Page:The Science of Fairy Tales.djvu/250

 where we must find their mates, the corresponding goddesses. We have already had glimpses of them in Morgan the Fay, in the Emperor Frederick's lady-housekeeper (ausgeberin) and in the maid who in another saga attended on his bidding. The lady-housekeeper is expressly called in one story Dame Holle. Now Dame Holle herself is the leader of a Furious Host, or Wild Hunt, and has been identified by Grimm beyond any doubt as a pagan goddess, like Berchta.

Let us take another story in which the female companion of the enchanted hero appears. Near the town of Garz, on the island of Rügen, lies a lake by which a castle formerly stood. It belonged to an old heathen king, whose avarice heaped up great store of gold and jewels in the vaults beneath. It was taken and destroyed by the Christians, and its owner was transformed into a great black dog ever watching his treasure. Sometimes he is still seen in human form with helm, or golden crown, and coat of mail, riding a grey horse over the city and the lake; sometimes he is met with by night in the forest, wearing a black fur cap and carrying a white staff. It is possible to disenchant him, but only if a pure virgin, on St. John's night between twelve and one o'clock, will venture, naked and alone, to climb the castle wall and wander backwards to and fro amid the ruins, until she light upon the spot where the stairway of the tower leads down into the treasure chamber. Slipping down, she will then be able to take as much gold and jewels as she can carry, and what she cannot herself carry the old king will bring after her, so that she will be rich for the rest of her life. But she must return by sunrise, and she must not once look behind her, nor speak a single word, else not only will she fail, but she will perish miserably. A princess who was accused of unchastity obtained her father's permission to try this adventure, in order to prove the falsehood of the charge against her. She safely gained the vault, which was illuminated with a thousand