Chapter 4

THE HISTORY OF FAIRY TALES

The gods of ancient mythology were changed into the demi-gods and heroes of ancient poetry, and these demi-gods again became, at a later age, the principal characters of our nursery tales.--MAX MÜLLER

Stories originally told about the characters of savage tales, were finally attracted into the legends of the gods of ancient mythology, or were attributed to demi-gods and heroes.--ANDREW LANG.

I. THE ORIGIN OF FAIRY TALES

Now that we have indicated the worth of fairy tales, have observed those principles which should guide the teacher in choosing and in interpreting a tale, and have stated those rules which should govern the story-teller in the telling of the tale, we may well ask a few further questions concerning the nature of these fairy tales. What is a fairy tale and whence did it come, and how are we to find its beginning? Having found it, how are we to follow it down through the ages? How shall it be classed, what are the available types which seek to include it and show its nature? And lastly, what are the books which are to be the main practical sources of fairy tales for the teacher of little children? The remaining pages attempt to give some help to the teacher who wishes to increase her resources with an intelligent knowledge of the material she is handling.

Many times the question, "What is a fairy tale?" has been asked. One has said: "The fairy tale is a poetic presentation of a spiritual truth." George MacDonald has answered: "_Undine_ is a fairy tale." Mr. G.K. Chesterton has said: "A fairy tale is a tale told in a morbid age to the only remaining sane person, a child. A legend is a fairy tale told to men when men were sane." Some, scorning to reply, have treated the question as one similar to, "What poem do you consider best in the English language?" As there are many tales included here which do not contain a fairy, fairy tales here are taken to include tales which contain something fairy or extraordinary, the magic or the marvelous--fairies, elves, or trolls, speaking animals, trees, or a talkative Tin Soldier. The Myth proper and the Fable are both excluded here, while the _pourquois_ tale, a myth development, and the Beast tale, a short-story fable development, are both included.

The origin of the word "fairy," as given by Thomas Keightley in his _Fairy Mythology_, and later in the Appendix of his _Tales and Popular Fictions_, is the Latin _fatum_, "to enchant." The word was derived directly from the French form of the root. The various forms of the root were:--

Latin _fatum_, "to enchant." French _fee, feerie_, "illusion." Italian _fata_. Provençal _fada_.

In old French romance, _fee_ was a "woman skilled in magic." "All those women were called Fays who had to do with enchantment and charms and knew the power and virtue of words, of stones, and of herbs, by which they were kept in youth and in great beauty and in great riches." This was true also of the Italian _fata_.

The word "fairy" was used in four senses. _Fairy_ represented:--

(1) Illusion, or enchantment.

(2) Abode of the Faes, the country of the Fays.

(3) Inhabitants collectively, the people of Fairyland.

(4) The individual in Fairyland, the fairy Knight, or Elf.

The word was used in the fourth sense before the time of Chaucer. After the appearance of Spenser's _Faerie Queene_ distinctions became confused, and the name of the real fairies was transferred to "the little beings who made the green, sour ringlets whereof the ewe not bites." The change adopted by the poets gained currency among the people. Fairies were identified with nymphs and elves. Shakespeare was the principal means of effecting this revolution, and in his _Midsummer Night's Dream_ he has incorporated most of the fairy lore known in England at his time. But the tales are older than their name.

The origin of fairy tales is a question which has kept many very able scholars busy and which has not yet been settled to the satisfaction of many. What has been discovered resolves itself mainly into four different origins of fairy tales:--

I. Fairy tales are detritus of myth, surviving echoes of gods and heroes. Against this theory it may be said that, when popular tales have incidents similar to Greek heroic myths, the tales are not detritus of myth, but both have a more ancient tale as their original source. There was:--

(1) A popular tale which reflected the condition of a rude people, a tale full of the monstrous and the miraculous.

(2) The same tale, a series of incidents and plot, with the monstrous element modified, which survived in the oral traditions of illiterate peasantry.

(3) The same plot and incidents, as they existed in heroic epics of cultivated people. A local and historical character was given by the introduction of known places and native heroes. Tone and manners were refined by literary workmanship, in the _Rig Veda_, the Persian _King-book_, the _Homeric Epics_, etc.

The Grimms noted that the evolution of the tale was from a strongly marked, even ugly, but highly expressive form of its earlier stages, to that which possessed external beauty of mold. The origin is in the fancy of a primitive people, the survival is through _Märchen_ of peasantry, and the transfiguration into epics is by literary artists. Therefore, one and the same tale may be the source of Perrault's _Sleeping Beauty_, also of a _Greek myth_, and also of an _old tale of illiterate peasantry_. This was the opinion held by Lang, who said, "For the roots of stories, we must look, not in the clouds but upon the earth, not in the various aspects of nature but in the daily occurrences and surroundings, in the current opinions and ideas of savage life."

In the savage _Märchen_ of to-day, the ideas and incidents are the inevitable result of the mental habits and beliefs of savages. We gain an idea of the savage mind through Leviticus, in the Bible, through Herodotus, Greek and Roman geographers, Aristotle, Plutarch, Pliny, etc., through voyagers, missionaries, and travelers, and through present savage peoples. Savage existence is based on two great institutions:--

(a) The division of society into clans.--Marriage laws depend on the conception that these clans descend from certain plants, animals, or inorganic objects. There was the belief in human descent from animals and kinship and personal intercourse with them.

(b) Belief in magic and medicine-men, which resulted in powers of metamorphosis, the effect of incantation, and communion with the dead.--To the savage all nature was animated, all things were persons. The leading ideas of savage peoples have already been referred to in the list of motifs which appear in the different fairy tales, as given by Lang, mentioned under the "Preparation of the Teacher," in _The Telling of the Tale_.

II. Fairy tales are myths of Sun, Dawn, Thunder, Rain, etc.

This is sometimes called the Sun-Myth Theory or the Aryan Theory, and it is the one advocated by Max Müller and by Grimm.

The fairy tales were primitive man's experience with nature in days when he could not distinguish between nature and his own personality, when there was no supernatural because everything was endowed with a personal life. They were the poetic fancies of light and dark, cloud and rain, day and night; and underneath them were the same fanciful meanings. These became changed by time, circumstances in different countries, and the fancy of the tellers, so that they became sunny and many-colored in the South, sterner and wilder in the North, and more home-like in the Middle and West. To the Bushmen the wind was a bird, and to the Egyptian fire was a living beast. Even _The Song of Six-Pence_ has been explained as a nature-myth, the pie being the earth and sky, the birds the twenty-four hours, the king the sun, the queen the moon, and the opening of the pie, day-break.

