Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 2, 1891.djvu/118

110 New ground, or almost new ground, has been broken by Dr. Francesco Mango in his Sardinian Folk-tales. Twelve or fourteen folk-tales from the island of Sardinia at most had previously appeared in black and white, of which eleven were published in early volumes of the Archivio, and one is practically inaccessible to English students, having been printed in a limited edition on the occasion of Prof Guarnerio's wedding. Dr. Mango mentions also two others by Prof. Bariola, but where and when they were published he does not say. It is to us a curious custom, that of printing a tale in a dainty little pamphlet as a wedding compliment; but it is common among folk-lore students in Italy, and quite a number have thus appeared. Only a few of these have been translated by Prof. Crane in his Italian Popular Tales. He seems to have access, in that wonderful library at Harvard, to them all. Could he not be induced by the Council of the Folk-Lore Society to add to our heavy debt to him by translating the rest for the pages of ? This is by the way. The book before us consists of twentysix tales in their original dialect, followed by literal translations. Dr. Mango only names one of the peasants from whom he and his two fair assistants obtained them. The difficulties of collection, he says, were so great that he would have abandoned the enterprise but for the help and encouragement of Dr. Pitré, under whose editorship the volume appeared. The stories are obviously genuine, and they present some interesting variants of well-known themes,

A portion of Mrs. Milne-Home's little book consists of a reprint of the Ananci stories somewhat incongruously appended to Sir G. W. Dasent's Popular Tales from the Norse. The remainder is new, and comprises fourteen stories, chiefly variants of Uncle Remus' collection, where the part of Brer Rabbit is played by the Anansi. Brother Death, however, is a new character in such a company. The introduction deserves to be read for the writer's observations on the negro customs and superstitions in Jamaica,