Segnius Irritant: or Eight Primitive Folk-lore Stories/The Three Citrons
The Three Citrons.
[Slovenian.]
There was once an old king, and this king had an only son. This son he once called before him and addressed him thus: “My son! thou seest that my head is now white with age; to-day or to-morrow I shall close my eyes, and yet I know not in what state I shall leave thee. Wed thee, my son! let me bless thee, just as thou closest my eyes in death.” The son answered nothing, only he remained very pensive; he would have been heartily glad to fulfil his father’s wish, but there was no girl for whom his heart could feel affection.
Once as he sat in the garden, and was just thinking what he ought to do, where she came, there she came, before him stood an old woman. “Go to the hill of glass, gather the three citrons, and thou shalt have a wife that shall be dear to thy heart,” she said, and as she had appeared so she vanished. Like a bright ray of light these words streamed through the soul of the prince. That instant he determined, come what might, to discover the hill of glass and to gather the three citrons. He disclosed his intention to his father, and his father gave him a horse for the journey, a suit of armour and his own paternal benediction.
Through dense mountains, over lonely plains, wandered our prince, a long, very long, time; but of the hill of glass and the three citrons no hint or rumour. Once, quite tired out by the long journey, he threw himself down under a broad linden in the cool. As he threw himself on the ground, his father’s sabre rang out, for he had it at his side, and opn the top of the broad linden, a dozen ravens croaked. Scared by the clatter of the sabre they rose on the wing and flew away through the air above the tall trees. “H’m! it is long since I have seen a living creature,” said the prince to himself, and leapt from the ground. I will go in the direction the ravens flew, perhaps some hope will shew itself.”
On and on he went again for three whaole days and nights, until at last a lofty tower appeared in the distance. Praised be God! at all events I shall once more get among human beings,” he exclaimed joyfully, and stepped forward.
The mountains re-bellowed, the castle shook again, and Jezibaba whispered to the prince that it was her son coming. “Fuj! Fuj! what a smell of man’s flesh; I am going to eat it,” roared Jezibaba’s son, while still at the door, and thumped on the ground with a great club of lead, so that the whole castle shook again. “Ach! not so, my son, not so!” said Jezibaba coaxingly; “Why, it is a beautiful youth who has come, and wishes to ask your advice about something.” “Oh! well, if he wishes to ask my advice, let him come here.” “Faith, he shall come, my son, but only if thou dost promise me that thou wilt not do anything to him.” “Well, I will not do anything to him, only let him come!”
The prince, under the broom, was shaking like an aspen, for he saw through the rods before him a giant to whose knees he scarcely reached. Happily he had now his life guaranteed, when Jezibaba bade him come out from under the broom. “Well, thou cockchafer, what art thou frightened of?” roared the ogre; “Whence art thou? What wouldst thou?” “Oh! as to what I want,” replied the prince, I have been wandering ever so long in these mountains and cannot find what I am looking for, and so I have come to thee to see if thou mightest not be able to tell me something about the hill of glass and the three citrons.” Jezibaba’s son wrinkled his brow, and after a little time said in a quieter voice: “About the hill of glass, nothing is to be heard here; but hie away to my brother of the castle of silver, perhaps he will be able to tell thee something. But stay, I will not let thee go away empty; mother, bring here the dumplings.” Old Jezibaba placed a large dish on the table, and her gigantic son sat down to it. “Come and eat,” he roared to the prince. The prince took the first dumpling and bit it, but two of his teeth snapped, for it was a dumpling of lead. “Nu! why dost thou” not eat? Perhaps it does not please thee?” asked Jezibaba’s son. “Oh, yes! indeed, they are excellent, but I am not hungry just now.” “Well, if thou art not hungry just now, put it in thy pocket and eat it on the road.” The poor young prince, must, willy-nilly, put the leaden dumplings into his pocket. After this he took himself off, and went forward.
On and on he went for three whole days and nights, and the further he went the more he wandered astray in the thick dark mountains. Before him was a desert, behind him a desert; not a single living creature was to be seen. Quite wearied out by the long journey he flung himself on the ground. The sound of the silver sabre spread far and wide. Above him croaked four-and-twenty ravens, scared by the clatter of the sabre, and rising on the wing, flew into the air. “A lucky sign!” cried the prince, I will go in the direction in which the ravens have flown.”