Every word or phrase became a new story as soon as the first meaning of the original name was lost. Andrew Lang tells how Kephalos the sun loved Prokris the dew, and slew her by his arrows. Then when the first meaning of the names for sun, dew, and rays was lost, Kephalos, a shepherd, loved Prokris, a nymph, and we have a second tale which, by a folk-etymology, became the _Story of Apollo, the Wolf_. Tales were told of the sun under his frog name; later people forgot that _frog_ meant "sun," and the result was the popular tale, _A Frog, He Would A-Wooing Go_.

In regard to this theory, "It is well to remember," says Tylor in his _Primitive Culture_, "that rash inferences which, on the strength of mere resemblances, derive episodes of myth from episodes of nature, must be regarded with utter distrust; for the student who has no more stringent criterion than this for his myths of sun and sky and dawn will find them wherever it pleases him to seek them." There is a danger of being carried away by false analogies. But all scholars agree that some tales are evidently myths of sun and dawn. If we examine the natural history of savages, we do find summer feasts, winter feasts, rituals of sorrow for the going of summer and of rejoicing for its return, anxious interest in the sun, interest in the motion of the heavenly bodies, the custom of naming men and women from the phenomena of nature, and interest in making love, making war, making fun, and making dinner.

III. Fairy tales all arose in India, they are part of the common Aryan heritage and are to be traced by the remains of their language.

They were first written in the _Vedas_, the sacred Sanskrit books of Buddhism. This theory is somewhat allied to the Sun-Myth Theory. This theory was followed by Max Müller and by Sir George Cox.

The theory of a common source in India will not answer entirely for the origin of tales because many similar tales have existed in non-Aryan countries. Old tales were current in Egypt, 2000 B.C., and were brought from there by Crusaders, Mongol missionaries, the Hebrews, and Gypsies.

The idea of connecting a number of disconnected stories, as we find in _Arabian Nights_, _The Canterbury Tales_, and the _Decameron_, is traced to the idea of making Buddha the central figure in the folk-literature of India. And Jacobs says that at least one-third of all the stories common to the children of Europe are derived from India, and by far the majority of the drolls. He also says that generally, so far as incidents are marvelous and of true fairy-like character, India is the probable source, because of the vitality of animism and transformation in India in all time. Moreover, as a people, the Hindus had spread among their numbers enough literary training and mental grip to invent plots.

And again, there is an accepted connection in myth and language between all Aryan languages and Sanskrit. According to Sir George Dasent, "The whole human race has sprung from one stock planted in the East, which has stretched its boughs and branches laden with the fruit of language and bright with the bloom of song and story, by successive offshoots to the utmost parts of the earth." Dasent tells how the Aryans who went west, who went out to _do_, were distinguished from the nations of the world by their common sense, by their power of adapting themselves to circumstances, by making the best of their position, by being ready to receive impressions, and by being able to develop impressions. They became the Greeks, the Latins, the Teutons, the Celts, and the Slavonians. The Aryans who stayed at home, remained to _reflect_, and were distinguished by their power of thought. They became a nation of philosophers and gave to the world the Sanskrit language as the basis of comparative philology. Dasent shows how legends, such as the _Story of William Tell_ and _Dog Gellert_, which have appeared in many Aryan peoples were common in germ to the Aryan tribes before migration. Joseph Jacobs has more recently settled the travels of _Gellert_, tracing its literary route from the Indian _Vinaya Pitaka_, through the _Fables of Bidpai, Sindibad, Seven Sages of Rome, Gesta Romanorum_, and the Welsh _Fables of Cottwg_, until the legend became localized in Wales.

IV. Fairy tales owe their origin to the identity of early fancy.

Just as an individual, after thinking along certain lines, is surprised to come upon the exact sequence of his thought in a book he had never seen, so primitive peoples in remote parts of the world, up against similar situations, would express experience in tales containing similar motifs. A limited set of experiences was presented to the inventive faculty, and the limited combinations possible would result in similar combinations. The Aryan Jackal, the Mediaeval Reynard, the Southern Brer Rabbit, and the Weasel of Africa, are near relations. Dasent said, "In all mythology and tradition there are natural resemblances, parallelisms, suggested to the senses of each race by natural objects and everyday events; and these might spring up spontaneously all over the earth as home-growths, neither derived by imitation from other tribes, nor from the tradition of a common stock."

It is probable that all four theories of the origin of fairy tales are correct and that fairy tales owe their origin not to any one cause but to all four.

II. THE TRANSMISSION OF FAIRY TALES

Oral transmission. The tale, having originated, may have been transmitted in many ways: by women compelled to marry into alien tribes; by slaves from Africa to America; by soldiers returning from the Crusades; by pilgrims returning from the Holy Land or from Mecca; by knights gathering at tournaments; by sailors and travelers; and by commercial exchange between southern Europe and the East--Venice trading with Egypt and Spain with Syria. Ancient tales of Persia spread along the Mediterranean shores. In this way the Moors of Spain learned many a tale which they transmitted to the French. _Jack the Giant-Killer_ and _Thomas Thumb_, according to Sir Walter Scott, landed in England from the very same keels and warships which conveyed Hengist and Horsa and Ebba the Saxon. A recent report of the Bureau of Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution of the United States expressed the opinion that the _Uncle Remus Tales_ have an Indian origin. Slaves had associated with Indian tribes such as the Cherokees, and had heard the story of the Rabbit who was so clever that no one could fool him. Gradually the Southern negroes had adopted the Indian tales and changed them. Joseph Jacobs claims to have found the original of the "Tar Baby" in the _Jataka Tales_. A tale, once having originated, could travel as easily as the wind. Certainly a good type when once hit upon was diffused widely. Sir Walter Scott has said: "A work of great interest might be compiled from the origin of popular fiction and the transmission of similar tales from age to age and from country to country. The mythology of one period would then appear to pass into the romance of the next century, and that into the nursery tales of subsequent ages. Such an investigation would show that these fictions, however wild and childish, possess such charms for the populace as to enable them to penetrate into countries unconnected by manners and language, and having no apparent intercourse to afford the means of transmission."

Thomas Keightley, in _Tales and Popular Fictions_, has given interesting examples of the transmission of tales. Selecting _Jack the Giant-Killer_, he has shown that it is the same tale as Grimm's _The Brave Tailor_, and _Thor's Journey to Utgard_ in the Scandinavian _Edda_. Similar motifs occur also in a Persian tale, _Ameen of Isfahan and the Ghool_, and in the _Goat and the Lion_, a tale from the _Panchatantra_. Selecting the _Story of Dick Whittington_ he has shown that in England it was current in the reign of Elizabeth; that two similar tales, Danish legends, were told by Thiele; that a similar Italian tale existed at the time of Amerigo Vespucci, which was a legend told by Arlotto in 1396-1483; that another similar Italian tale was connected with the origin of Venice, in 1175; and that a similar tale existed in Persia in 1300, before 1360, when Whittington of England was born. He also pointed out that the _Odyssey_ must have traveled east as well as west, from Greece, for Sindbad's adventure with the Black Giant is similar to that of Ulysses with the Cyclops.

