This long and not very coherent story gains a little in unity in a variant by the identification of the second and “more wonderfully terrible beast” with the sea-maiden to whom the hero had been promised ere his birth. Omitting this episode and that of the giants, we have the ordinary plot of the King of the Fishes with little change, beyond the substitution of the sea-maiden for the wizard-fish. The alteration does not affect the substance of the tale, for it matters little whether the food which results in the birth of the twin heroes be the flesh of the King of the Fishes, or some other gift of supernatural power.
The opening of the North German tale of The Two Similar Brothers approaches that of The Sea-Maiden, while it also recalls one of the great stories of The Arabian Nights. A fisherman, casting his net into a pool, brings up, instead of fish, a little urn covered with a lid. On his opening the urn, a thick red cloud curls up from within; and before he is aware of it a big burly fellow appears in the midst of the cloud and begs to be put back into the vase. “How can I put you back,” asks the fisherman, “when you are so big and the vase so little?” But the apparition prevails on him to try, promising in reward not merely a good catch of fishes, but also a casket which he must divide into six parts, whereof one is to be given to his wife, one to his horse, one to his dog, and the remaining three are to be buried under the eaves of his dwelling; but he is to beware of looking into the casket before he gets home. Thereupon the fisherman lays hands upon the apparition, finds him as collapsible as a modern travelling-bag, and soon succeeds in fastening down this fairy Jack-in-the-box once more. Flinging the vase again into the water, he cast his net, and was rewarded as the apparition had promised. Before a year had passed, the fisherman’s wife had borne twin boys so much alike as to be indistinguishable. Two foals and two puppies were also added to the household; and under the eaves up-sprouted two swords, two pistols and two guns. The twins set out together. They obtained the usual helpful animals—in this case, two young bears, wolves and lions. Parting at a crossway, one of them sticks his knife into a tree; and it is agreed that they will meet there again in a year’s time. Whichever of them comes first is to examine the blade of the knife: if it be rusted, that will be a token that his brother is dead. The dragon in this tale has no fewer than fourteen heads, and is beside reinforced by fourteen giants, to whom he belongs. The hero, of course, kills them all; and the rest of the story follows the ordinary course.[40.1]
In the Pentameron the magical food is a sea-dragon’s heart, which must be cooked by a pure maiden. A king who wants offspring is advised by a beggar to get this powerful medicine. When it is brought to him he gives it to a pretty maid of honour to cook. No sooner has she put it on the fire than it begins to emit a pitch-black smoke so powerful in its effects that not merely the condition of the queen who tastes the heart, but that of the maiden who cooks it, as well as of every article of furniture in the room where it is cooked, becomes interesting. The old four-post bedstead gives birth to a cradle, the chest to a little chest, the settle to a little settle, the table to a little table: nay, the very night-commode brings forth a tiny night-commode so charming and pretty that one could have kissed it! At the end of four days the queen and her maiden bear each a son, who grow up fast friends. The queen’s jealousy, however, causes Canneloro, the maid’s son, to leave his friend. Before departing, in a final interview with Fonzo, the queen’s son, he flings his dagger on the ground, and a spring starts forth, which he declares will run clear so long as his life is clear and serene. Not satisfied with this, he sticks his sword in the earth, and there sprouts a bilberry bush from the soil as a further token. But whereas the magical elements in the opening scenes are thus grotesquely exaggerated, the central portion of the story is tamed down to a commonplace tournament, at which Canneloro wins a king’s daughter. This treatment has for its purpose to throw into relief the episode of the Medusa-witch. As the Enchanted Hind, the witch gives her name to the story. Pursuing this animal, Canneloro is met by a snowstorm, and takes refuge in a cave, where he kindles a fire. The hind he has been following appears at the door of the cave, and asks leave to come in and warm herself. To calm her fears the hero binds his dogs, his horse and his sword. The hind then changes into an ogre, who throws Canneloro into a pit, whence he is of course rescued by Fonzo.[41.1]
That Basile took some liberties with the story might thus be suspected from internal evidence. How slight those liberties really were has been proved by the discovery of an almost exact parallel as a folktale in the Basilicata. Even the hero’s name is preserved as Cannelora. His life-tokens are a jet of water and a myrtle. He is directed at a crossway by two gardeners whose quarrel he has reconciled; and he rescues a fairy under guise of a serpent from some boys who are persecuting it and have already cut off its tail. The Medusa-witch is a golden-horned snake. The storm is a tempest of thunder and lightning, from which he takes refuge in a cavern. The snake becomes a giant and imprisons the hero, exactly as in Basile’s version. Delivered by Emilio, as the queen’s son is here called, together with the giant’s other prisoners, he weds the fairy, who provides wives also for Emilio and the rest.[41.2]
In a Pisan tale of the same collection we are brought back to the talking fish of the typical story. The life-token is a bone tied to a beam in the kitchen: it sweats blood when anything untoward happens to either of the fisherman’s three sons. The dragon is a fairy in the shape of a cloud that carries away a girl every year. The lot having fallen on the king’s daughter, the cloud sucks her blood through her finger, and, when she faints, carries her away. The hero, having previously obtained from three grateful animals, a lion, an eagle and an ant, the power of transforming himself into their shapes, sets out after the cloud, in the form of an eagle. The fairy-cloud could only be slain by hitting her on the forehead with an egg, which was in the body of a seven-headed tigress. The hero accomplishes this, and weds the princess. The Medusa-witch is a supernatural mist. Penetrating this, the hero is invited to play a game with some ladies. He loses, and is, with his horse and dog, turned into marble.[42.1] In a Tuscan variant, imperfectly recollected by the teller, the fish is an eel with two heads and two tails; the boys are twins; the tails, planted in the garden, yield two swords; and the heads, given to the bitch, produce puppies; the life-token is a cornel-tree planted by the hero before leaving home. The hero’s brother, arriving in search of him, finds that he is imprisoned with his horse and dog in an enchanted castle, leaves him to his fate, and, being precisely like the unhappy prisoner in appearance, he takes possession of the princess his wife. This chivalrous conduct, however, is perhaps to be imputed rather to the teller’s defective memory than to the original sin of the younger brother.[42.2]
