ess "within a year,
a month, and a day." The youngest comes in turn to the same country,
wagers his head, and searches a year and fifteen days in vain. On the
advice of an old woman, he has built a golden acula (just what this
word means I have been unable to determine) large enough to contain
a person playing a musical instrument. Four men carry the acula to
the palace; discovery of the princess follows. Second test: to pick
the princess out from twenty-four maidens dressed exactly alike.

In none of these three stories (nor in Pitre, No. 96, which is a
shorter variant of No. 95) does the opening resemble our forms of the
tale. Nor in any of the three, either, does the hero bring the wager
on himself because of the announcement he makes that he who has gold
can discover anything. With this detail, however, compare the couplet
which the hero displays in Pitre, No. 96:--

"Cu' havi dinari fa chiddu chi voli,
Cu' havi bon cavallu va unni voli."

The line "He who has gold can do whatever he wishes" is almost
identical with the corresponding line in the Tagalog verse story.

It is to be noted that the bride-wager incident in this group of
stories resembles closely the same episode in our No. 19. The opening
of our No. 21 has been influenced by the setting of the stories of
the Carancal group (No. 3).

TALE 22

THE REWARD OF KINDNESS.

Narrated by Elisa Cordero, a Tagalog from Pagsanjan, La Laguna,
who heard the story from a Tagalog friend.

In a certain town there once lived a couple who had never had a
child. They had been married for nearly five years, and were very
anxious for a son. The name of the wife was Clara; and of the man,
Philip.

One cloudy night in December, while they were talking by the window
of their house, Clara said to her husband that she was going to pray
the novena, [70] so that Heaven would give them a child. "I would
even let my son serve the Devil, if he would but give us a son!" As
her husband was willing that she should pray the novena, Clara began
the next day her fervent devotions to the Virgin Mary. She went to
church every afternoon for nine days. She carried a small prayer-book
with her, and prayed until six o'clock every evening. At last she
finished her novenario; [71] but no child was born to them, and the
couple was disappointed.

A month had passed, when, to their great happiness, Clara gave birth to
a son. The child they nicknamed Ido. Ido was