So he went in that direction, on and on, as far as his feet would carry him, until all at once a tall castle appeared. He was still far from the castle, and already its walls flashed brightly, for this castle was of pure silver. Before the castle stood a hump-backed old woman leaning on a long silver staff, and it was Jezibaba. “Eh! my son, whither wouldst thou this way? Here there is not even a little bird, not even a little butterfly, much less any little human being,” exclaimed Jezibaba to the prince. “As thy life is dear to thee, fly, for when my son comes he will eat thee.” Ah! old mother, he’ll scarcely eat me, I fancy; why, I have not yet saluted him from his brother of the castle of lead.” “Oh! if thou hast not yet saluted from the castle of lead, then go into the room, my son, and tell me what thou art looking for?” “Hey! old mother! what am I Jooking for? Now, for ever so long I have been looking for the hill of glass and the three citrons, and I cannot find them; and so I am come here to ask if you could not tell me something about them.” “About the hill of glass I know nothing; but stay until my son comes, perhaps he will be able to tell you something. Hide under the bed, and do not betray thy presence unless I summon thee.”
The mountains re-bellowed with a voice of a hundredfold compass, and the castle shook again, and the prince now knew that it was Jezibaba’s son coming home. “Fuj! Fuj! what a smell of man’s flesh, I am come to eat it!” roared the gigantic fellow, while yet at the door, and thumped with a silver club on the ground, so that the whole castle shook again. “Ah! not so, not so, my son; why, it is a beautiful youth has come and brought thee salutations from thy brother of the castle of lead.” “Oh! if he has been at my brother’s, and if he has done nothing to him, don’t let him be the least afraid of me; let him come out.” The prince jumped out from under the bed and stood beside him, and looked beside him as if he had posted himself under a very tall pine tree. “Well, thou midget, wert thou really at my brother’s?” “Yes, that I have been; and here I have some of the dumplings left which he gave me for the journey.” Well, I believe thee; so now tell me, what wouldst thou?” “Ach! what would I? I have come to ask thee if thou couldst perhaps tell me something about the hill of glass and about the three citrons.” “H’m! I have heard something about it all, but I cannot point thee out the way. Meanwhile, knowest thou what? Go to my brother at the castle of gold—he will direct thee. But, stay! I will not let thee go empty; mother, quick, the dumplings!” Jezibaba brought the dumplings upon a great silver dish and placed them on the table. There! eat,” exclaimed her son. The prince, perceiving that the dumplings were of silver, said he was not hungry, but would take some on the journey, if he might. “Take as many as thou wishest, and salute my brother and aunt.” The prince pocketed the dumplings, politely expressed his thanks, and continued his journey.
Three days had already elapsed since he had quitted the castle of silver, and had wandered continuously through thick mountains, not the least knowing whither he ought to go, whether this way or that. Completely tired out he threw himself under a broad beech tree to take breath a bit. His silver sabre rang out upon the ground, and its voice was carried far and wide. “Kr, kr, kr,” croaked above the wayfarer a flock of ravens, scared by the clatter of the sabre, and flew into the air. “Praised be God! the golden castle will not be far off now!” exclaimed the prince, and, relieved and comforted, continued his journey according as the ravens showed him the way. Scarcely had he emerged from the valley on to the hillside, when he saw a beautiful broad meadow; in the middle of the meadow stood a castle of gold. It was as though he had been looking at the sunrise, and before the gate of this castle stood old hump-backed Jezibaba leaning upon a staff of gold. “Eh! my son, what art thou looking for?” she called out to the prince. “Why, here there is not a single little bird, not a single little butterfly to be heard or seen, much less any poor little human being. Ah! as thou lovest thy life, be off with thee | for when my son comes he will eat thee.” Hoj! old mother, he’ll scarcely eat me, I fancy. Why, I have not saluted him yet from his brother of the castle of silver.” “Oh, well, if thou hast not saluted yet from the castle of silver, then come into the hall and tell me what has led thee to us.” “Oh! old mother! what has led me hither? Ever so long I have been wandering through these mountains and cannot discover where the hill of glass is and the three citrons; so they directed me to you, as perhaps you might be able to tell me something about them.” Where is the hill of glass? that I cannot tell thee myself; but wait until my son comes, he will counsel thee what to do and whither to go. Hide under the table, and stay there so long as I do not summon thee.”