Another interesting set of parallels shown by him is connected with the _Pentamerone_ tale, _Peruonto_. This is the Straparola _Peter the Fool_, the Russian _Emelyan the Fool_, the Esthonian tale by Laboulaye, _The Fairy Craw-Fish_, and the Grimm _The Fisherman and his Wife_. The theme of a peasant being rewarded by the fish he had thrown back into the water takes on a delightful varied form in the tale of different countries. The magic words of Emelyan, "Up and away! At the pike's command, and at my request, go home, sledge!" in each variant take an interesting new form.

Literary transmission. The travels of a tale through oral tradition are to be attempted with great difficulty and by only the most careful scholarship. One may follow the transmission of tales through literary collections with somewhat greater ease and exactness. Popular tales have a literature of their own. The following list seeks to mention the most noteworthy collections:--

No date. _Vedas_. Sanskrit.

No date. _Zend Avesta_. Persian.

Fifth century, B.C. _Jatakas_. Probably the oldest literature. It was written at Ceylon and has been translated into 38 languages, in 112 editions. Recently the Cambridge edition has been translated from the Pali, edited by E.B. Cowell, published by Putnam, New York, 1895-1907.

4000 B.C. _Tales of Ancient Egypt_. These were the tales of magicians, recorded on papyrus.

600 B.C. (about). _Homeric Legends_.

200 B.C. (about). _Book of Esther_.

Second century, A.D. _The Golden Ass, Metamorphoses of Apuleius_.

550 A.D. _Panchatantra_, the _Five Books_. This was a Sanskrit collection of fables, the probable source of the _Fables of Bidpai_.

Second century, A.D. _The Hitopadesa_, or _Wholesome Instruction_. A selection from the _Panchatantra_, first edited by Carey, in 1804; by Max Müller, in 1844.

550 A.D. _Panchatantra_. Pehlevi version.

Tenth century, A.D. _Panchatantra_. Arabic version.

Eleventh century, A.D. _Panchatantra_. Greek version.

Twelfth century, A.D. _Panchatantra_. Persian version.

1200 A.D. _Sanskrit Tales_. These tales were collected by Somadeva Bhatta, of Cashmere, and were published to amuse the Queen of Cashmere. They have been translated by Brockhaus, 1844. Somadeva's _Ocean of the Streams of Story_ has been translated by Mr. Tawney, of Calcutta, 1880.

Tales of the West came from the East in two sources:--

1262-78. (1) _Directorium Humanæ Vitæ_, of John of Capua. This was translated from the _Hebrew_, from the _Arabic_ of the eighth century, from the _Pehlevi_ of Persia of the sixth century, from the _Panchatantra_, from the _Sanskrit original_. This is the same as the famous Persian version, _The Book of Calila and Dimna_, attributed to Bidpai, of India. There was a late Persian version, in 1494, and one in Paris in 1644, which was the source of La Fontaine.

Thirteenth century. (2) _The Story of the Seven Sages of Rome_, or _The Book of Sindibad_. This appeared in Europe as the Latin _History of the Seven Sages of Rome_, by Dame Jehans, a monk in the Abbey of Haute Selve. There is a Hebrew, an Arabic, and a Persian version. It is believed the Persian version came from Sanskrit but the Sanskrit original has not yet been found.

Tenth century. _Reynard the Fox_. This was first found as a Latin product of the monks, in a cloister by the banks of the Mosel and Mass. _Reynard the Fox_ shares with _Æsop's Fables_ the distinction of being folk-lore raised into literature. It is a series of short stories of adventure forming a romance. These versions are known:--

1180. German-_Reinhart_, an epic of twelve adventures by Heinrich Glichesäre.

1230. French-_Roman de Renard_, with its twenty-seven branches.

1250. Flemish-_Reinaert_, part of which was composed by Willem, near Ghent.

1148. _Ysengrimus_, a Latin poem written at Ghent.

Thirteenth century. _Of the Vox and of the Wolf_, an English poem.

Later date. _Rainardo_, Italian.

Later date. Greek _mediaeval version_.

_Reynard the Fox_[5] was first printed in England by Caxton in 1481, translated from a Dutch copy. A copy of Caxton's book is in the British Museum. Caxton's edition was adapted by "Felix Summerley"; and Felix Summerley's edition, with slight changes, was used by Joseph Jacobs in his Cranford edition.

A Dutch prose romance, _Historie von Reynaert de Vos_ was published in 1485. A German copy, written in Lower Saxony was published in 1498. A chap-book, somewhat condensed, but giving a very good account of the romance, was published in London in 1780, printed and sold in Aldermary Churchyard, Bow Lane. This chap-book is very much finer in language than many of the others in Ashton's collection. Its structure is good, arranged in nine chapters. It shows itself a real classic and would be read with pleasure to-day. Goethe's poem, _Reineke Fuchs_, was published in 1794. This version was more refined than previous ones but it lost in simplicity. Monographs have been written on _Reynard_ by Grimm, Voigt, Martin, and Sudre.

Raginhard was a man's name, meaning "strong in counsel," and was common in Germany which bordered on France. This name naturally was given to the beast who lived by his wits. Grimm considered _Reynard_ the result of a Teutonic Beast Epic of primitive origin. Later research has exploded this theory and has decided that all versions are descended from an original French one existing between 1150 and 1170. Modern editions have come from the Flemish version. The literary artist who compiled _Reynard_ took a nucleus of fables and added to it folk-tales which are known to have existed in the eleventh and twelfth centuries and which exist to-day as tradition among some folk. The folk-tales included in _Reynard_ are: _Reynard and Dame Wolf_; _The Iced Wolf's Tail_; _The Fishes in the Car_; _The Bear in the Cleft_; _The Wolf as Bell-Ringer_; and _The Dyed Fox_. The method of giving individual names to the animals such as Reynard, Bruin, and Tibert, was current among the Folk before a literary form was given to _Reynard_. As this was the custom in the province of Lorraine it is supposed that the origin of these names was in Lorraine. Other names, such as Chanticleer, the Cock, and Noble, the Lion, were given because of a quality, and indicate a tendency to allegory. These names increase in the later development of the romance. In the beginning when the beasts had only personal adventures, these were told by the Folk to raise a laugh. Later there was a meaning underneath the laugh and the Beast Epic Comedy of the Folk grew into the world Beast Satire of the literary artist.

_Reynard_ exhibits the bare struggle for existence which was generally characteristic of Feudal life. Cunning opposes force and triumphs over it. The adventurous hero appeals because of his faculty of _adjustment_, his power to adapt himself to circumstances and to master them. He also appeals because of his small size when compared with the other animals. In the Middle Ages _Reynard_ appealed because it was a satire upon the monks. Of _Reynard_ Carlyle has said, "It comes before us with a character such as can belong only to very few; that of being a true World's Book which through centuries was everywhere at home, the spirit of which diffused itself into all languages and all minds."

