Page:Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian traditionary tales.djvu/415

Rh 14. Indien, p. 17.

15. Examen Critique, p. 347.

16. But only committed to memory. See supra, p. 333.

17. Burnouf, ''Introduction à l'Hist. du Buddh.'', vol i.

18. Concerning the late introduction of this idea, see supra, pp. 337–8.

19. Indische Alterthumskunde, i. 839.

20. Lassen, iii., p. 44.

21. Mommsen (History of Rome, book iv., ch. viii.), writing of Mithridates Eupator, who died within a few years of the date ascribed to Vikramâditja's birth, says, "Although our accounts regarding him are, in substance, traceable to wTitten records of contemporaries, yet the legendary tradition, which is generated with lightning expedition in the East, early adorned the mighty king with many superhuman traits. These traits, however, belong to his character just as the crown of clouds belongs to the character of the highest mountain peaks; the outline of the figure appears in both cases, only more coloured and fantastic, not disturbed or essentially altered."

22. The legend from which the following is gathered has been given by Wilford, in a paper entitled "Vikramâditja and Salivâhâna, their respective eras."

23. See Lassen, Indische Alterthumskunde, ii. 49–56.

24. Wilson, in Mackenzie Collection, p. 343.

25. A vetâla is a kind of sprite, not always bad-natured, usually carrying on a kind of weird existence in burial-places. "They can possess themselves of the forms of those who die by the hand of justice, and assume them. By the power of magic men can make them obedient, and use them for all manner of difficult tasks above their own strength and sufficiency." Brockhaus' Report of the R. Saxon Scientific Soc. Philologico-historical Class, 1863, p. 181. "The Vetâlas were a late introduction among the gods of popular veneration." (Lassen, iv. 570.) "They came also to be regarded as incarnations of both Vishnu and Shiva." (Lassen, iv. 159.)

26. Two interesting instances of the way in which traditionary legends become attached to various persons as they float along the current of time, have been brought to my notice while preparing these sheets for the press. I cannot now recall where I picked up the story of "The Balladmaker and the Bootmaker," which I have given in "Patrañas," but I am sure it was told of a wandering minstrel, and as occurring on Spanish soil, as I have given it. I have since met it in "The Hundred Novels" of Sacchetti (written little after the time of Boccacio) as an