ions, tales or anecdotes that circulate among the people and are
the work of the popular invention, which sometimes creates and at others
imitates, if it does not plagiarize, trying when it imitates to give to
the imitation the form of the original. Some of the writers or
collectors abroad, and especially in Germany, who have devoted
themselves to a similar task, have followed a method different from
mine; since, like the Brothers Grimm, they reproduce the popular tales
almost as they have collected them from the lips of the people. This
system is not to my taste, because almost all popular tales, although
they have a precious base, have an absurd form, and in order to enter
worthily into the products of the literary art they need to be perfected
by art, and have a moral or philosophical end, which nothing in the
sphere of art should be without."

The subjects of some of these stories are well known out of Spain. "St.
Peter's Doubts" (_Las Dudas de San Pedro_) is as old as the _Gesta
Romanorum_ (cap. 80), and is familiar to English readers from Parnell's
_Hermit_. Another, "A Century in a Moment" (_Un Siglo en un Momento_),
is the story of the woman allowed after death to come back to the earth
and see her lover, whom she finds faithless. Still another,
_Tragaldabas_, is familiar to the readers of Grimm's _Household Tales_,
where it figures as "Godfather Death."

The volume of _Popular Tales_ contains nineteen stories of the most
varying description. Some are popular in the broadest sense, as "The
Three Counsels" (_Los Consejos_), in which a soldier whose time of
service has expired buys from his captain with his pay three pieces of
advice: Always take the short cut on a road, Do not inquire into what
does not concern you, and Do nothing without reflection. The soldier on
his way home has occasion to put in practice all three counsels, and
thereby saves his life and property. Others, are legendary, as _Ofero_,
the legend of St. Christopher, and _Casilda_, the story of the Moorish
king's daughter converted to the Christian religion by a physician from
Judea, who proves to be Our Lord. One, "The Wife of the Architect" (_La
Mujer del Arquitecto_), is a local tradition of Toledo, and another,
"The Prince without a Memory" (_El Principe Desmemoriado_), is taken
from Gracian Dantisco's _Galateo Espanol_.

We may say of this collection, as of the last, that, although the
stories show much humor and skill, they are not among