* * * * *

About one tenth of European folk-lore is traced to collections used in the Middle Ages: _Fables of Bidpai_, _Seven Wise Masters_, _Gesta Romanorum_, and _Barlaam and Josophat_. These tales became diffused through the _Exempla_ of the monks, used in their sermons, through the _Novelle_ of Italy, the _Decameron_ of Boccaccio, the _Tales of Chaucer_, Painter's _Palace of Pleasure_, and the _Elizabethan Drama_ of England. One half of La Fontaine's _Fables_ are of Indian sources.

1326. The _Gesta Romanorum_, written in Latin. This was a compilation, by the monks, of stories with a moral appended to each. It was the most popular story-book before the invention of printing. In England it was printed by Wynkyn de Worde, of which edition the only known copy is at St. John's College, Cambridge. The earliest manuscript of the collection is dated 1326. Between 1600 and 1703 fifteen editions of the book prove its popularity. One English version is by Sir Frederick Madden, who lived 1801-73. The author of the _Gesta Romanorum_ is unknown, but was likely a German. The stories included are miscellaneous and vary in different editions. Among its stories are Oriental tales, tales of the deeds of Roman Emperors, an early form of _Guy of Warwick_, the casket episode of _The Merchant of Venice_, a story of the Jew's bond, a tale of the Emperor Theodosius, being a version of _King Lear_, the story of the Hermit, and a tale of Aglas, the daughter of the Roman Emperor Pompey, being a version of _Atalanta and her Race_.

1000 A.D. (about). _Shah-Nameh_, or _King-book of Persia_, by Ferdousee, born about 940 A.D. This book is the pride and glory of Persian literature. It was written by the Persian poet at the command of the king, who wished to have preserved the old traditions and heroic glories of Persians before the Arabian conquest. Ferdousee declared that he invented none of his material, but took it from the _Bostan-Nameh_ or _Old-Book_.

The _King-Book_ is very ancient, it is the Persian Homer. It was the labor of thirty years. It consisted of 56,000 distichs or couplets, for every thousand of which the Sultan had promised the poet one thousand pieces of gold. Instead of the elephant-load of gold promised, the Sultan sent in payment 60,000 small silver coins. This so enraged the poet that he gave away one third to the man who brought them, one third to a seller of refreshments, and one third to the keeper of the bath where the messenger found him. After the poet's death the insult was retrieved by proper payment. This was refused by his one daughter, but accepted by the other and used to erect a public dike the poet had always desired to build to protect his native town from the river. The fine character of the tales of the _King-Book_ is shown in the tale of _Roostem and Soohrab_, taken from this book, which Keightley has translated in _Tales and Popular Fictions_. Keightley considered it superior to any Greek or Latin tale. Modern literature knows this tale through Matthew Arnold's poem.

1548 (not later than). _The Thousand and One Nights_, Arabian. 12 volumes. Galland's French translation appeared in 1704. This was supplemented by Chavis and Cazotte, and by Caussin de Percival. Monsieur Galland was Professor of Arabic in the Royal College of Paris. He was a master of French and a fairly good scholar of Arabic. He brought his manuscript, dated 1548, to Paris from Constantinople. He severely abbreviated the original, cutting out poetical extracts and improving the somewhat slovenly style. In his translation he gave to English the new words, _genie, ogre_, and _vizier_. His work was very popular.

Boulak and Calcutta texts are better than the Galland. They contain about two hundred and fifty stories. The Cairo edition has been admirably translated by Edward W. Lane, in 3 volumes (1839-41) published in London. This is probably the best edition. It also omits many poetical quotations. A recent edition using Lane's translation is by Frances Olcott, published by Holt in 1913. Editions which attempt to be complete versions are by John Payne (13 volumes, 1882-84), and by Sir Richard Burton (16 volumes, 1885-88). Lane and Burton give copious notes of value. The recent edition by Wiggin and Smith used the editions of Scott and Lane.

The stories in _Arabian Nights_ are Indian, Egyptian, Arabian, and Persian. Scenes are laid principally in Bagdad and Cairo. Lane considered that the one hundred and fifteen stories, which are common to all manuscripts, are based on the Pehlevi original. The idea of the frame of the story came from India. This was the birth of the serial story. There is authority for considering the final collection to have been made in Egypt. Cairo is described most minutely and the customs are of Egypt of the thirteenth century and later. The stories must have been popular in Egypt as they were mentioned by an historian, 1400-70. Lane considered that the final Arabic collection bears to Persian tales the same relation that the _Æneid_ does to the _Odyssey_. Life depicted is Arabic, and there is an absence of the great Persian heroes. Internal evidence assists in dating the work. Coffee is mentioned only three times. As its use became popular in the East in the fourteenth century this indicates the date of the work to be earlier than the very common use of coffee. Cannon, which are mentioned, were known in Egypt in 1383. Additions to the original were probably made as late as the sixteenth century. _The Arabian Nights_ has been the model for many literary attempts to produce the Oriental tale, of which the tales of George Meredith are notable examples.

Thomas Keightley, in _Tales and Popular Fictions_, considered Persia the original country of _The Thousand and One Nights_, and _The Voyages of Sinbad_, originally a separate work. He showed how some of these tales bear marks of Persian extraction and how some had made their way to Europe through oral transmission before the time of Galland's translation. He selected the tale, "Cleomedes and Claremond," and proved that it must have been learned by a certain Princess Blanche, of Castile, and transmitted by her to France about 1275. This romance must have traveled to Spain from the East. It is the same as "The Enchanted Horse" in _The Thousand and One Nights_, and through Keightley's proof, is originally Persian. Keightley also selected the Straparola tale, _The Dancing Water, the Singing Apple, and the Beautiful Green Bird_, and proved it to be the same as Grimm's _Three Little Birds_, as a Persian _Arabian Night's_ tale, and also as _La Princesse Belle Etoile_, of D'Aulnoy. But as Galland's translation appeared only the year after Madame D'Aulnoy's death, Madame D'Aulnoy must have obtained the tale elsewhere than from the first printed version of _Arabian Nights_.

No date. _The Thousand and One Days_. This is a Persian collection containing the "History of Calaf."

1550. _Straparola's Nights_, by Straparola. This collection of jests, riddles, and twenty-one stories was published in Venice. The stories were taken from oral tradition, from the lips of ten young women. Some were agreeable, some unfit, so that the book was forbidden in Rome, in 1605, and an abridged edition prepared. There was a complete Venetian edition in 1573, a German translation in 1679, a French one in 1611, and a good German one with valuable notes, by Schmidt, in 1817. Straparola's _Nights_ contained stories similar to the German _The Master Thief, The Little Peasant, Hans and the Hedge-Hog, Iron Hans, The Four Brothers, The Two Brothers_, and _Dr. Know-all_.

