in the sack," with which he gets back the magic things which his brothers have lost and they live very happily with their father, who now rejoices that he did not squander away the little he had on his sons. In Lina's Märchenbuch, by Albert Ludwig Grimm, see No. 4, The Cudgel in the Sack. Compare with this the story from Meran, in Zingerle, pp. 84 and 185, and a Swabian story, Meier, No. 22. In Danish, see Etlar, p, 150. In Norwegian, Asbjörnsen, p. 43. In Netherlandish, see Wodana, No. 5. Hungarian, see Stier, p. 79.
In Polish, see Levestam, p. 105. In Wallachian, Schott, No. 20. To this also belongs a tale from the Zillerthal,[1] Zingerle, p. 56, which corresponds with the Irish story The Bottle (Elfenmärchen, No. 9),[2] and also with the Russian one, The Gentle Man and the Cross Wife, in Dietrich, No. 8. The story of the Knapsack, Hat, and Horn is also allied with it (No. 54).
[A version of this story is also to be found in Von Hahn's Modern Greek Household Tales, and a somewhat similar one, No. 1, in the Pentamerone of Basile. Mr. Henderson gives two which are current in the East and West Ridings of Yorkshire, in his Folklore.—Tr.]
37.—Thumbling.
From Mühlheim on the Rhine. Belongs to the same class of fables as Thumbling as Journeyman (No. 45); compare the notes on that. In Slavonic, see Vogl. No. 6. In Roumanian, from the Bukowina in Wolf's Zeitschrift für deutsche Mythologie, 1. 48. In Albanian, see Hahn, 2. pp. 168, 169.
38.—Mr. Fox.
Is told in many forms in Hesse and the Maine district: we here give the two most important variations, the others turn on the fact of the old fox being really dead, or only apparently so (as in the old French poem), and whether foxes only, or other animals as well, come to woo the widow. In the latter case her questions are more numerous: "What is the wooer like? Does he, too, wear a redcap?" "Alas, no—a white one," for it was the wolf. "Has he a little red jacket on?" "No, a yellow one," for it was the lion. The speech to the cat at the beginning has also many variations:
"Mistress Cat, Mistress Kit,
Is your fire ready lit?
Is your meat on the spit?
What is Mistress Fox about?"
