in our second chapter, and illustrated repeatedly in the
course of this work, are received as undisputed opinions. They are
fulfilled again when the relics of these opinions, and the memories of
the mythical events believed in accordance with such opinions, are still
operative in the mind, though no longer with the vividness of primitive
times; when some of them still hold together, but for the most part they
are decaying and falling to pieces, and are only like the faded rags of
a once splendid robe which a child may gather round its puny form and
make believe for the moment that it is a king. To the genuine credulity
of the South-Sea Islander, and to the conscious make-believe of the Arab
story-teller and the peasant who repeats the modern _maerchen_, all
things are possible. But to the same peasant when relating the
traditional histories of his neighbours, and to the grave mediaeval
chronicler, only some things are possible, though many more things than
are possible to us. The slow and partial advance of knowledge destroys
some superstitions sooner, others later. Some branches of the tree of
marvel flourish with apparently unimpaired life long after others have
withered, and others again have only begun to fade. Hence, where the
adventures of Tawhaki, the mythical New Zealander, are incredible, the
legend of the origin of the Physicians of Myddfai from the Lady of the
Lake may still be gravely accepted. Gervase of Tilbury would probably
have treated the wild story of Hasan's adventures in the islands of Wak
as what it is; but he tells us he has seen and conversed with women who
had been captives to the Dracs beneath the waters of the Rhone, while a
relative of his own had married a genuine descendant of the serpent-lady
of that castle in the valley of Trets.

Accordingly, the episode of the recovery of the bride is scarcely ever
found in the sagas of modern Europe, or indeed of any nation that has
progressed beyond a certain mark in civilization. But it is common in
their _maerchen_, as well as in the sagas of more backward nations. In
the sagas of the advanced races, with rare exceptions, the most we get
is what looks like a reminiscence of the episode in the occasional
reappearance of the supernatural wife to her children, or as a Banshee.
Putting this reminiscence, if it be one, aside for the present, we will
first discuss some aspects of the bride's recovery. In doing so, though
the natural order may seem to be i