1637. _The Pentamerone_, by Basile. Basile spent his early youth in Candia or Crete, which was owned by Venice. He traveled much in Italy, following his sister, who was a noted singer, to Mantua. He probably died in 1637. There may have been an earlier edition of _The Pentamerone_, which sold out. It was republished in Naples in 1645, 1674, 1714, 1722, 1728, 1749, 1788, and in Rome in 1679. This was the best collection of tales formed by a nation for a long time. The traditions were complete, and the author had a special talent for collecting them, and an intimate knowledge of dialect. This collection of fifty stories may be looked upon as the basis of many others. Basile wrote independently of Straparola, though a few tales are common to both. He was very careful not to alter the tale as he took it down from the people. He told his stories with allusions to manners and customs, to old stories and mythology. He abounds in picturesque, proverbial expressions, with turns and many similes, and displays a delightful exuberance of fancy. A valuable translation, with notes, was written by Felix Liebrecht, in 1842, and an English one by John Edward Taylor, in 1848. Keightley, in _Fairy Mythology_, has translated three of these tales and in _Tales and Popular Fictions_, two tales. Keightley's were the first translations of these tales into any language other than Italian. Among the stories of Basile are the German _Cinderella, How Six got on in the World, Rapunzel, Snow White, Dame Holle, Briar Rose_, and _Hansel and Grethel_.

1697. _The Tales of Mother Goose_, by Charles Perrault. In France the collecting of fairy tales began in the seventeenth century. French, German, and Italian tales were all derived independently by oral tradition. In 1696, in _Recueil_, a magazine published by Moetjens, at The Hague, appeared _The Story of Sleeping Beauty_, by Perrault. In 1697 appeared seven other tales by Perrault. Eight stories were published in 12mo, under a title borrowed from a _fabliau_, _Contes de ma Mere l'Oye_. In a later edition three stories were added, _The Ass's Skin_, _The Clever Princess_, and _The Foolish Wishes_. The tales of Perrault were:--

1. The Fairies. 2. The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood. 3. Bluebeard. 4. Little Red Riding Hood. 5. Puss-in-Boots. 6. Cinderella. 7. Rique with the Tuft. 8. Little Thumb. 9. The Ass's Skin. 10. The Clever Princess. 11. The Foolish Wishes.

Immediately afterwards the tales appeared published at Paris in a volume entitled, _Histoires ou Contes du Temps Passe, avec des Moralites--Contes de ma Mère l'Oye_. The earliest translation into English was in a book containing French and English, _Tales of Passed Times, by Mother Goose, with Morals. Written in French by M. Charles Perrault and Englished by R.S., Gent_. An English translation by Mr. Samber was advertised in the English _Monthly Chronicle_, March, 1729. Andrew Lang, with an introduction, has edited these tales from the original edition, published by the Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1888. These tales made their way slowly in England, but gradually eclipsed the native English tales and legends which had been discouraged by Puritan influence. In Perrault's time, when this influence was beginning to decline, they superseded the English tales, crowding out all but _Jack the Giant-Killer, Tom Hickathrift, Jack and the Beanstalk, Tom Thumb_, and _Childe Rowland_.

1650-1705. _Fairy Tales_, by Madame D'Aulnoy. In France there were many followers of Perrault. The most important of these was Madame D'Aulnoy. She did not copy Perrault. She was a brilliant, witty countess, and brought into her tales, entitled _Contes de Fées_, the graces of the court. She adhered less strictly to tradition than Perrault, and handled her material freely, making additions, amplifications, and moral reflections, to the original tale. Her weaving together of incidents is artistic and her style graceful and not unpleasing. It is marked by ornamentation, sumptuousness, and French sentimentality. It shows a lack of naïveté resulting from the palace setting given to her tales, making them adapted only to children of high rank. Often her tale is founded on a beautiful tradition. _The Blue-Bird_, one of the finest of her tales, was found in the poems of Marie de France, in the thirteenth century. Three of her tales were borrowed from Straparola. Among her tales the most important are:--

_Graciosa and Percinet_. (Basile.)

_The Blue-Bird_. (Contains a motif similar to one in _The Singing, Soaring Lark_.)

_The White Cat_. (Similar to _Three Feathers_ and _The Miller's Boy and the Cat_.)

_The Hind in the Wood_. (Similar to _Rumpelstiltskin_.)

_The Good Little Mouse_. (Basile.)

_The Fair One with the Golden Locks. (Ferdinand the Faithful.)_

_The Yellow Dwarf_.

_Princess Belle Etoile_. (Straparola.)

The careful translation of Madame D'Aulnoy's tales by Mr. Planché faithfully preserves the spirit of the original.

There were many imitators of Countess D'Aulnoy, in France, in the eighteenth century. Their work was on a much lower level and became published in the _Cabinet des Fées_, a collection of stories including in its forty volumes the work of many authors, of which the greater part is of little value. Of those following D'Aulnoy three deserve mention:--

1711-1780. _Moral Tales_, by Madame de Beaumont. These were collected while the author was in England. Of these we use _Prince Cherry_. Madame de Beaumont wrote a children's book in which is found a tale similar to _The Singing, Soaring Lark_, entitled _The Maiden and the Beast_. She also wrote 69 volumes of romance.

1765. _Tales_, by Madame Villeneuve. Of these we use _Beauty and the Beast_.

1692-1765. _Tales_, by Comte de Caylus. The author was an antiquarian and scholar. Of his tales we use _Sylvain and Yocosa_.

Very little attempt has been made in modern times to include in our children's literature the best of foreign literature for children, for there has been very little study of foreign books for children. Certainly the field of children's literature would be enriched to receive translations of any books worthy of the name classic. A partial list of French fairy tales is here given, indicating to children's librarians how little has been done to open up this field, and inviting their labor:--

_Bibliothèque Rose_, a collection. (What should be included?)

_Bibliothèque des Petits Enfants_, a collection. (What should be included?)

1799-1874. _Fairy Tales from the French_, by Madame de Ségur. These tales are published by Winston. We also use her _Story of a Donkey_, written in 1860 and published by Heath in 1901.

1866. _Fairy Tales of all Nations_, by Edouard Laboulaye.

1902. _Last Fairy Tales_, also by Laboulaye.

_Tales_, by Zenaide Fleuriot. (What should be included?)

1910. _Chantecler_, by Edmund Rostand. Translated by Gertrude Hall, published by Duffield.

1911. _The Honey Bee_, by Anatole France; translated by Mrs. Lane; published by Lane.

1911. _The Blue-Bird_, by Maurice Maeterlinck; published by Dodd.

In Great Britain many old tales taken from tradition were included in the Welsh Mabinogion, Irish sagas, and Cornish Mabinogion. Legends of Brittany were made known by the poems of Marie de France, who lived in the thirteenth century. These were published in Paris, in 1820. In fact, most of the early publications of fairy tales were taken from the French.

