Page:The folk-tales of the Magyars.djvu/402

 326 the Russian story "Marya-Morevna" (Ralston, p. 85); and, in seeking for the sisters, the Magyar incidents come in. The story continues to tell of the youngest son's entering the forbidden chamber, and letting loose a man, True-steel, who was confined there (cf. Payne's Arabian Nights, vol. i. p. 141, "Story of the Third Calender"), who runs away with his wife. His labours to regain her occupy the rest of the tale. True-steel is killed in the end, by the secret of his strength being destroyed, as in "Punchkin."

The tying up of Midnight and Dawn is a piece of primitive science that in one shape or other is to be found in many stories. Cf. Lapp stories, where "Evening Red," and the "Sun's Sister" are girls; Friis, No. 44; and in No. 45 Ashiepattle goes for a golden lasso, and has to go till the sunlight ceases; and then till the moonlight ceases; and then till starlight ceases. When he arrives in the regions of darkness he finds the golden lasso. The tale appears to be imperfect, and no use is made of the lasso. Guns and cannons appear beyond the land of the moonlight!

The Finnish "Leppäpölkky' tells how Alder Block goes to a castle, and is told "that a wicked one cursed the sunlight, and so a snake with nine heads has taken it; and when the snake goes to the sea, he takes the sun with him. When he is in the country it is day, when he is in the sea it is night. A wicked one has cursed the moonshine, and a snake with six heads has taken the moonshine. When he is on the land, it is light; but when he is in the sea, it is dark. The wicked one has also cursed the dawn, because it began to shine too soon, and he could not sleep; so the snake with three heads has taken the dawn. When he is on the land we have dawn, but when he is at sea we have no dawn." The heroes in turn destroy the snakes; and dawn, the moon, and the sun escape; and as each shines over the land, the people pray for blessings on the man's head, who has delivered the dawn, moon, and sun. This appears to be pretty clearly an attempt of early man to describe natural phenomena. The story goes on to tell how the king offered his daughters to the heroes, but they declined them, only asking for a little corn.

There is a most interesting myth of Dawn and Twilight, well worthy of notice, in the Esthonian "Koit ja Ämarik" (Dawn and