XVII. JACK AND HIS SNUFF-BOX.
Source.-Mr. F. Hindes Groome, In Gipsy Tents, p. 201 seq. I have eliminated a superfluous Gipsy who makes her appearance towards the end of the tale à propos des boltes, but otherwise have left the tale unaltered as one of the few English folk-tales that have been taken down from the mouths of the peasantry: this applies also to i., ii., xi.
Parallels.-There is a magic snuff-box with a friendly power in it in Kennedy's Fictions of the Irish Celts, p. 49. The choice between a small cake with a blessing, &c., is frequent (cf. No. xxiii.), but the closest parallel to the whole story, including the mice, is afforded by a tale in Carnoy and Nicolaides' Traditions populaires de l'Asie Mineure, which is translated as the first tale in Mr. Lang's Blue Fairy Book. There is much in both that is similar to Aladdin, I beg his pardon, Allah-ed-din.