Celtic tales have been collected in modern times in a greater number than those of any nation. This has been due largely to the work of J.F. Campbell. Celtic tales are unusual in that they have been collected while the custom of story-telling is yet flourishing among the Folk. They are therefore of great literary and imaginative interest. They are especially valuable as the oldest of the European tales. The Irish tale of _Connla and the Fairy Maiden_ has been traced to a date earlier than the fifth century and therefore ranks as the oldest tale of modern Europe. The principal Celtic collections are:--

_Iolo M. S_., published by the Welsh M. S. Society.

_Mabinogion_, translated by Lady Guest. (Contains tales that trace back to the twelfth century.)

_Y Cymrodor_, by Professor Rhys.

1825. _Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland_, by T. Crofton Croker.

1842. _Popular Rhymes of Scotland_. Chambers.

1860-62. _Popular Tales of the West Highlands_, by J.F. Campbell.

_Tales_, collected and published with notes, by Mr. Alfred Nutt.

1866. By Patrick Kennedy, the Irish Grimm. _Legendary Fictions of the Irish Celts; Fireside Stories of Ireland_ (1870); and _Bardic Stories of Ireland_ (1871).

In England the publication of fairy tales may be followed more readily because the language proves no hindrance and the literature gives assistance. In England the principal publications of fairy tales were:--

1604. _Pasquil's Jests_. Contained a tale similar to one of Grimm's.

1635. _A Tract, A Descryption of the Kynge and Quene of Fairies, their habit, fare, abode, pomp, and state_.

Eighteenth century (early). _Madame D'Aulnoy's Tales_, a translation.

1667-1745. _Gulliver's Travels_, by Dean Swift. (One modern edition, with introduction by W.D. Howells, and more than one hundred illustrations by Louis Rhead, is published by Harpers. Another edition, illustrated by Arthur Rackham, is published by Dutton.)

1700-1800. _Chap-Books_. Very many of these books, especially the best ones, were published by William and Cluer Dicey, in Aldermary Church Yard, Bow Lane, London. Rival publishers, whose editions were rougher in engraving, type, and paper, labored in Newcastle.

The chap-books were little paper books hawked by chap-men, or traveling peddlers, who went from village to village with "Almanacks, Bookes of Newes, or other trifling wares." These little books were usually from sixteen to twenty-four pages in bulk and in size from two and one half inches by three and one half inches to five and one half inches by four and one quarter inches. They sold for a penny or six-pence and became the very popular literature of the middle and lower classes of their time. After the nineteenth century they became widely published, deteriorated, and gradually were crowded out by the _Penny Magazine_ and _Chambers's Penny Tracts and Miscellanies_. For many years before the Victorian period, folk-lore was left to the peasants and kept out of reach of the children of the higher classes. This was the reign of the moral tale, of Thomas Bewick's _Looking Glass of the Mind_ and Mrs. Sherwood's _Henry and His Bearer_. Among the chap-books published by William and Cluer Dicey, may be mentioned: _The Pleasant and Delightful History of Jack and the Giants_ (part second was printed and sold by J. White); _Guy, Earl of Warwick; Bevis of Hampton; The History of Reynard the Fox_, dated 1780; _The History of Fortunatus_, condensed from an edition of 1682; _The Fryer and the Boy; A True Tale of Robin Hood_ (Robin Hood Garland Blocks, from 1680, were used in the London Bridge Chap-Book edition); _The Famous History of Thomas Thumb; The History of Sir Richard Whittington_; and _The Life and Death of St. George. Tom Hickathrift_ was printed by and for M. Angus and Son, at Newcastle-in-the-Side: _Valentine and Orson_ was printed at Lyons, France, in 1489; and in England by Wynkyn de Worde. Among the chap-books many tales not fairy tales were included. With the popularity of _Goody Two Shoes_ and the fifty little books issued by Newbery, the realistic tale of modern times made a sturdy beginning. Of these realistic chap-books one of the most popular was _The History of Little Tom Trip_, probably by Goldsmith, engraved by the famous Thomas Bewick, published by T. Saint, of Newcastle. This was reprinted by Ed. Pearson in 1867.

Of _Jack the Giant-Killer_, in Skinner's _Folk-Lore_, David Masson has said: "Our _Jack the Giant-Killer_ is clearly the last modern transmutation of the old British legend, told in Geoffrey of Monmouth, of Corineüs the Trojan, the companion of the Trojan Brutus when he first settled in Britain; which Corineüs, being a very strong man, and particularly good-humored, is satisfied with being King of Cornwall, and killing out all the aboriginal giants there, leaving to Brutus all the rest of the island, and only stipulating that, whenever there is a peculiarly difficult giant in any part of Brutus' dominions, he shall be sent for to finish the fellow."

_Tom Hickathrift_, whose history is given in an old number of _Fraser's Magazine_, is described by Thackeray as one of the publisher Cundall's books, bound in blue and gold, illustrated by Frederick Taylor in 1847. According to Thackeray this chap-book tale was written by Fielding. Speaking of the passage, "The giant roared hideously but Tom had no more mercy on him than a bear upon a dog," he said: "No one but Fielding could have described battle so." Of the passage, "Having increased his strength by good living and improved his courage by drinking strong ale," he remarked: "No one but Fielding could have given such an expression." The quality of the English of this chap-book is apparent in the following sentence, taken from Ashton's version: "So Tom stepped to a gate and took a rail for a staff."

In regard to their literary merit the chap-books vary greatly. Some evidently are works of scholars who omitted to sign their names. In the collection by Ashton those deserving mention for their literary merit are: _Patient Grissel_, by Boccaccio; _Fortunatus_; _Valentine and Orson_; _Joseph and His Brethren_; _The Friar and the Boy_; _Reynard the Fox_, from Caxton's translation; _Tom Hickathrift_, probably by Fielding; and _The Foreign Travels of Sir John Mandeville_.

1708-90. Chap-Books. Printed by J. White, of York, established at Newcastle, 1708. These included: _Tom Hickathrift; Jack the Giant-Killer_; and _Cock Robin_.

1750. _A New Collection of Fairy Tales_. 2 vols.

1760. _Mother Goose's Melodies_. A collection of many nursery rhymes, songs, and a few old ballads and tales, published by John Newbery. The editor is unknown, but most likely was Oliver Goldsmith. The title of the collection may have been borrowed from Perrault's _Contes de ma Mère l'Oye_, of which an English version appeared in 1729. The title itself has an interesting history dating hundreds of years before Perrault's time. By 1777 _Mother Goose's Melodies_ had passed the seventh edition. In 1780 they were published by Carnan, Newbery's stepson, under the title _Sonnets for the Cradle_. In 1810 _Gammer Gurton's Garland_, a collection, was edited by Joseph Ritson, an English scholar. In 1842 J.O. Halliwell issued, for the Percy Society, _The Nursery Rhymes of England_. The standard modern text should consist of Newbery's book with such additions from Ritson and Halliwell as bear internal evidence of antiquity and are true nursery rhymes.