The mountains re-bellowed, the castle shook again, and Jeszibaba’s son entered the hall. “Fuj! Fuj! there’s a smell of man’s flesh, I am come to eat it!” he roared, while yet at the door, and thumped with a golden mace upon the ground, so that the whole castle quivered. “Softly, softly, my son,” said Jezibaba coaxingly, “why, it is a beautiful youth that has come and has brought thee salutations from thy brother of the castle of silver; if thou wilt do nothing to him, I will summon him at once.” “Well, if my brother has done nothing to him, I will do nothing to him either.” The prince dragged himself out from under the table and stood beside the other, and looked, compared with him, as if he had posted himself beside some lofty tower; and he shewed him the silver dumplings in proof of his really having been at the castle of silver. “Well, tell me, midget, what wouldst thou?” thundered the tremendous fellow. “If I can advise thee I will advise thee, never fear!” Then the prince recounted to him all his own long journeyings, and begged him to advise him what way to go to get to the hill of glass, and what he ought to do to obtain the three citrons. “Seest thou that globe which blackens yonder?” he said, pointing it out to him with his golden mace; “that is the hill of glass; on its summit stands a tree, and on that tree hang three citrons which scent the air all round for seven miles. Thou shalt climb on to that hill of glass, kneel under the tree and stretch out thy hands; if the citrons are destined for thee they will fall of their own accord into thy hands; but if they are not destined for thee, thou wilt not tear them off, do what thou wilt. When thou art returning, and art hungry or thirsty, cut one of these citrons in two, and thou shalt eat and drink thy fill. And now go! and God be with thee! But stay, I will not let thee go away hungry; mother! here with those dumplings!” Then old Jezibaba placed a large golden dish on the table. “There, eat!” says her son to the prince, “and if thou art not hungry now, put them in thy pocket and eat on the road.” The prince was not hungry, but put them in his pocket, observing that he would eat them on the road. After this he thanked the giant finely for his hospitality and advice, and continued his journey.
Briskly he stepped out from hill to valley, from valley to hill again, and never halted until under that very same hill of glass. Here he halted as if turned to stone. The hill was high and smooth, there were no excrescences of any sort upon it. On the summit waved and trembled the branches of the miraculous tree, and on the tree the three citrons swung to and fro, and smelt so strong that the young prince almost swooned. “Honour and praise to God! What will be, will be. Now I am once here, I can at least know my fate!” he thought to himself, and tried to scramble up by clawing at the smooth glass; but searce had he ascended a few fathoms, when he missed his footing and down he fell head over heels from the top to the bottom, so that he had not a notion where he was nor what he was, save when he found himself on the ground. In his vexation he begins to toss away the dumplings, thinking that perhaps their weight impeded him. He flings away the first, and lo! the dumpling sticks to the hill of glass; he throws away a second and a third, and sees before him three steps on which he could stand without danger. The prince was quite enchanted. He flung the dumplings before him, and everywhere steps formed out of them for him. First he flung out the leaden dumplings, then the silver ones, and finally the golden ones. Over the steps thus formed the prince strode upward, ever higher and higher, until he had reached safe and sound the very crest of the hill of glass. Here he knelt under the tree and stretched out his hands, and lo! three beautiful citrons flew down into his outstretched palms of their own accord. The tree crumbled away, the hill of glass flattened out and vanished, and when the prince came to himself again, there was neither tree nor hill—a bare plain stretched before him in all directions.
And so he again turned his steps homeward, overjoyed. He neither ate nor drank, nor saw nor heard, for very rapture. Not until the third day did his interior begin to assert its claims. He was so hungry that he would even have had recourse to the leaden dumplings if his pocket had not been empty. There he was with empty pockets, in a plain as bare as the palm of your hand! So he drew out of his pocket a citron and cut it in half; but what did not happen? Out of the citron sprang a beautiful girl, naked as your finger, bowed herself before him, and exclaimed: “What hast thou prepared me to eat? What hast thou prepared me to drink? What fine clothes hast thou prepared for me?” “I have not, oh! beautiful creature, anything to give thee to eat, nor to drink, nor to array thyself in,” said the prince, remorsefully; and the beautiful girl clapped three times with her white hands before him, bowed, and vanished.
“Aha! now I know then what sort of citrons they are! Stay, now I will not cut them open on such slight pretexts,” said the prince. From the one he had cut in half he ate and drank his fill, and thus refreshed, marched forward. But on the third day a hunger three times worse than the previous hunger overpowered him, “Praise and glory to the Lord God!” he thought to himself, “there is still one left; I will divide it.” And here he drew out the second citron, cut it in half, and lo! a still more beautiful girl than the previous one stood before him, just as God had created her. “What hast thou prepared me to eat? What hast thou prepared me to drink? What fine raiment hast thou prepared for me?” “Nothing have I prepared, fair darling! nothing,” and the beautiful girl clapped with her hands three times before him, bowed herself, and vanished.
