as her husband, for he lay in the cemetery embracing her ashes,
which was an act of deep affection."
A modern link is the Georgian folk-tale of "The King and the Apple"
(Wardrop, No. XVI), in which the king's magic apple tells three
riddle-stories to the wonderful boy:--
(1) A woman is travelling with her husband and brother. The party
meets brigands, and the two men are decapitated. Their heads are
restored to them by the woman through the help of a magic herb
revealed to her by a mouse. However, she gets her husband's head on
her brother's body. Q.--Which man is the right husband? A.--The one
with the husband's head.
(2) A joiner, a tailor, and a priest are travelling. When night comes,
they appoint three watches. The joiner, for amusement, cuts down a
tree and carves out a man. The tailor, in his turn, takes off his
clothes and dresses the figure. The priest, when his turn comes,
prays for a soul for the image, and the figure becomes alive. Q.-Who
made the man? A.--He who gave him the soul.
(3) A diviner, a physician, and a swift runner are met together. The
diviner says, "There is a certain prince ill with such and such
a disease." The physician says, "I know a cure." The swift runner
says, "I will run with it." The physician prepares the medicine,
the runner runs with it, and the prince is cured. Q.--Who cured the
king's son? A.--He who made the medicine.
These three stories, with their framework, appear to be descended in
part from the Ardschi-Bordschi saga. A connection between the third
and our type II is obvious.
A Bohemian form of this type is No. 4 of Wratislaw's collection.
(II) Type II, according to Benfey, also originated in India. The
oldest known form of the story is the "Vetalapancavincati," No. 5. A
brief summary of Somadeva's version, "The Story of Somaprabha and
her Three Suitors" (Tawney, 2 : 258-260), may be given here:--
In Ujjayini there lived a Brahman who had an excellent son and a
beautiful proud daughter. When the time for her to be married came,
she told her mother to give the following message to her father and
her brother: "I am to be given in marriage only to a person possessed
of heroism, knowledge, or magic power."
A noble Brahman (No. 1) in time came to the father and asked for
his daughter's hand. When told of the conditions, he said, "I am
possessed of magic power," and to demonstrate, he made a chariot and
took the father for a ride in the clouds. Then Harisvam
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