1770. _Queen Mab, A Collection of Entertaining Tales of Fairies_.

1783. _The Lilliputian Magazine_. Illustrated by Thomas Bewick, published by Carnan.

1788. _The Pleasing Companion, A Collection of Fairy Tales_.

1788. _Fairy Tales Selected from the Best Authors_, 2 vols.

1770-91. Books published by John Evans, of Long Lane. Printed on coarse sugar paper. They included: _Cock Robin_, 1791; _Mother Hubbard; Cinderella_; and _The Tragical Death of an Apple Pye_.

1809. _A Collection of Popular Stories for the Nursery_, translated from French, Italian, and Old English, by Benjamin Tabart, in 4 volumes.

1810 (about). _Lilliputian Library_, by J.G. Rusher, of Bridge St., Banbury. The Halfpenny Series included:

_Mother Hubbard and Her Dog; Jack The Giant-Killer; Dick Whittington and His Cat; The History of Tom Thumb_ (Middlesex); _Death and Burial of Cock Robin; and Cinderella and Her Glass Slipper_.

The Penny Series included:--

_History of a Banbury Cake, and Jack the Giant-Killer_, designed by Craig, engraved by Lee.

Of Rusher's books those engraved by the Bewick School were:

_Cock Robin; The History of Tom Thumb_; and _Children in the Wood_.

Rusher's books also included:

_Mother Hubbard and Her Dog, Cinderella and Her Glass Slipper_, and _Dick Whittington and His Cat_, all designed by Cruikshank, engraved by Branstone.

1818. _Fairy Tales, or the Lilliputian Cabinet_, collected by Benj. Tabart, London. This was a new edition of the collection of 1809, and contained twenty-four stories. A full review of it may be seen in the _Quarterly Review_, 1819, No. 41, pp. 91-112. The tales included translations from Perrault, Madame D'Aulnoy, Madame de Beaumont, tales from _The Thousand and One Nights_, and from _Robin Hood_; and the single tales of _Jack the Giant-Killer, Tom Thumb_, and _Jack and the Bean-Stalk_.

1824, 1826. _German Popular Stories_, translated by Edgar Taylor, with illustrations by Cruikshank, published by Charles Tilt, London. A new edition, introduction by Ruskin, was published by Chatto & Windus, 1880.

The above are the main collections of fairy tales in England. Many individual publications show the gradual development of fairy tale illustration in England:[6]--

1713-1767. John Newbery's _Books for Children_. Among these were _Beauty and the Beast_, by Charles Lamb, 1765, and _Sinbad the Sailor_, 1798.

1778. _Fabulous Histories of the Robins_. Mrs. Sarah Trimmer. Cuts designed by Thomas Bewick, engraved by John Thompson, Whittingham's Chiswick Press.

1755-1886. _Life and Perambulations of a Mouse_; and _Adventures of a Pin-Cushion_. Dorothy Kilner.

1785. Baron Munchausen's _Narratives of His Famous Travels and Campaigns in Russia_. Rudolf Raspe.

1788. _Little Thumb and the Ogre_. Illustrated by William Blake; published by Dutton.

1790. _The Death and Burial of Cock Robin_. Illustrated by Thomas Bewick. Catnach.

1807. _Tales from Shakespeare_. Charles and Mary Lamb. W.J. Godwin and Co. William Blake illustrated an edition of these tales, probably the original edition.

1813. Reprints of forgotten books, by Andrew Tuer: _Dame Wiggins of Lee; The Gaping Wide-Mouthed Waddling Frog: The House that Jack Built. Dame Wiggins of Lee_ was first printed by A.K. Newman and Co., Minerva Press. Original cuts by Stennet or Sinnet. Reprinted by Allen, 1885, with illustrations added by Kate Greenaway.

1841. _King of the Golden River_. John Ruskin. Illustrated by Richard Doyle, 1884.

1844. _Home Treasury_, by "Felix Summerley" (Sir Henry Cole). "Felix Summerley" was a reformer in children's books. He secured the assistance of many of the first artists of his time: Mulready, Cope, Horsley, Redgrave, Webster, all of the Royal Academy, Linnell and his three sons, Townsend, and others. These little books were published by Joseph Cundall and have become celebrated through Thackeray's mention of them. They aimed to cultivate the affections, fancy, imagination, and taste of children, they were a distinct contrast to the Peter Parley books. They were new books, new combinations of old materials, and reprints, purified but not weakened. Their literature possessed brightness. The books were printed in the best style of the Chiswick Press, with bindings and end papers especially designed. They included these tales: _Puck's Reports to Oberon; Four New Fairy Tales; The Sisters; Golden Locks; Grumble and Cherry; Little Red Riding Hood_, with four colored illustrations by Webster; _Beauty and the Beast_, with four colored illustrations by Horsley; _Jack and the Bean-Stalk_, with four colored illustrations by Cope; _Jack the Giant-Killer_, also illustrated by Cope; and _The Pleasant History of Reynard, the Fox_, with forty of the fifty-seven etchings made by Everdingen, in 1752.

1824-1883. Publications by Richard Doyle. These included _The Fairy Ring_, 1845; _Snow White and Rosy Red_, 1871; _Jack the Giant-Killer_, 1888, etc.

1846. _Undine_, by De La Motté Fouque, illustrated by John Tenniel, published by James Burns.

1846. _The Good-Natured Bear_, by Richard Hengist Home, the English critic. This was illustrated by Frederick Taylor, published probably by Cundall. The book is now out of print, but deserves to be reprinted.

1847-1864. _Cruikshank Fairy Library_. A series of small books in paper wrappers. Not equal to the German popular stories in illustration. It included _Tom Thumb_, 1830; _John Gilpin_, 1828 (realistic); and _The Brownies_, 1870.

1847. _Bob and Dog Quiz_. Author unknown. Revived by E.V. Lucas in _Old-fashioned Tales_. Illustrated by F.D. Bedford; published by Stokes, 1905.

1850. _The Child's Own Book_. Published in London. There was an earlier edition, not before 1830. The introduction, which in the 1850 edition was copied from the original, indicates by its style that the book was written early in the nineteenth century. The book was the delight of generations of children. It was a collection containing tales from _Arabian Nights_, Perrault's tales of _Cinderella, Puss-in-Boots, Hop-o'-my-Thumb, Bluebeard_, etc., D'Aulnoy's _Valentine and Orson_, chap-book stories of _Dick Whittinqton, Fortunatus, Griselda, Robinson Crusoe, The Children in the Wood, Little Jack_, and others. A recent edition of this book is in the _Young Folks' library_, vol. 1, published by Hall & Locke, Boston, 1901.