Now he had only one citron left. He takes it in his hand and thus addresses it: “I will not cut thee in two, save in the house of my father!” And with this he hastened home. On the third day he saw again, after a long time, his native city. He himself did not the least know how he got there, save that all at once he found himself in the fortress castle of his father. Tears of joy filled his aged father’s eyes. “Welcome, my son, welcome, a hundred times!” he exclaimed, and fell about his neck. The prince related how he had fared on the journey; and those at home, how yearningly they had awaited his return.
The following day a grand feast was prepared; the nobility was invited from all sides, the tables were loaded with the choicest wines and viands in the world, and dresses were prepared, beautifully embroidered with gold and begemmed with pearls. The nobility gathered itself, sat down to table, and awaited what should happen. Then the prince drew out the remaining citron, divided it in half, and forth from the citron sprang a maiden, three times more beautiful than the previous ones: “What hast thou prepared me to eat? What hast thou prepared me to drink? What fine raiment hast thou prepared forme? “Everything, my darling, everything have I prepared,” responded the prince, and offered her the beautiful raiment. The beautiful girl arrayed herself in the beautiful raiment, and all—how they exulted in her incomparable beauty. Not long after this was the betrothing, and after the betrothals a splendid wedding.
And so at last the desire of the old king was fulfilled; he blessed his son, handed the kingdom over to him, and not long after died.
The first thing that surprised the young king, after the death of his father, was a war which neighbouring kings stirred up against him. So now he must separate for the first time from his hardlywon bride. That nothing might happen in his absence, he had a throne erected in a garden above a lake, and this garden no one could reach unless she let down a silken cord and drew him to her.
Not far from the royal fortress castle lived an old grandmother— she, in fact, who had advised the young king about the three citrons. She had for a servant a gipsy-girl, whom she sent to this lake for water. Well, she knew that the young king had got a wife, and it vexed her exceedingly that he had not invited her to the wedding, ay, that he had not even thanked her for her good advice. And so once she sent this servant girl to the lake for water. The servant goes, dips her jug, and behold in the water a beautiful form. Under the impression that it is her own reflection, she flings the vessel of water on the ground, so that it breaks into a hundred fragments. “As if thou wert worthy,” she says, “that I, such a fine girl as I am, should carry water for thee, thou old witch.” And as she so spoke she looked up, and lo! it was not her own reflection that she had seen in the water, but that of the beautiful queen. Abashed and mortified, she collected the fragments and returned home. The old grandmother, who already knew beforehand what had happened, ran out with a new vessel to meet her, and inquired of her servant, only for form’s sake, what had occurred. The servant related everything as it had happened. “Nu! that’s nothing,” says the old grandmother; “but knowest thou what? go once again to the lake and request this lady to let down the silken cord and to draw thee up that thou mayst comb her hair; and when she falls asleep, stab this pin into her head. After this, array thyself in her robes and sit there as queen.”
The gipsy-girl did not require much persuasion. She took the pin, took the water vessel, and returned to the lake. She fills, her vessel and looks round at the beautiful queen. “Ach! how fine thou art, oh! how fine thou art!” she exclaims, and peers maliciously into her eyes. “Hej!” she says, “but you would have been a hundred times more beautiful if you had let me comb your hair; verily, I would so have plaited your majesty’s golden hair that your royal husband would have been enchanted.” And she so bewildered the queen, so bewitched her, that at last she let down the silken cord and drew the gipsy up to her.
The wicked gipsy combs the golden hair, handles and plaits it, until the beautiful queen at last fairly dozes off to sleep. Then the gipsy draws out the pin and thrusts it into the head of the sleeping queen. At that moment a beautiful white dove fluttered down from the golden throne, and of the queen not a trace was left except her beautiful robes, in which the gipsy hastily arrayed herself, seated herself on the spot where the queen had sat before, and looked at herself in the lake; but in the lake no beautiful reflection appeared, for the gipsy, even in royal robes, remained a gipsy still.
The young king happily prevailed over his enemy, and made peace with him. Scarcely had he returned to the city, when he ran to the garden to look for his beloved, in case anything had happened to her. But who can describe his dismay and astonishment when, instead of his beautiful queen, he beheld the wicked gipsy. " “[1]Ah! my dear, my ever dearest, how changed I find thee!” he sighed deeply, and with streaming eyes. “Changed I am, my beloved, changed I am, for my longing for thee has sapped my strength,” said the gipsy, and tried to fall upon his neck; but the king turned away from her and quitted the garden full of angry sorrow.
From that time he had no rest nor peace, he had neither day nor night, but continually bemoaned the lost beauty of his queen, and nothing could ecomfort him.
