y
more barbarous in several respects than that yielded by the islanders of
the Southern Ocean; but the latter bears testimony to a state of society
more archaic than the other. Presumably, therefore, it represents more
nearly the primitive form of the story.

We turn next to the central incidents. In the previous chapter I have
taken pains to show the unmistakable relation between the different
types of the myth, in spite of the omission of the feather-robe, or
indeed of any substitute for it. The truth is that the feather-robe is
no more than a symbol of the wife's superhuman nature. From the more
archaic variants it is absent; but frequently the true form of the lady
is held to be that of a member of what we contemptuously call "the brute
creation." Men in savagery, as we have already seen, have quite
different feelings from those of contempt for brutes. On the contrary,
they entertain the highest respect and even awe for them. They trace
their descent from some of them; and a change of form from beast to man,
or from man to beast, while still preserving individual identity, would
not seem at all incredible, or even odd, to them. By and by, however,
the number of creatures having these astonishing powers would decrease,
as the circle of experience widened. But there would linger a belief in
remarkable instances, as at Shan-si, in China, where it is believed that
there is still a bird which can divest itself of its feathers and become
a woman. Not every swan would then be deemed capable of turning when it
pleased into a fair maiden; and when this change happened, it would be
attributed to enchantment, which had caused the maiden merely to assume
the appearance of a swan for a time and for a special purpose. This
often occurs, as we have seen, in _maerchen_, where the contrast between
the heroine and her father, or, as it is then often put, her master, is
very strong. It occurs, too, in tales belonging to other types. A
_maerchen_ told by Dr. Pitre relates that a man had a pet magpie, which
by enchantment had the power of casting its wings and becoming a woman.
She always practised this power in his absence; but he came home one day
and found her wings on the chair. He burnt them, and she remained
permanently a woman and married him. In a saga from Guiana a warlock's
daughter persuades her father to transform her into a dog that she may
venture near a hunter whom she loves. He accordingly gives her a skin,
which she dra