he
deepest degradation, and ends on the highest summit of glory. There is
a special interest in this story. The reader will not have failed to
notice the similarity of Assipattle with Cinderella. In both stories
the circumstances are the same, only the Ash-lad has been replaced by
the Cinder-girl. There is no doubt which version is the older:[245]
the one is the maternal form, the other the patriarchal.

[245] In this connection, see K. Pearson in the essay already
quoted, p. 85 _et seq._

The setting of these stories should be noticed. We see the simplicity
of the habits and life so vividly represented. All folk-legends deal
with country people living near to nature. So similar, indeed, are the
customs depicted throughout that these folk-records might well be
taken as a picture of the social organisation among many barbarous
tribes. I should like to wait to point out these resemblances, such,
for instance, as the tendency to personify natural objects, the
identification of human beings with animals and trees, found so often
in the stories, as well as many other things--the belief in magic and
the power of wise women. And what I want to make clear is the very
early beginning of these folk-tales; they take us back to the social
institutions of the mother-age. Thus there is nothing surprising to
find that kingdoms and riches are won by hero-lovers, and that
daughters carry the inheritance. This is really what used to happen.
It is our individual ideas and patriarchal customs that make these
things seem so strange.

I wish I had space in which to follow further these still-speaking
relics of a past, whose interest offers such rich reward. In his essay
"Ashiepattle, or Hans seeks his Luck" (_The Chances of Death_, Vol.
II, pp. 51-91), Prof. Karl Pearson has fully and beautifully shown the
evidence for mother-right to be found in these stories. To this essay
the reader, who still is in doubt, is referred. All that has been
possible to me is to suggest an inquiry that any one can pursue for
himself. It is the difficulty of treating so wide and fascinating a
subject in briefest outline that so many things that should be noticed
have to be passed over.

The witness afforded by these folk-stories for mother-right cannot be
neglected. For what interpretation are we to place on the curious
facts they record? Are we to regard this maternal marriage with
descent through the daughter, and not the son, as idle inventions