Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 20, 1909.djvu/416

 362 Reviews.

of the Huth MS., — (the last only preserved in certain French fragments, and in the Spanish and Portuguese translations). In the two latter, the adventures of Galahad are of a far more chivalric and conventional character than are those attributed to him in the better known version. Was it this more secular form with which the writer of these tales was acquainted ? If this were the case, it would be interesting, as so far we have no trace of an insular survival of this version.

In any case Arthur and his knights are here names, and nothing more, and the setting is of no critical interest.

But was it the original setting ? Taking the stories as a whole, they impress me as being either a somewhat unintelligent adapta- tion of an older and better version, or imitations of such older stories by a writer of inferior talent. For example, the story of the transformation of the Crop-Eared Dog recalls the tales of The Children of Llyr^ and Morraha, but it is immeasurably inferior to both. The title of the hero of the second story, and certain of his feats, suggests the possibility that we are here dealing with a rationalized form of such a tale as that of Yonec, — did Eagle-boy really leap to the window of the prison tower by aid of " the staves of his spears, and the poles of his javelins"? (N.B. — Does not the javelin here represent the gaverlot, i.e. a smal/ hand-thrown dart ?) Or did he not originally enter the maiden's prison chamber in the form of a bird whose name he bears ? An opinion based on a translation in absence of any knowledge of the original language can only be tentative, but the tales do not impress me as original, either in incident or in character. Certainly they must have been redacted, if not composed, at a period when the Arthurian story was in its final stage of development. There are certainly earlier features to be detected, — e.g. the general inca. pacity which overtakes Arthur's warriors in the presence of the enemy in the first story, and the fact of Arthur's refusal to eat, at any high feast, previous to the occurrence of some startling adventure, in the second ; but in the first instance Irish tradition preserves the same feature, and in the second it is most unskil- fully employed. Arthur always awaits events in his banqueting hall, in the presence of his feasting knights, — (the tabu does not apply to them), — and not on the moorland. Again, Arthur's