[10] See pp. 125–127 below.
[11] Pp. 212–214. He regards the story in Wolf, Hausmärchen, p. 230, as linking the two.
[12] P. 91. Cosquin, it will be noted, makes the fruit an alternative of the water of life.
[13] For example, “The Baker’s Three Daughters” in Mrs. M. Carey’s Fairy Legends of the French Provinces, 1887, pp. 86 ff., unites the water of life with both the magical apples and the bird.
[14] The need of such a study may be shown by stating that, while Wünsche has treated about thirty variants, I know at present of something like four times that number.
[15] See p. 118 above.
[16] This well-known märchen has been treated by various scholars, most recently by G. L. Kittredge, in Arthur and Gorlagon (Studies and Notes in Philology and Literature, viii.) 1903, pp. 226 f., from whom I take the liberty of transcribing the following references, some of which would otherwise be unknown to me. In note 2 to p. 226 he says: “See Benfey, Das Märchen von den ‘Menschen mit den wunderbaren Eigenschaften,’ Ausland, 1858, pp. 969 ff. (Kleinere Schriften II. iii. 94 ff.); Wesselofsky, in Giovanni da Prato, Il Paradiso degli Alberti, 1867, I. ii. 238 ff.; d’Ancona, Studj di Critica e Storia Letteraria, 1880, pp. 357–358; Köhler-Bolte, Ztsch. des Ver. f. Volkskunde, vi. 77; Köhler, Kleinere Schriften, i. 192 ff., 298 ff., 389–390, 431, 544; ii. 591; Cosquin, Contes pop. de Lorraine, i. 23 ff.; Crane, Italian Popular Tales, p. 67; Nutt, in MacInnes, Folk and Hero Tales, pp. 445 ff.; Laistner, Rätsel der Sphinx ii. 357 ff.; Steel, Tales of the Punjab, pp. 42 ff.; Jurkschat, Litauische Märchen, pp. 29 ff.; etc.” A peculiarly interesting specimen is that in Bladé, Contes pop. de la Gascogne, 1886, iii. 12–22. See also Luzel, Contes pop. de Basse-Bretagne, 1887, iii. 296–311; Carnoy and Nicolaides, Traditions pop. de l’Asie Mineure, 1889, pp. 43–56; and Goldschmidt, Russische Märchen, 1883, pp. 69–78.
[17] So I venture to call the story of the woman, who through enchantment or her own bad taste is the mistress of an ogre or some other monster. She is rescued by a hero, who is able to solve the extraordinary riddles or to accomplish the apparently impossible tasks which she sets him at the advice of the monster, after other suitors have perished in the attempt. See Kittredge, Arthur and Gorlagon, p. 250 (note to p. 249); Wesselofsky, Arch. f. slav. Phil. vi. 574. A good specimen tale is “The Magic Turban” in R. Nisbet Bain’s Turkish Fairy Tales, 1901, pp. 102–111.
[18] Kittredge thus summarizes the tale (work cited, p. 226): “Three or more brothers (or comrades) are suitors for the hand of a beautiful girl. While her father is deliberating, the girl disappears. The companions undertake to recover her. One of them, by contemplation (or by keenness of sight), finds that she has been stolen by a demon (or dragon) and taken to his abode on a rock in the sea. Another builds a ship by his magic (or possesses a magic ship) which instantly transports them to the rock. Another, who is a skilful climber, ascends the castle and finds that the monster is asleep with his head in the maiden’s lap. Another, a master thief, steals the girl without waking her captor. They embark, but are pursued by the monster. One of the companions, an unerring shot, kills the pursuer with an arrow. The girl is restored to her parents.” This analysis would not hold for all variants, even when uncompounded (e.g. Grimm, Kinder- und Hausmärchen, No. 71, “Sechse kommen durch die ganze Welt”) but a better could scarcely be made without a systematic study of the type. As Kittredge notes, the companions are not at all constant in number and function.
[19] Hungarian I., Rumanian II., Straparola II., Sicilian, and Treu Heinrich.