Thus resentful and absent-minded, he once walked up and down the garden. And would you believe it? there flies down to him from a high tree a beautiful white dove, and alights upon his hand, and looks with sorrowful eyes into his sorrowful and indignant ones. “Ach! my little dove! why art thou so gloomy? Has thy mate grown ugly and repulsive to thee as my fair queen to me?” murmured the young king as he stroked her fondly over the head and neck. Only he detects on her head a sort of lump, blows the feathers apart, and lo! there is the head of a pin. Stirred by pity the king draws out the pin; at that moment the beautiful mournful dove transforms itself into his beautiful wife. She related him everything, how it happened to her and what, how the gipsy had hocussed her and had thrust the pin into her head. The king immediately ordered the gipsy and the old grandmother to be seized and burnt without any sort of trial.
From that time nothing any more disturbed his happiness; neither the strength of his enemies nor the wickedness of malicious people; and so he lived with his beautiful queen in peace and love, and ruled happily, and is ruling still if he is not yet dead.
NOTE.
This story is one of the most complete of the West Slavonia annual solar or epic fairy stories, and it will be worth while dwelling upon it a little. It is a form of the Jack in the Bean Stalk legend, which occurs over the whole northern hemisphere from Dogger Indians to England, and has travelled south in its original form pretty near as far as the Siebenbürger. Transmitted from there through Bohemia to Slovenia, the branches the shepherd-hero carries with him from plateau to plateau, became transformed into dumplings, either through a deliberate play upon words or unconsciously—most likely the former. For in Bohemian, haluze means a branch (a small one), whereas in Slovenian the word halushki means dumplings, and the word konar a branch. Most likely it was from Slovenia that the tegend penetrated to Venice, where the whole of if occurs in an abridged and more or less mutilated form under the name of The Love of the Three Oranges. The second half of the story has also become another Venetian legend called The Dead Man. There are also traces of it in a third called El Vento (The Wind). In one or two particulars the Venetian and apparently modernized forms of the legend supplement the Slovenian legend; in fact, they render it possible to lay down a more or less definite chronological plan of the story, and this in its turn leads to some very remarkable conclusions. In the Venetian story of The Love of the Three Oranges, the legend has adapted itself to town life, and would hardly be recognizable as an annual solar legend were it not for the Slovenian one. The castles have become three old men, who send the hero on from one to the other when he asks them where he is to go for the love of the three oranges. The third sends him to an enchanted Venetian palace, the ground floor of which is full of cats, dogs, and witches. He duly pacifies them, goes upstairs and finds the three oranges on the chimney-piece in the drawing room. When the third beauty springs from the cleft orange (this happens on the journey home), he leaves her in charge of a washerwoman whose swarthy daughter takes the place of the gipsy in the Slovenian story. She sticks three pins into the head of the heroine, and when they are drawn one by one from the dove’s head, first an arm and a leg, then the other arm and leg, and lastly the whole person of the heroine re-emerges. It is particularly worth noticing that in this story, and also in that of The Dead Man, the wicked character is represented in one case as swarthy, in the other as a Moorish slave. This is a strong indication that the two stories have travelled south, for it is a particularly northern idea, and is in exact contradiction to the ideas of the Venetian common people as expressed in their popular sayings, of which the following are a few:
Tera mora fa boni fruti
Tera bianca tuti bruti.—(Matrimonial proverb.)
Oci gori (castagna) fa bel vardar
Oci mori fa inamorar
Oci da gata (chiari) fa ispirita
Xe megio una mora co tuti i so ati
Che no una bianca co mile ducati.
[Those whose hair-front forms an M ( ⌒⌒ ) are good and to be trusted.] The beginning of the Venetian variant is as follows: A king has a son who never laughs. To make him laugh the king digs a hole in his garden and fills it with oil, thinking that the people who come to draw this oil may make his son laugh. The device does not succeed until the oil gets very low, and an old woman, in attempting to draw it, tumbles into the hole. Then the king’s son laughs, and the old woman threatens that he shall never be happy until he has won the love of the three oranges. Now we know for certain, from internal evidence and from comparison with other folk-lore stories, that the Slovenian version of the Three Citrons begins at the end of November or the beginning of December; the Venetian variant proves beyond doubt that the goat in George and his Goat is Capricornus and not Aries. The prince, or princess, therefore, who does not laugh, is, as regards this idiosyncrasy, the gloomy month of November; Listopad, the fall of the leaf in Slav, the month of the Novene, the commemoration of the dead; in Central Europe of small-pox and other epidemics, of Morana, goddess of pestilence, of fog and gloom everywhere, and of expiring life. Capricornus the goat, which has the faculty of sticking things together, and which makes nature laugh, is therefore the first winter frost with a bright clear sky, that occurs at the beginning of December or the end of November. And how closely the popular imagination has kept to fact in the allegory is shewn in the following. In the Basket of Flowers (Venetian) the story finishes with the making of the princess laugh, and she marries an old man, because the story finishes within the limits of the old year. In George and his Goat, on the contrary, we have the three boon companions—that is to say, besides Capricornus, Aquarius, Sagittarius and Pisces—in other words, the story is carried on to the eve of the new year, and includes the triumph of spring. The princess, therefore, is imagined as ultimately marrying the youthful hero.
