and make it fit so the joints would n't show? It is the habit of man, the world over, to stand in awe, secret or avowed, of that which he does not understand. When I say, therefore, that the introduction is wonderfully learned, I mean that I do not understand it.
To that introduction I owe my reputation abroad (very much abroad) as a student or a professor of folk-lore. To that introduction also the reader owes the curious narrative (or narratives) which I have concluded to put on record here, in order (if I may be so fortunate) to put an end to a bitter dispute that has raged and is still raging in the various folk-lore societies in Europe and Asia, from Jahore to London,—a dispute that is not the less bitter or demoralizing because it is carried on in seven different languages and thirteen different dialects.
The way of it was this. On the 16th of February, 1892,—the date is in my note-book, though it is not of the slightest importance,—I received a communication from Sir Waddy Wyndham, one of her Majesty's officials at Jahore. Sir Waddy evidently had plenty of time at his command, for his letter contained fourteen sheets of note-paper, con-
