Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/111

Rh " Then the boy took hold of the parrot, and tore off one of his CHAP, wings, and when he did so, the magician's right arm fell off. ^^

" Punchkin then stretched out his left arm, crying, * Give me my parrot' The prince pulled off the parrot's second wing, and the magician's left arm tumbled off.

" ' Give me my parrot,' cried he, and fell on his knees. The prince pulled off the parrof s right leg, the magician's right leg fell off; the prince pulled off the parrot's left leg, down fell the magician's left.

" Nothing remained of him save the limbless body and the head ; but still he rolled his eyes, and cried, ' Give me my parrot ! ' ' Take your parrot, then,' cried the boy ; and Avith that he wrung the bird's neck, and threw it at the magician, and as he did so, Punchkin twisted round, and with a fearful groan he died." ^

In its key-note and its leading incidents this story is precisely The Giam parallel to the Norse tale of the " Giant who had no Heart in his no Heart in Body." Here, as in the Deccan legend, there is a king who has ^^^ Bodj/. seven sons, but instead of all seven being sent to hunt or woo, the youngest is left at home ; and the prince whose children they marry has six daughters, not seven. This younger brother who stays at home IS the Boots of European folk-lore, a being of infinitely varied character, and a subject of the highest interest for all who wish to know whence the Aryan nations obtained the materials for their epic poems. Seemingly weak and often despised, he has keener -w-it and more resolute will than all who are opposed to him. Slander and obloquy are to him as nothing, for he knows that in the end his truth shall be made clear in the sight of all men. We see him in a thousand forms.^ He is the Herakles on whom the niean Eurystheus de-

bird, as in the Hindu tale, is won by to shiver than the sun. At midnight the youngest of the family, but it is the he is still quick with the heat of fire, princess Parizade disguised as a man which cannot be cooled even by contact who performs the exploit, ha-ing, like with the dead. Like Sigurd, he recovers Odysseus, as he approached the Seiren's the treasures in the robber's keeping, land, filled her ears with cloth. Nor and he learns to shiver only when his is the bird less mighty than the magi- bride pours over him at night a pail of cian, although he is not killed off in the water full of fish — in other words, when same way. See also Tylor, Pri7nitive Helios plunges into the sea as Endy- Culture, i. 305. mion. Elsewhere, he is not only the

' For Slavonic stories of external wanderer or vagabond, but the dis- hearts see Ralston, Russian Folk Tales, charged soldier, or the strolling player, 109; Songs of the Russian People, 165. who is really the king Thrushbeard in

' Dasent, Norse Tales, cliv. Some the German story, who tames the pride of the stories told of Boots are very sig- of the princess as Indra subdues Da- nificant. Among the most noteworthy hana ; or he is the countryman who is Grimm's story of " One who travelled cheats the Jew in the story of the to learn what shivering meant." The "Good Bargain." He is the young stupid boy in this tale shows marvellous king of Easaidh Ruadh in the Scottish strength of arm, but he is no more able story, who gets for the giant the Glaive