as in the "Frog King," it will, however, be perfectly clear if we compare this example with later ones, especially those with Freudian transpositions (Verlegung). Again and again impregnation is represented in childless people in symbolic form (here the frog is the symbol of fertilization), and the child originating therefrom has a fate of projected significance.
The tale brings thus, among the applications of the magic and transformation technic undertaken by it, first the symbol, in order to represent the sexual story and establish in the given moment the whole as represented by the symbol.
The Tale of "The Little Hazel Branch" (Bechstein, p. 40).—A merchant has to make a journey and wishes to bring back a present for his three daughters. (Compare "Oda and the Serpent.") The first wanted a pearl necklace, the second a diamond ring, the third whispered her wish for a beautiful, green, little hazel twig. On the way home he had great difficulty to find one. Finally he accidently discovered a beautiful, green, little branch with golden nuts. As he broke it off, a bear, to whom the branch belonged, rushed out of the thicket. He surrendered it to him; the merchant had to promise the bear, however, to give him that which he first met on the way home. Naturally this was the youngest daughter. The bear came, after a little while, with a wagon to take her away. When he returned to the forest he asked her to caress him, noticed her manner, that it was only that of a substitute peasant maiden and instantly went for the right youngest daughter of the merchant. The bear took his bride to a cave with horrible dragons and serpents, and by not looking about her she breaks the enchantment and the bear becomes a prince, the owner of a beautiful palace and the liberated monsters are his followers. The bear is thus the prince, to him belongs the fruit-bearing little hazel branch that is here the special sexual symbol. The disenchantment explains the relation only that therein the little branch is no longer mentioned. The analogy with Oda and the serpent is quite transparent. The idea of the magic cave is naturally assisted by the mythological view of the (chthonischen) divinities dwelling in the ground and in the mountains, and perhaps the bear is a prince who has died and the fearful animals, his followers, who are freed from magic or death. The little hazel branch to be sure fits only half way into