The story of L’omo morto, The Dead Man (Venetian), is the second half of The Three Citrons, modified by being told as a city story.
A poor sempstress runs away to find her fortune, and comes to an empty and enchanted palace. Here she finds dinner prepared, and is served by mysterious hands. She wanders over the palace, and in one room finds a dead man, with a placard at his feet announcing that if any one will watch by him a year, three months, and a week, he will come to life and marry her. She watches a year. Towards the end of the three months she hears from the canal below the balcony (the scene, observe, has contracted to Venice), voices from a gondola announcing Moorish slaves for sale. Being weary of solitude she buys one. At the beginning of the last week, she tells this Moorish girl to watch by the dead man while she sleeps for three days. On the third day the Moorish girl is to awake her. Instead of this, the slave lets her sleep on, and thus supplants her. The dead man wakes, sees the slave-girl watching, embraces and marries her. Ultimately, as in The Three Citrons, etc., but by a different chain of circumstances, the fraud is discovered, and the slave punished by being burnt alive. The story forms, therefore, one of the large family of stories that have sprouted from the last week’s events of the primitive annual solar or epic fairy story. The Lorely legend, the Lady of Shalott, The Troll-hatten legend, The Miraculous Hair (Serbian), The Death of Dido (Virgil), Medea and the Golden Fleece, The Dead Man (Venetian), the second half of The Three Citrons, the second half of The Love of the Three Oranges (Venetian)—and no doubt there are many other variants and derivatives—have all in common the following: (1) A shining[2] maiden seated aloft (except in the Argonaut legend, where she has become a golden fleece); (2) a river, sea, or piece of water below her; (3) a dark, sinister, or adverse person, who comes from below, meddles with her hair, and thus bewitches her—except in the Lorely legend where the tables are turned.
This event occurs some time in March, when the triumph of the spring of life has been definitely assured, and the sunlight has been rescued from its imprisonment during winter in the pitch-dark underworld.
The action of this kind of epilogue is comprised within exactly seven days, or a week. Translating the allegory into general terms, it evidently is intended to represent something of the following kind. The sunlight dancing on a rock, increasing every day in power, causes vapours fo rise from the water as dusky clouds when seen against the mountain and to interfere with the sun’s rays (the golden hair). Ultimately, they obscure the sun, forming above into white cumulus clouds (transformation of the maiden into the dove). This process has continued a week, and has been accompanied by frost (struggle of the young king with his enemies). At the end of that time the frost ceases, but the sky still remains overcast, until finally the warm teeming earth disperses the white cumulus clouds, and the sun again leaps forth.
So specialized a phenomenon, particularly as to time (just seven days) seems to point to the primitive legend having been framed in some very definite and circumscribed locality, with an extremely cold upper stratum of atmosphere.
Let us now turn to the internal evidence of the Slovenian legend, which indicates pretty clearly whereabouts that region lay. And first let us take stock, so to say, of our acquired knowledge in the matter. First, from Father Know-All and L’omo morto we know that the whole period of the primitive myth was one year, three months, one week, and a brief indefinite period after it.
From Long, Broad, and Sharp-Eyes, and from George and his Goat, and other stories, we know that the three months are the three winter months presided over by Capricornus, Aquarius, and Pisces.
