Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 5, 1894.djvu/337

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
Folk-Lore de Lesbos.
329

and references to his own and other French works. To these he has added abstracts of variants of stories he has already published, arranged under their types, so as readily to be referred to. In every case he has, in accordance with his admirable custom, recorded when and by whom the stories were told him. Among the tellers we meet with the famous Rose Renaud, and others of our old friends.


Le Folk-Lore de Lesbos. Par G. Georgeakis et Leon Pineau. Paris: J. Maisonneuve, 1894.

M. Pineau must be heartily congratulated on this product of his enthusiasm for the science of folk-lore. He tells us, in the preface, that M. Georgeakis, a native of Lesbos, having come to France to learn French, was surprised, brought up as he had been on Homer and Demosthenes, to find M. Pineau (who is a distinguished professor) so much attached to the rustic traditions of Poitou. The pleasure to be found in them seemed to him not less strange than the profit to be derived from them was dubious. However, after many a talk with M. Pineau, the Greek islander became thoroughly interested; and at last he confessed, almost blushingly, that in his own Lesbos the same things were found as in Poitou. We can see, though, of course, we are not told, that the eloquence and enthusiasm of our French confrére had won a new and valuable convert to folk-lore. Very soon, on M. Pineau's suggestion, he had written home to friends who, he knew, could furnish materials, and, after awhile, from remote villages, tale and song, riddle and custom and superstition, poured in welcome numbers fresh and unadulterated from their source. These have been translated for western students from the Lesbian dialect, together with others which M. Georgeakis has sent since his return to Mytilene; and we are bidden to expect an even fuller and more abundant harvest from his further researches on the spot.