any, or Magazine, in the form of the small Elzevir collection,
called _Recueil de pieces curieuses et nouvelles, tant en prose qu'en
vers_. Perrault had already published _Les Souhaits Ridicules_, in a
Society paper, Le Mercure Galant (Nov. 1693). He now reprinted this
piece, with _Griselidis_ and _Peau d'Ane_, in Moetjens' _Recueil_[11].
These versified tales caused some discussion, and were rather severely
handled by anonymous writers in the _Recueil_. In 1694, Perrault put
forth the three, with the introductions and essay, in a small volume.
Probably each tale had appeared separately, but these treasures of the
book-hunter are lost. Another edition came out, with a new preface, in
1695[12].

This is the early bibliographical history, as far as it has been traced
by M. Andre Lefevre, of the stories in verse. They received a good deal
of unfriendly criticism, and Perrault was said, in _Peau d'Ane_, to have
presented the public with his own natural covering. This witticism,
rather lacking in finish, is attributed to Boileau in an epigram
published in Moetjens' _Recueil_. Boileau was still irritated with
Perrault for his conduct in the great Battle of the Books between the
Ancients and Moderns. By a curious revenge Perrault, who had blamed
Homer for telling, in the Odyssey, old wives' fables, has found, in old
wives' fables, his own immortality. In the _Parallele_, iii. p. 117, the
Abbe quotes Longinus, and his admiration of certain hyperboles in Homer.
The Chevalier, another speaker in the dialogue, replies, 'this sort of
Homeric hyperbole is only imitated by people who tell stories like _Peau
d'Ane_, and introduce Ogres in seven-leagued boots (_bottes a sept
lieues_).' The 'seven-leagued boots' are in the Chevalier's fancy an apt
parallel to the prodigious bounds made by the horses of Discord, in the
Iliad. Thus, even before Perrault began to write fairy tales, he and
Boileau had a very pretty quarrel about _Peau d'Ane_. Boileau happened
to remember that Zoilus of old had reviled Homer for his _contes de
Vieilles_, and thus he could conscientiously treat Perrault as a new
Zoilus. In the fifth volume of his works (Paris, 1772), in which these
amenities are republished, there is a Vignette by Van der Meer
representing Homer, very old and timid, cowering behind a shield which
Boileau, like Ajax, holds up for his protection, while Perrault, in a
sword and cocked hat, throws arrows at the blind bard of Chios. The
strange th