From George and his Goat, and from the Venetian form of The Three Citrons (L’amore delle Tre Narancie), we know that these three months were sometimes preluded by two or three of the last days of November, represented by George’s goat, Capricornus, symbolizing the first frosts after the misty weather of November. Now these three winter months count exactly ninety days, and this, be it said parenthetically, explains the prevalence of this number, which is a noteworthy feature of Siberian legends and others of high latitudes, but which disappears almost completely as the legends drift south. It may be laid down as a rule that the imagination of the people and of poets is much more matter-of-fact than learned people give it credit for, and that to produce a myth of the prodigious dimensions of the primitive annual solar fairy story we are here considering required a prodigious natural phenomenon. When the popular fancy declares that the sun disappeared into a black sea, that the hero wandered through pitchblack forests, or that there was a kingdom where the sun never shone, and that to make up for its absence the king of that country led a Sun-horse through it from one end to the other, popular fancy means what it says; it doesn’t mean that there came a bright spell of keen frosty winter weather. Let us, then, for a moment assume that the myth was hatched within the Arctic circle, on a latitude where the sun disappears below the horizon for a length of time equal to that occupied by the prince from his first encounter with the ravens to his exodus from the castle of silver. Let us also assume that the ravens represent days. Turn to the plan of the story represented graphically, and it will be seen at a glance that it is a period of 42 days of darkness—that is to say, 21 days from the 1st of December to the shortest day, and 21 days from the shortest day to the departure from the castle of silver. Now, when the prince disturbs the next flock of ravens after three days’ journeying, we should expect them to be 86 in number, but the story expressly omits to give the number, and it is easy to see why it does so; but it will become more clear when we consider the interpretation of the citrons, which can be explained by comparing them with the three hairs in Father Know-All. The general reason is that, having emerged from the definite period of darkness, the period of light is, as regards the story, unlimited. We have, then, a period of three days from the castle of silver to the castle of gold, a period when the sun was just re-appearing after its long winter sleep. Now, there was a period between the departure of the prince from his father’s castle and his first encounter with the ravens. If, in George and his Goat, Manka, Doodle and Kate represent three days, as is likely enough, they would be the last three days of November, and the law of symmetry also requires this number. We should then have just 48 days from the prince’s departure from home to his arrival at the castle of gold. Now in Father Know-All the hero arrives at a precisely similar castle of gold, and the sun returns to the castle as an old man. Therefore, when the giant returns to the castle of gold he returns at sunset, and is, in fact, the sun returning to the underworld. The three golden hairs are pulled out in a single night, the old man wakes three times and then falls asleep again. Now this part of the allegory falls in, to perfection, with the Arctic hypothesis, but cannot be satisfactorily explained in any other way whatever. Obviously, at the beginning of the sun-period in high Arctic latitudes, the sun rises for a very short time at first, and then sets again, hardly, in fact, as yet really breaking the long winter night, in allegorical language, the old man (Pushan, Bhaga (Czech, Buh, god) or Aditva), just waking and then falling asleep again. Since, then, the gathering of the three citrons obviously corresponds to the drawing out of the three hairs in Father Know-All, the period of transit from the castle of gold to the hill of glass may be neglected as probably only occupying a few hours; the three cifrons will therefore represent three Arctic winter days; to the cutting of the first orange there are three days; to the cutting of the second, three days; to the arrival home, three days—in all, twelve. From the arrival home, comprising the betrothal, marriage, and death of the old king, we may well imagine a month of thirty days to elapse, and this just accounts for the 90 days of the three winter months, thus:
Capricornus 31, Aquarius 31, Pisces 28 … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … |
= 90. |
| Prince’s journey to castle of gold 48+3 (hill of glass),+3+3+3+30 | = 90. |
The hill of glass ought not to occasion any difficulty, though learned people have racked their brains over it to little purpose. The giant of the castle of gold (recollect, it is sunset) points it out to the hero with these words: “Do you see that globe there in the distance?” That is to say, it obviously means the cap of darkness spreading over the eastern region of the sky after sunset. And seeing that the next three days are but brief and fleeting apparitions, it maintains its individuality throughout, and then, as the days go on lengthening, crumbles away, vanishes and collapses altogether. The result, therefore, of this investigation is as follows: (1) The primitive epic fairy story consisted of five parts—A prelude of a year; the three months of winter, and a week with a few days appended. (2) This fairy story was hatched on that degree of latitude within the Arctic circle where the sun remains continuously below the horizon in winter for just six weeks. (8) It was hatched in a region where some very special formations of cloud cumulus occurred during one week, and, in fact, the first week in March; probably a region where exists a wide extent of lakes and perhaps rivers.
