Page:Poetry of the Magyars.djvu/102

lxxx the hour―aye, by the night long—without wearying their hearers. These are for the most part to be found among soldiers and peasants. The stories which in other lands are preserved only in work-rooms and nurseries to our days, are narrated in Hungary in the porch, by watch and shepherd fires, and amidst the night labors of the field. The character of the Magyar tale is wholly unlike that of southern lands. The hero is generally a student, a soldier, or a king's son; his companion, a magic horse called Tatós, who is his counsellor and saviour. His enemy is often a dragon with six, nine, or twelve heads, and the hero must undergo three ordeals; and this number is the ruling one throughout the story. There is a sharpness and oddity about the conception, and an original development of the plot. The scenery, and the deeds of the principal actors, shew that the stories emanate from a people who lived in elevated places. The narrator sometimes unites two or three stories in one — sometimes divides one into many—elaborates or changes it according to his own caprice or the demands of his audience.—It has happened that many tales of foreign origin have been introduced, which have been all nationalized by time. I remember to have heard a celebrated story-telling woman in