1850 (about). _The Three Bears_. Illustrated by Absalon and Harrison Weir. Addy and Co.

1824-1889. Work by Mrs. Mary Whateley. She had a Moslem school in Cairo and exerted a fairy tale influence.

1826-1887. _The Little Lame Prince; Adventures of a_ _Brownie_; and _The Fairy Book_. Produced by Mrs. Dinah Muloch Craik.

1854. _The Rose and the Ring_, by William M. Thackeray. A modern edition contains the original illustrations with additions by Monsell. Crowell.

1855. _Granny's Story Box_. A collection. Illustrated by J. Knight; published by Piper, Stephenson, and Spence.

1856. _Granny's Wonderful Chair_, containing _Prince Fairy-foot_. Written by Frances Browne, a blind Irish poetess.

1863. _Water Babies_. Charles Kingsley. Sir Noel Patton. The Macmillan Company.

1865. _Stories Told to a Child, including Fairy Tales; Mopsa the Fairy_, 1869. By Jean Ingelow.

1865. _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_, by Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson), with 42 illustrations by John Tenniel, published by Macmillan Company, Oxford. First edition recalled. Later editions were published by Richard Clay, London.

1869. _At the Back of the North Wind_; _The Princess and the Goblin_, 1871. By George MacDonald. Arthur Hughes. Strahan. Reprinted by Blackie.

1870. _The Brownies_; 1882, _Old-fashioned Fairy Tales_. By Juliana Ewing.

1873. _A Series of Toy-Books for Children_, by Walter Crane (1845-1914). Published by Routledge and printed in colors by Edmund Evans. Twenty-seven of these stories in nine volumes are published by John Lane, Bodley Head. _Princess Fioromonde_, 1880, _Grimm's Household Stories_, 1882, and _The Cuckoo Clock_, 1887, all by Mrs. Molesworth, were also illustrated by Crane.

1878-. _Picture-Books_, by Randolph Caldecott (1846-1886). These were sixteen in number. They are published by F. Warne.

1875-. _Stories from the Eddas; Dame Wiggins of Lee (Allen)_; and _The Pied Piper of Hamelin_. These delightful books by Kate Greenaway (1846-1901) were published by Routledge and engraved by Edmund Evans. They are now published by F. Warne.

This brings the English side of the subject down to the present time. Present editions of fairy tales are given in Chapter VI.

In Germany there were also many translations from the French of Perrault and D'Aulnoy. There were editions in 1764, 1770, etc. Most of those before the _Grimms' Tales_ were not important. One might mention:--

1782. _Popular German Stories_, by Musäus.

1818. _Fables, Stories, and Tales for Children_, by Caroline Stahl.

1819. _Bohemian Folk-Tales_, by Wolfgang Gerle.

1812-1814. _Kinder und Haus-Märchen_, by Jacob and William Grimm. The second edition was published in 3 volumes in Berlin, by Reiner, in 1822. This latter work formed an era in popular literature and has been adopted as a model by all true collectors since.

Concerning the modern German fairy tale, the Germans have paid such special attention to the selection and grading of children's literature that their library lists are to be recommended. Wolgast, the author of _Vom Kinderbuch_, is an authority on the child's book. The fairy tale received a high estimate in Germany and no nation has attained a higher achievement in the art of the fairy tale book. The partial list simply indicates the slight knowledge of available material and would suggest an inviting field to librarians. A great stimulus to children's literature would be given by a knowledge of what the Germans have already accomplished in this particular. In Germany a child's book, before it enters the market, must first be accepted by a committee who test the book according to a standard of excellence. Any book not coming up to the standard is rejected. A few of the German editions in use are given:--

_Bilderbücher_, by Löwensohn.

_Bilderbücher_, by Scholz.

_Liebe Märchen_. One form of the above, giving three tales in one volume.

_Märchen_, by W. Hauff, published by Lowe. One edition, illustrated by Arthur Rackham, is published by Dutton. _The Caravan Tales_ is an edition published by Stokes.

_Märchen_, by Musaus, published by Von K.A. Müller.

1777-1843. _Undine_, by La Motte Fouqué. A recent edition, illustrated by Rackham, is published by Doubleday.

1817-77. _Books_ by Otillie Wildermuth. (What of hers should be translated and included?)

_Hanschen im Blaubeerenwald; Hanschens Skifart Märchen_, both by Elsa Beskow, published by Carl.

_Windchen_; and _Wurzelkindern_, both by Sybille von Olfers, published by Schreiber.

_Das Märchen von den Sandmannlein_, by Riemann, published by Schreiber.

_Der Froschkönig_, by Liebermann, published by Scholz.

_Weisst du weviel Sternlein stehen_, by Lewinski, published by Schreiber.

In Sweden there appeared translations of Perrault and D'Aulnoy. _The Blue-Bird_ was oftenest printed as a chap-book. Folk-tales were collected in:--

_Swedish Tales_, a collection. H. Von Schroter.

1844. _Folk-Tales_. George Stevens and Hylten Cavallius.

Sweden has given us the modern fairy tale, _The Wonderful Adventures of Nils_ (2 volumes). This delightful tale by Selma Lagerlöf, born 1858, and a winner of the Nobel prize, has established itself as a child's classic. It has been translated by V.S. Howard, published by Doubleday, 1907.

In Norway we have:--

1851. _Norske Folkeeventyr_, collected by Asbjörnsen and Moe.

1862. _Norse Tales_. The above tales translated by Sir George W. Dasent.

In Denmark we have:--

_Sagas of Bodvar Biarke_.

_Danske Folkeeventyr_, by M. Winther, Copenhagen, 1823.

1843-60. _Danmarks Folkesagn_, 3 vols., by J.M. Thiele.

1805-1875. _Fairy Tales_, by Hans Christian Andersen. These tales are important as marking the beginning of the modern fairy tale. They are important also as literary fairy tales and have not been equaled in modern times.

In Slavonia we have:--

_Wochentliche Nachrichten_, by Busching, published by Schottky.

In Hungary we have:--

1822. _Marchen der Magyaren_, by George von Gaal.

In Greece and Russia no popular tales were collected before the time of the Grimms.

In Italy the two great collections of the world of fairy tales have been mentioned. Italy has also given the modern fairy tale which has been accepted as a classic: _Pinocchio_, by C. Collodi (Carlo Lorenzini). This has been illustrated by Copeland, published by Ginn; and illustrated by Folkhard, published by Dutton.

In America the publication of fairy tales was at first a reprinting of English editions. In colonial times, previous to the revolution, booksellers imported largely from England. After the revolution a new home-growth in literature gradually developed. At first this was largely in imitation of literature in England. After the time of Washington Irving a distinct American adult literature established itself. The little child's toy-book followed in the wake of the grown-up's fiction. The following list[7] shows the growth of the American fairy tale, previous to 1870. Recent editions are given in