When we reflect upon this reconstituted Arctic fairy story, we find to our amazement that it lies at the root of the three most celebrated and popular forms of our European literature—the Epic poem, the Greek and modern drama, the latter with its five acts being based upon the analysis of the Greek drama, and the three-volume novel. As to the epic poem, the Iliad and Odyssey are the two perfect types, and conform so completely to the annual solar myth as to have induced competent writers to believe them to be altogether allegorical—myths of the dawn or what not. All other modern European epics are merely imitations of them. In the drama the first act is the annual prelude, the next three develop the action, and the fifth gives the final solution—exactly as in the annual solar myth. Many of Shakespeare’s plays are indeed forms of fairy stories. We may cite for example “All’s well that ends well,” closely dramatized from Boccaccio, whose story most likely is but an elaborated European form of Kalidasa’s masterpiece, the Indian drama, “Sakuntala, or the Lost Ring,” itself obviously drawn from the annual solar myth; “The Taming of the Shrew,” also dramatized, if I mistake not, from Boccaccio, who was probably indebted to the Venetian popular fairy story, Casa Cuccagna, itself a version of the Slovenian, “The Golden Spinneress.” How appropriate, too, to lay the scene of the fairy drama, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” in Athens in the time of Theseus, to indicate what our modern learned are only just beginning to realize, that Greek myths, North and Central European fairy stories, Jewish and Christian superstitions, and Hindoo creeds and mythologies are all but parts and parcels of one aftd the same thing. The first half of “Cymbeline,” again, is taken from Boccaccio’s story of the Merchant of Genova, and this has its counterpart in various Venetian fairy stories, the closest being The Three Waiters and the Golden Apple (El pomo d’oro), which in its turn is derived from the Polish legend of the Shepherd’s Pipe. In form, again, “King Lear” is a pure and simple annual solar myth containing all the principal elements. But it is needless to insist further upon what is so obvious. In the three-volume novel—we moderns are such busy folk—the three winter months, the months of action of the Epic fairy story, have alone gone to form the new literary variant. In Blackmore’s highly artistic “Lorna Doone,” we have, however, an anti-climax, corresponding to the seven days ab the end of The Three Citrons. Probably the host of unhappy scribblers who furnish our half-educated reading public with that feeble literary pabulum, the three-volume novel, which is supposed to give a picture of modern life, is quite unconscious that the optimistic fatality which compels it to marry off its heroes and heroines at the end of the story is due to the permanent disappearance of the sun during some weeks of winter within the Arctic circle, and its re-appearance and subsequent marriage, in spring, with the re-awaking and glittering forces of life and movement that have conjured it back once more. In what is probably the greatest modern novel, however, Flaubert’s Salambô, the solar myth form has been scrupulously preserved, only that, being transplanted to the semitropic soil of North Africa, the annual solar myth has melted into its microcosm of a diurnal one, as, in fact, happens more or less wherever the original Arctic epic fairy story drifts south. We have had instances, but not very marked ones, in the case of the Venetian fairy stories. The similar case of the Vedic and Brahmin mythology is still more to the point. When the winter setting is removed, the allegory in its original form ceases to appeal to the senses of the popular audience, and little by little modifies itself to reflect more closely the new climatic conditions. Cervantes’ Don Quixote also partakes more or less of the pature of a solar myth, and most likely, upon analysis, it would be found that many of our most famous novels were modelled upon the same block, not perhaps always consciously, bub owing to the instinctive conservatism of art and literature and its loyal adherence to and reliance upon the traditions of the craft.
In conclusion, it may be noted that, as I have already pointed out, two of the most famous modern lyrics, Heine’s Lorely and Tennyson’s Lady of Shalott are merely versified forms of the seven days’ epilogue or anti-climax of the primitive story of The Three Citrons.
If the reader looks at the graphic plan of the story, and reflects a little, he will perceive that, whatever the state of the moon, when the sun disappeared on the 1st of December, the relative position of the castle of lead and the castle of silver can always be imagined as in the story and diagram. In certain cases, however, the distance between the castle of silver and that of gold would be increased. The mysterious disappearance of the sun into the underworld for a considerable period of time is sufficient to account for all the various Indian and Egyptian solar myths as well as those of Central and Northern Europe and Asia; but no other natural phenomenon is in the least degree sufficient—eclipses are too rare and intermittent, the diurnal disappearance too brief, frequent, and commonplace. When the primitive northern folk perceived that the ebb or drain underground of the life-forces in operation upon the surface of the ground, as it intensified, had gradually affected the sky also, and finally pulled the golden apple of the sun underground as well—for with their rude scientific knowledge they naturally inverted cause and effect according to our scientific way of looking at things—they must have turned to the pale image of the sun, the waxing and waning moon, as a pledge that the disappearance of the vital forces of nature was not permanent. No wonder if they associated it with those ebbing forces, and if the juices of lifg, the Soma, the water of immortality, became indissolubly connected with the waxing and waning, but yet, relatively speaking, constant moon, so that at last they came to be looked upon as almost one and the same thing.