Page:Popular Tales of the Germans (Volume 1).djvu/219

 flowers, and are ubject to the vulgar fate of the daughters of Eve.

‘However marvellous it may eem to you, ir knight, it is nevertheles true, that the pedigree of the beautiful Zoe acends as high as Leda’s eggs. As the mot certain proof of this, he becomes a wan once every year, or, as he exprees it, puts on her wan’s dres; for Leda’s daughters do not, like thoe of common mortals, make their entry into the world tark naked, but have their delicate bodies cloathed in an aerial garment, formed of condened light, which expands in proportion to their growth, and not only poees all the properties of the puret phlogiton, o as to overcome the weight of gros earthy matter, and elevate it rapidly to the clouds, but alo changes the wearer into a wan, as oon as he puts it on. The annual flight to the bath of beauty takes nine days; and when it is not prevented or omitted, it confers on female vanity Rh