Page [280]. The ghostly horsemen recalls a strange story an old woman (nearly 80) told me some time ago, and which it is averred happened in Lincolnshire. One fine frosty night, as the Winterton carrier was going along the road, he met a pale man on horseback, who said, "It's a hard winter, and there's going to be a hard time: twenty years' disease amongst vegetables, twenty years' disease amongst cattle, and twenty years' disease amongst men, and this will happen as surely as you have a dead man in your cart." The carrier angrily declared that there was no dead man in his cart. "But there is," said the horseman. Then the carrier went and looked, and found that a man he had taken up to give a ride was dead. Turning round he found the horseman had disappeared. The potato disease, cattle disease, and cholera followed, said the old dame. This pale horseman is said to have ridden through the county, and I have heard of him at various places.
[SNAKE SKIN.]
In the Finnish Story, "Haastelewat Kuuset," the talking Pines, S. ja T. 2: a hunter is rewarded for helping a snake. See notes to "Woman's Curiosity," in this collection.
Pentamerone, "The Serpent."
Folk-Lore Record, 1883. "The good Serpent," a Chilian tale.
The king in this tale is angry at his daughter marrying such a husband, just as he is in the Finnish "Hüri Morsiamena," where the bride is a mouse.
Cf. Grimm, "The three Feathers;" "The poor Miller's Boy and the Cat;" and notes thereto.
Kahn und Schwartz, Norddentsche Sagen, "Das weisze Kätschen."
Asbjörnsen og Moe, Norske Folke eventyr, "Dukken i Græsset."