Joseph Jacobs

MYTHS OF JAPAN

The Jellyfish and the Monkey 129

Adapted by Yei Theodora Ozaki

The Old Man and-the Devils 137

Autumn and Spring 139

Adapted by Frank Kinder

The Vision of Tsunu 142

Adapted by Frank Kinder

The Star-Lovers 144

Adapted by Frank Kinder

MYTHS OF THE SLAVS

The Two Brothers 147

Adapted by Alexander Chodsko

The Twelve Months 150

Adapted by Alexander Chodsko

The Sun; or, the Three Golden Hairs of the Old Man Vésèvde 156

Adapted by Alexander Chodsko

A MYTH OF AMERICA

Hiawatha 166

Adapted from H.R. Schoolcraft's version

HEROES OF GREECE AND ROME

Perseus 187

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

Odysseus 202

Adapted by Jeanie Lang

The Argonauts 222

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

Theseus 246

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

Hercules 259

Adapted by Thomas Cartwright

The Perilous Voyage of Æneas 273

Adapted by Alice Zimmern

How Horatius Held the Bridge 282

Adapted by Alfred J. Church

How Cincinnatus Saved Rome 284

Adapted by Alfred J. Church

HEROES OF GREAT BRITAIN

Beowulf 289

Adapted by H.E. Marshall

How King Arthur Conquered Rome 302

Adapted by E. Edwardson

Sir Galahad and the Sacred Cup 314

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

The Passing of Arthur 323

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

Robin Hood 328

Adapted by H.E. Marshall

Guy of Warwick 346

Adapted by H.E. Marshall

Whittington and His Cat 356

Adapted by Ernest Rhys

Tom Hickathrift 364

Adapted by Ernest Rhys

HEROES OF SCANDINAVIA

The Story of Frithiof 370

Adapted by Julia Goddard

Havelok 383

Adapted by George W. Cox and E.H. Jones

The Vikings 394

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

HERO OF GERMANY

Siegfried 405

Adapted by Mary Macgregor

HERO OF FRANCE

Roland 429

Adapted by H.E. Marshall

HERO OF SPAIN

The Cid 455

Adapted by Robert Southey

HERO OF SWITZERLAND

William Tell 474

Adapted by H.E. Marshall

HERO OF PERSIA

Rustem 491

Adapted by Alfred J. Church

ILLUSTRATIONS

Jason Snatched off his Helmet and Hurled it.

Out Flew a Bright, Smiling Fairy.

Orpheus and Eurydice.

The Punishment of Loki.

The Princess Labam ... Shines so that She Lights Up all the Country.

Hiawatha in His Canoe.

So Danae was Comforted and Went Home With Dictys.

Orpheus Sang Till His Voice Drowned the Song of the Sirens.

They Leapt Across the Pool and came to Him.

Theseus Looked up into Her Fair Face.

Sir Galahad.

Robin Hood in an Encounter.

The Hero's Shining Sword Pierced the Heart of the Monster.

William Tell and His Friends.

Book Cover

(Many of the illustrations in this volume are reproduced by special permission of E.P. Dutton & Company, owners of American rights.)

INTRODUCTION

With such a table of contents in front of this little foreword, I am quite sure that few will pause to consider my prosy effort. Nor can I blame any readers who jump over my head, when they may sit beside kind old Baucis, and drink out of her miraculous milk-pitcher, and hear noble Philemon talk; or join hands with Pandora and Epimetheus in their play before the fatal box was opened; or, in fact, be in the company of even the most awe-inspiring of our heroes and heroines.

For ages the various characters told about in the following pages have charmed, delighted, and inspired the people of the world. Like fairy tales, these stories of gods, demigods, and wonderful men were the natural offspring of imaginative races, and from generation to generation they were repeated by father and mother to son and daughter. And if a brave man had done a big deed he was immediately celebrated in song and story, and quite as a matter of course, the deed grew with repetition of these. Minstrels, gleemen, poets, and skalds (a Scandinavian term for poets) took up these rich themes and elaborated them. Thus, if a hero had killed a serpent, in time it became a fiery dragon, and if he won a great battle, the enthusiastic reciters of it had him do prodigious feats—feats beyond belief. But do not fancy from this that the heroes were every-day persons. Indeed, they were quite extraordinary and deserved highest praise of their fellow-men.

So, in ancient and medieval Europe the wandering poet or minstrel went from place to place repeating his wondrous narratives, adding new verses to his tales, changing his episodes to suit locality or occasion, and always skilfully shaping his fascinating romances. In court and cottage he was listened to with breathless attention. He might be compared to a living novel circulating about the country, for in those days books were few or entirely unknown. Oriental countries, too, had their professional story-spinners, while our American Indians heard of the daring exploits of their heroes from the lips of old men steeped in tradition. My youngest reader can then appreciate how myths and legends were multiplied and their incidents magnified. We all know how almost unconsciously we color and change the stories we repeat, and naturally so did our gentle and gallant singers through the long-gone centuries of chivalry and simple faith.

Every reader can feel the deep significance underlying the myths we present—the poetry and imperishable beauty of the Greek, the strange and powerful conceptions of the Scandinavian mind, the oddity and fantasy of the Japanese, Slavs, and East Indians, and finally the queer imaginings of our own American Indians. Who, for instance, could ever forget poor Proserpina and the six pomegranate seeds, the death of beautiful Baldur, the luminous Princess Labam, the stupid jellyfish and shrewd monkey, and the funny way in which Hiawatha remade the earth after it had been destroyed by flood?

Then take our legendary heroes: was ever a better or braver company brought together—Perseus, Hercules, Siegfried, Roland, Galahad, Robin Hood, and a dozen others? But stop, I am using too many question-marks. There is no need to query heroes known and admired the world over.

As true latter-day story-tellers, both Hawthorne and Kingsley retold many of these myths and legends, and from their classic pages we have adapted a number of our tales, and made them somewhat simpler and shorter in form. By way of apology for this liberty (if some should so consider it), we humbly offer a paragraph from a preface to the "Wonder Book" written by its author:

"A great freedom of treatment was necessary but it will be observed by every one who attempts to render these legends malleable in his intellectual furnace, that they are marvelously independent of all temporary modes and circumstances. They remain essentially the same, after changes that would affect the identity of almost anything else."

Now to those who have not jumped over my head, or to those who, having done so, may jump back to this foreword, I trust my few remarks will have given some additional interest in our myths and heroes of lands far and near.

Daniel Edwin Wheeler