Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 1, 1890.djvu/283

Rh forelock by keeping a black cat in front. The other night, when I went to the Haymarket to see how A Man’s Shadow stood a second visit, the black cat came and sat down beside me. Such an admirable cat is the Haymarket pussy that it took its place so unobtrusively that I did not notice its presence till an attendant came and said, ‘I think we’ll take the cat away.’ Then I discovered the harbinger of fortune sitting at my elbow. Needless to say that after such an incident I was fortunate enough to enjoy A Man’s Shadow quite as much as on a first visit.” (2) From the Glasgow Evening Citizen, January 6, 1890 (but probably quoted from a theatrical paper), regarding the pantomime at Drury Lane: “Some surprise has been expressed at the appearance of Juno in the Olympian procession at Drury Lane Theatre without anything in her dress to associate her with the peacock, the bird dedicated to ‘the Queen of Heaven’. The omission is not accidental, but designed, theatrical people having a superstitious aversion to the peacock in any form appearing on the stage. Mr. Harris was spoken to on the subject, but declined to interfere with a cherished superstition.”

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Rabbinic Parallel to a Story of Grimm.—In preparing my edition of the Great Midrash on the Pentateuch, the largest collection of Jewish legendary lore in existence, I came across the following, which my friend Mr. Jacobs thinks would be of interest to students of folk-lore. I may add that all the MSS. of the Midrash Haggado come from Yemen in Arabia, where an isolated colony of Jews has existed since the beginning of the Christian era. The collection is probably not later than the fourteenth century, but it is impossible to state how much earlier the particular passage may be. So far as I know, no parallel exists in any other part of Rabbinic literature.

.–A Gentile and a Jew were walking along a road. Then the Gentile said to the Jew, “My religion is better than thine.” Now the Jew said, “It is not true; my religion is better than thine, for it is written, Deut. iv, 8.” Then said the Gentile, “Let us ask; if they say my religion is better I will take all your money; if they say thine, you will take mine.” Then said the Jew to him, “’Tis well; I accept the wager.” Now they continued their walk, and Satan came in the shape of an old man. They asked him whose religion is the better, and he said the Gentile’s. Afterwards they continued their walk, and the same Satan took the shape of a young man, and they asked him again, and he gave the same answer. Thereupon the Gentile took away the whole money of the Jew. The Jew departed in great trouble, and he passed the night in a ruin. Now, when there came the third part of the night he heard three persons talking.