Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/77

 Notes and Queries. 69

when the other man see her do that he jest hollered, " Make a big fire, an that '11 kill her sure." So they made a big fire right quick, and that killed her.

And the man's wife had been dead a long while ; he did n't know it, but she got killed being thrown from a hoss.

Told to Fanny D. Bergen by a young colored girl at C/iestertown, Md.

Folk-Tale of the Pansy. — That charming

"little western flower Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound,"

called by maidens " love-in-idleness," but also known as " heart's-ease " and "Johnny-jump-up " (the Viola tricolor of botanists), has given rise to many pleasing folk-tales. One used in Germany to illustrate an episode of family life has found its way across the Atlantic, and has been told me in the following manner : My friend first pointed out that the perfect flower con- sists principally of three parti-colored brilliant petals and two plainer ones, together with a small central pistil partly concealed by the showy corolla, and that beneath the five colored petals there are four green sepals. The family episode herein symbolized concerns a man with his two daughters, his second wife and her two daughters, and deals with the selfishness of the stepmother. Holding the pansy so that the three handsome gold and purple petals are below the two plain ones, the story-teller proceeds thus : —

Once upon a time there lived in the Thuringian forest a family consist- ing of a man (show the pistil), his two daughters (show the two plain pet- als), his wife and her two daughters (show the three gaudy petals). The father of the family was of a retiring disposition (show that the pistil is quite hidden by the corolla), while the ladies of the household were more showy and conspicuous ; the stepmother, being proud and selfish, arrayed herself and her own daughters in gorgeous gold and purple gowns (show the three brilliant petals), while she gave her step-children cheaper and simpler garments (show the two plainer petals). And besides this, the lady was so unkind as to secure for herself and her own children a stool apiece for each to sit on (here remove each of the parti-colored petals, and point out that each rests upon a green sepal beneath), whereas her two step-children had but a single stool between them (show that the two plain petals rest upon one green sepal). Remove the corolla and proceed : Having taken away the ladies who overshadowed the head of the family, the latter (the pistil) becomes visible, with his little round head and bright red necktie, and there he sits in silent retirement with his feet in a tub of hot water.

H. Carrington Bolton.

Ropes of Sand ; Asses ; and the Danaides. — The occurrence of a sin- gle incident in ancient Egyptian custom, on Greek and Roman monuments, in an Arabian story, and in English folk-lore provokes suspicion that some one idea worth finding out may lie behind the scattered facts. Such an

�� �