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 Hasan is much later. Besides this, the accumulation of adventures, which are not very closely knit together, implies that the author of Hasan was acquainted with earlier tales of the same type. It is useless, therefore, in my opinion, to attempt to trace in Hasan any direct influence of those primitive conceptions which Mr. Hartland brings in for the illustration of the tale. They may be primitive in origin, but as used in Hasan they are simply conventions of Arabic story-telling, and by no means imply existence of the matriarchate, or the marriage of capture, among the Arabs. On the other hand, it is possible that some of the incidents may be, directly or indirectly, derived from sailors' yarns of countries where these primitive customs still prevail. Burton's notes give us very many curious parallels from the Arabic geographers, which could be increased from a source nearer home (Mandeville's Travels). It is simpler to account for the reference to these curious customs in Hasan by misunderstandings of travelers' accounts from savage lands than to assume that the story itself had lasted on among Arabic-speaking peoples from the time when they themselves were savages.

ERIC THE FAR-TRAVELER

Source.—The frame-work has been derived from a translation of "Erek's Saga Vidforla," kindly translated by the Rev. J. Sephton from the third vol. of the Fornaldur Sögur, where it is printed from a vellum written about 1350. I have added the "Voyage of Thorkill," from Saxo Grammaticus (Mr. Elton's translation, pp. 344-256), but have had to re- write, owing to the excessive Latinity of Saxo.

Parallels.—There is a much more elaborate account of the voyage of Eric in Saxo's fifth book (Mr. Elton's translation, pp. 156-99), which as Professor York Powell points out in the introduction to Saxo (p. Ixxvii.), is to a large extent a variant of the "Voyage of Thorkill"; for that