In this collection also appears the riddle: “Which is heaviest, a pound of lead or a pound of feathers?” which everyone knows, but with an addition, which is an improvement. After the answer, “Each weighs a pound, and they are equal in weight,” the questioner says further: “Not so—try in water. The pound of feathers will float, and the pound of lead will sink.”
Ques. How can you carry a jug of water in your hands on a broiling summer day, in the full blaze of the sun, so that the water shall not get hotter?—Ans. Let the water be boiling when you fill the jug.
Ques. How can a farmer prevent the mice from stealing his corn?—Ans. By giving them his corn.
Ques. A certain man left a penny by his will to be divided equally among his fifty relatives, each to have as much as the other, and each to be quite contented with what he got, and not envy any of the other legatees. How did the executor comply with this testamentary disposition?—Ans. He bought a packet of fifty tin-tacks with the penny, and hammered one into the back of each of the legatees.
There is another very curious old German collection of riddles called Æsopus Epulans; but that contains anecdotes as well and a great deal of very interesting matter. This is a much larger volume, and is the commonplace book of a party of priests who used to meet at each other’s houses to smoke, and drink, argue, and joke. One of the members took down the particulars of conversation at each meeting, and published it. A most curious and amusing volume it is. Some of the conundrums the old parsons asked each other were the same as those in Hans Sachs’ collection; they had become traditional. We may safely say that none were better, and some were, if possible, more pointless. They have all much the same character: they resemble faintly the popular conundrum of the type so widely spread, and so much affected still by nurses and by the labouring class, and which so often begins with “London Bridge is broken down,” or, “As I went over London Bridge.” These are very ancient. We have analogous riddles among those which Oriental tradition puts into the mouth of the Queen of Sheba when she “proved Solomon with hard questions.” Mr. Kemble published for the Ælfric Society a collection of questions and answers that exist in Anglo-Saxon as a conversation between Solomon and Saturn, and numerous versions existed in the Middle Ages of the dialogue between Solomon and—as the answerer was often called—Markulf. But these questions only partially correspond with our idea of riddles.
A more remarkable collection is that in the Icelandic Herverar Saga, where the King Heidrek boasts of his power to solve all riddles. Then Odin visits him in disguise as a blind man, and propounds to the king some hard questions. Of these there are sixty-four. We will give a few specimens. Ques. What was that drink I drank yesterday, which was neither spring water, nor wine, nor mead, nor ale?—Ans. The dew of heaven. Ques. What dead lungs did I see blowing to war?—Ans. A blacksmith’s bellows whilst a sword was being forged. Ques. What did I see outside a great man’s door, head downwards, feet heavenwards?—Ans. An onion.
These riddles are all in verse, and the replies also in verse. The end was that Odin asked Heidrek what he, Odin, whispered into the ear of Baldur before he was burned on his funeral pyre. Thereupon Heidrek drew his sword and cut at his questioner, shouting: “None can answer that but yourself!” Odin had just time to transform himself into an eagle; but the sword shore off his tail, and eagles ever after have had short tails.
The Sphinx will recur to the recollection of the reader, who tore to pieces those who could not answer its riddles. At last Creon, King of Thebes, offered his sister, Jocasta, to anyone who could solve the enigmas propounded by the Sphinx. Œdipus ventured, and when asked by the monster, “What animal is four-footed in the morning, two-footed at noon, and three-footed in the evening?” answered: “Man, who as a babe crawls, and as an old man leans on a crutch.” The Sphinx was so distressed at hearing its riddle solved, that it precipitated itself from a precipice and was dashed to pieces.
The Persian hero, Sal, who was brought up by the gigantic bird Simorg, appears before Mentuscher, Schah of Iran. The latter, forewarned that Sal will be a danger to him, endeavours to get rid of him. However, he first tests him with hard questions. If he answers these, he is to be allowed to live. The first question is: “There stand twelve cypresses in a ring, and each bears thirty boughs.” Sal replies, “These are the twelve months, each of which has thirty days.” Another question is—“There were two horses, one black, the other clear as crystal.” “They are Day and Night,” replied Sal.
In English and Scottish Ballads a whole class has reference to the importance of riddle answering.