unmistakable facts, and to rely upon any mythological theory that does not arise naturally and unforcedly out of the documents. In this case too, the myth, as reconstructed by Prof. Rhys, is open to grave objection from the side of the orthodox nature-mythologists. Prof Rhys has further embarrassed himself by what I cannot but regard as a wholly chimerical attempt to equate the Lancelot story, as we find it in Crestien, with his hypothetical Peredur-Owain story. I would further urge that the endeavour to find, not a Celtic basis, but a basis in the existing scanty remains of Celtic literature for all the leading situations and motifs in the gigantic mass of French Arthurian literature must necessarily result in strained interpretation. It can hardly be doubted that we do not possess even one tithe of the Brythonic story-hoard. It would be an amazing coincidence if all that is Celtic in the French Arthurian romances went back precisely to that tithe. Yet I for one cannot regret that Prof Rhys should have apparently acted upon this coincidence theory; it has led him to strain every nerve to identify stories which I believe to have little in common, but in so doing he has accumulated such a number of interesting and indubitable minor parallels between the person- and place-names of genuine Welsh tradition and those of French Arthurian romance as to place the Brythonic origin of the latter beyond all possibility of doubt.
Prof Rhys is largely concerned with the Grail. Here he is supplemented by Prof Heinzel of Vienna, whose work, quoted at the head of this article, is by far the most searching, minute, and erudite examination of the French Grail romances that has yet appeared. Prof Heinzel displays in this work all that penetration, that sanity, and that rigorously scientific method that have won him so much credit in the field of Teutonic mythology and saga. Those who are familiar with his previous researches will know that any opinion of his is entitled to the most respectful consideration.
