It is very interesting to compare a Finnish fragment entitled "The Dove's Cooing" with the foregoing. A dove and a hen had each a nest, but the dove had ten eggs and the hen only two. Then the hen began to try and make the dove change with her. At last the dove consented, and gave the hen her ten eggs and took her two. Soon the dove saw she had lost, and began to repent her foolish bargain, and she still laments it, for as soon as you hear her voice you hear her sad song,
"Kyy, Kyy, Kymmenen munaa minä,
waiwainen waihdoin tanan, kahteen munaan."
"I've foolishly bartered my ten eggs
For the hen's two!"[87]
[1] Cf. Finska Kranier jämte några natur och literatur-studier inom andra områden af Finsk Antropologi Skildrade af Prof. G. Retzius, Stockholm, 1878, p. 121. A most valuable and interesting work which ought to be known to all students of anthropology. See also Du Chaillu's Land of the Midnight Sun, vol. ii. p. 277.
[2] Hereafter quoted as S. ja T.
[3] This valuable collection will hereafter be quoted as Friis.
[4] Villon Society. London, 1884; and hereafter quoted as Payne's Arabian Nights.
[5] Such a window as they had in old times: a hole with sliding door or shutter. Vide Retzius, p. 110.
[6] The bath-house is a separate building with a stove in the corner covered with large stones which become red hot and then water is thrown upon them which fills the house with steam. Round the sides are shelves where the bathers (both sexes) recline, and whip themselves with branches of birch on which the leaves have been left to die. Retzius, p. 119. Cf. also Land of the Midnight Sun, vol. ii. p. 207.
[7] A John Twardowski is said to have been a doctor of medicine in the university of Cracow, who, like Dr. Faust, signed a contract in his own blood with the devil. He is said to have been wont to perform his incantations on the mountains of Krzemionki, or on the tumulus of Krakus, the mythic founder of Cracow. The demon was to do all the magician bade him and to have no power over him until he met him at Rome, where he took good care not to go. Whether this gentleman is supposed to have ultimately become the lame fiend I know not. See Slavonic Folk-Lore, by Rev. W. S. Lach-Szyrma, in Folk-Lore Record, vol. iv. p. 62.