Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/14

X races, among the Celts, and among the Teutons. And, which is still more remarkable, when we study and compare the popular tales in these different races, we find that so great numbers of them are exactly the same in each, are identical with each other throughout, that we are led almost unconsciously to the conclusion that these races in which they are thus found are all derived from one original source, whence they received their popular tales; in fact, these tales form almost a stronger proof of the relationship of races than language itself. In this point of view the study of them becomes more and more interesting.

These tales, among the people who possessed them, would naturally form the domestic entertainment of the family in its home; and we can easily understand how, when what we call a literature came into existence, they would be brought together into collections, under