When the childless fisherman, in a Lettish tale, catches a certain pike, the latter gets its freedom by giving two fishes in its stead, both of which the fisher’s wife is to eat. The two boys thereafter born set out on their adventures together, and part at a cross-road, leaving as their life-token a knife sticking in an oak. The one who goes to the right spares to shoot five animals in succession, and out of gratitude they follow him. With their help he wins a princess from demons who haunt a castle; and by virtue of his victory over them he becomes king. The other brother is, for our purpose, the hero. Going to the left, he obtains similar animals, which conquer the nine-headed devil to whom a princess is to be given. The princess’ coachman is the impostor; and the Medusa-witch is the mother of the nine-headed devil, who lures and petrifies the hero in revenge. He is rescued at last by his brother.[43.1]
A Gipsy tale from Hungary attributes the Supernatural Birth to the mother’s having drunk from the two breasts of an urme, or fairy, who also suckled at the same time the dog and mare, and dropped milk into two holes in the earth. Each of the two boys had a golden star on his forehead; and from the earth sprang two oaks, the twins’ life-tokens. The hero’s horse and dog assist him in winning his bride by the performance of three tasks, the third of which is the lady’s deliverance from the enchanted form of a dragon watching three golden apples. Her father then sends him to hunt for the wedding-feast, and he meets the Medusa-witch. His younger brother delivers him, with his animals, from the enchantment by means of the golden apples; and by the same means the witch is destroyed. In the fit of jealousy often found in stories of this type, the hero subsequently kills his deliverer, who is, after explanations, restored to life with a magical plant.[43.2]
In two Russian tales the Medusa-witch incident precedes that of the Rescue of Andromeda. One of these calls for no special mention. But in the other—from Great Russia—the two heroes are the sons of the king’s granddaughter and her maid, born in consequence of their eating fish. The Medusa-witch is the Baba Yaga, who finds the youth sleeping on her meadow, and, giving him a hair, directs him to tie three knots in it and blow, whereupon he is, with his horse, turned to stone. His brother, having rescued him, passes on to the fight with the dragon. The life-token is a knife which runs with sweat.[44.1]
A Sanskrit tale departs more widely from the type than any of the foregoing. In The Ocean of the Streams of Story, a work of the end of the eleventh or the beginning of the twelfth century of our era, Somadeva relates that a childless king sacrificed to the goddess Durgá, and did penance, to obtain a son. The goddess appeared to him in a dream, giving him two heavenly fruits, one for each of his two wives. But one of the wives, not satisfied with the prospect of one son, ate both fruits, and in due time gave birth to twins. The other wife nursed vengeance in her heart; and when the two princes attained manhood, and were sent on a warlike expedition, she forged a despatch in the king’s name to the chiefs in the camp, commanding them to put both princes to death. Their maternal grandfather, however, was with the army in his capacity of royal minister. He found means to escape with them, but died of the hardships of the road; and his two grandsons made their way to the shrine of Durgá in the Vindhya Hills, where they underwent a course of fasting and asceticism to propitiate her. Pleased with their austerities, she appeared in a dream to Indívarasena, the elder brother, and presented him with a magical sword. Armed with this, he forced an entrance into the palace of the king of the Rákshasas, or ogres, and found the mighty monarch sitting on his throne, “having a mouth terrible with tusks, with a lovely woman at his left hand, and a virgin of heavenly beauty on his right hand.” Indívarasena challenged the ogre to fight, but found it useless to cut off his head, for as often as he cut it off it grew again, until he took a hint from the virgin, who made him a sign to cut the head in two after smiting it off. The treacherous virgin turned out to be the Rákshasa’s sister. She had fallen in love at first sight with the valorous youth, and on his victory immediately offered herself in marriage to him. This conduct is not uncommon in Somadeva’s amusing work, and is always eagerly responded to by the lucky (and polygamous) heroes. Indívarasena was no exception. He married her on the spot, and lived happily with her for some time. By virtue of his magical sword he obtained everything he wished for. In this way he got a flying chariot, and sent his brother in it to bear tidings of him to his parents. Meanwhile the other lady, who was the widow of the Rákshasa, attracted Indívarasena’s attention. His wife naturally grew jealous, and in a fit of pique flung his magical sword into the fire. She hardly expected the consequence. The sword was dimmed by the fire, and her husband lay senseless on the ground. Warned by a dream at that instant, his brother returned; and on hearing the miserable woman’s confession he thought he ought not to kill her, on account of her repentance; so he prepared to cut off his own head. However logical and proper this alternative may have been, the goddess interfered. He heard a voice arresting him, declaring that Durgá had struck his brother senseless—not, of course, for flirting, but for not taking enough care of the divine sword—and directing him to propitiate her. When he complied, the sword lost its stain, and his brother regained consciousness. By a revelation as convenient as those of Mohammed, the hero then learned that both ladies had been his wives in a former existence, and therefore it was quite right for him to have both now. So they were all happy ever after—especially Indívarasena.[46.1]
Here we have the Supernatural Birth, the Dragon-slaying, and the Medusa-witch, though the two latter are somewhat disguised. For the Life-token a miraculous dream is substituted. And the whole is overlaid by the practices and beliefs of the revived Hinduism paramount in India after the expulsion of Buddhism.