while, approached and asked: "With what?" Dante immediately replied: "With salt."
A poet, Carlo Gabrielli, put this incident into rhyme, and drew from it the following moral (senso):—
"L' acuto ingegno grande apporta gloria;
Maggior, se v'è congiunta alta memoria."
See Papanti, op. cit. pp. 183, 205.
26. This story is told in almost the same words in Pitrè, No. 297, "The Peasant and the King." There are several Italian literary versions, the best known being in the Cento nov. ant. ed. Borghini, Nov. VI.: see D'Ancona's notes to this novel in the Romania, III. p. 185, "Le Fonti del Novellino." It is also found in the Gesta Romanorum, cap. 57, see notes in Oesterley's edition; and in Simrock's Deutsche Märchen, No. 8, see Liebrecht's notes in Orient und Occident, III. p. 372. To the above may, finally, be added Köhler's notes to Gonz., No. 50 (II. p. 234).
27. Comparetti, No. 43, "La Ragazza astuta" (Barga). The first part of the story, dividing the fowl, and sending the presents, which are partly eaten on the way, is found in Gonz., No. 1, "Die Kluge Bauerntochter" ("The Peasant's Clever Daughter"). See Köhler's notes to Gonz., No. 1 (II. 205); and to Nasr-eddin's Schwänke in Orient und Occident, I. p. 444. Grimm, No. 94, "The Peasant's Wise Daughter," contains all the episodes of the Italian story except the division of the fowl. An Italian version in the Fiabe Mant. No. 36, "La giovane accorta" contains the episode of the mortar. The king sends word to the clever daughter that she must procure for him some ahimè (sneeze) salad. She sent him some ordinary salad with some garlic sprinkled over it, and when he touched it he sneezed (and formed the sound represented by the word ahimè). The rest of the story contains the episode lacking in the other popular Italian versions, but found in Grimm, and technically known as "halb geritten." For this episode see Gesta Romanorum, ed. Oesterley, cap. 124, and Pauli, 423.
Another Italian version from Bergamo may be found in Corazzini, p. 482, "La Storia del Pestu d' or" ("The Story of the Gold Pestle"), which is like the version in the text from the episode of the mortar on. In the story from Bergamo it is a gold pestle, and not a mortar, that is found, and the story of "halb geritten" is retained. The episode of the foal is changed into a sharp answer made (at the queen's suggestion) by the king's herdsman to his master, who had failed to pay him for his services. A version from Montale, Nerucci, p. 18, "Il Mortajo d' oro" ("The Golden Mortar"), contains all the episodes of the story in the text (including "halb geritten") except the division of the fowl. The first part of the story is found in a tale from Cyprus, in the Jahrb. XI. p. 360.
A parallel to the story in our text may also be found in Ralston's
