Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 4 1886.djvu/195

Rh O this—i.e., fellow, O such an one, ya majnūn, O mad (one, adjective used as noun), ya mārid, O insolent (one), &c.; and it may not unfairly be conjectured that Mr. Falconer has, with the lack of literary tact so common in Orientalists, substituted or added the incongruous word "man" of his own motion. It may be that in this we unjustly suspect him; but an extensive experience of the "tricks and manners" of translators from Oriental languages affords no little warrant for the suspicion. However, whether he be or be not to blame for some of the discrepancies above referred to, they are too numerous and too salient to be thus accounted for as a whole, and there is abundant internal evidence that the great majority of them are attributable to the author of the original work. Notwithstanding this general divergence from the European form, the Æsopic fable is not altogether absent from the collection. A certain number of regular specimens are be found scattered throughout the text, especially in the first and chief story, that from which the book takes its name, and which contains a number of short fables (e.g., The Fox and the Tabret, p. 14, The Raven and the Jackal, p. 23, The Crabs and the Heron, p. 24, The Lion and the Hare, p. 26, The Three Fishes, p. 31, The Flea and the Louse, p. 34, The Lion and the Camel, p. 43, The Sandpipers and the Sea, p. 48, The Apes and the Glowworm, p. 55), all formed after the pure Æsopic model, and introduced in illustration and support of various arguments and moral instances advanced by the beast-personages of the story; and occasional examples (e.g., The Wolf and the Bow, p. 117), are to be found in the other stories of the collection. The Stury of the Ringdove (p. 109) may also be noted in this connection for its partial correspondence with Æsop's fable of The Lion and the Mouse, and also for its general likeness to the stories of the Birds and Beasts and the Son of Adam, The Waterfowl and the Tortoise, and The Fox and the Crow, in the Arabian Nights See, also, p. xxv. of the Introduction for a curious version, ending with a characteristic Indian trait, of the story of the mice's proposal to bell the cat. A feature of special interest to the students of folk-lore is the occurrence of stories that are either closely related to or evidently the original forms of well-known European folk-tales. The follow-