lyric; but although it has received a form that can never be equalled, the deep myth which underlies it is not clearly brought out, and it depends for its effect on the rulership of the master. Pottage, like bread, as a primitive, simple fare, generally signifies all kinds of nourishment (Compare the Frogs of Aristophanes, 1073). It was formerly the custom in Thuringia for people to eat pottage made of millet at Shrovetide, because they believed that if they did so they would never lack anything all the rest of the year. See Prätorius's Glückstopf, p. 260. The wise woman also institutes a feast of sweet pottage as a reward to her workmen. Here we must mention a Norwegian story in Asbjörnsen, part 2, The Mill which grinds everything.
104.—Wise Folks.
From Hesse. It is to be found with many variations in Zingerle, p. 75, as The Country Man and the Country Woman; in Pröhle, No. 50, The Long Winter; in Meier, No. 20, and pp. 304, 305, The Traveller to Heaven; in Müllenhoff, No. 10; in Norwegian, in Asbjörnsen, 1, No. 10; in Wallachian, in Schott, No. 43. Der Schwank von dem fahrenden Schüler im Paradies, in Hans Sachs, 3, 3, 18, Nuremberg Edit. is allied to this.
In our previous editions the story of the Faithful Animals was placed here; it however must have been derived from the Relations of Ssidi Kur, as is proved by its exact similarity, although in the Gesta Romanorum (see under No. 9), the Pentamerone, 3, 5, and No. 14 in Meier, are stories which are allied.
105.—Stories of Snakes.
I. From Hesse, but belongs to several places. The ringed snake (Coluber natrix) which likes milk and is not poisonous, is the snake which is meant. Compare Schubert's Naturgeschichte, p. 196. There is a similar story in Ziska, p. 51. A story in the Gesta Romanorum, chap. 68 (under No. 11), is clearly related to this. A knight becomes poor, and is very sorrowful about it. Then a snake, which has lived for a long time in a corner of his room, begins to speak, and says, "Give me some milk every day, and set it ready for me yourself, and I will make you rich." So the knight brings the milk for it every day, and in a short time he becomes rich again. The knight's foolish wife, however, advises him to kill the snake for the sake of the treasures which are sure to be found in its hole. So the knight takes a bowl of milk in one hand, and a hammer in the other, and goes with them to the snake, which glides out of its hole to enjoy the milk. While it is drinking, he raises the hammer, but instead of hitting the snake strikes the bowl violently, on which the snake at once hurries away. From
