his pen, and possibly not ignorant of Arabic, the
language
of
his enemies.
his enemies.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v18 - Mom to Old
In his lecture
on Missions delivered in Westminster Abbey, December 3d, 1873, he
says:-
•
"There is one kind of faith that revels in words, there is another that can
hardly find utterance: the former is like riches that come to us by inherit-
ance, the latter is like the daily bread which each of us has to win by the
sweat of his brow. The former we cannot expect from new converts; we
ought not to expect it or exact it, for fear it might lead to hypocrisy and
superstition. .
We want less of creeds but more of trust, less of cere-
mony but more of work, less of solemnity but more of genial honesty, less of
doctrine but more of love. There is a faith as small as a grain of mustard
seed; but that grain alone can remove mountains, and more than that, it can
move hearts. »
Theories are forgotten, and sciences are outgrown; but to have
been the inspiring leader of many in the onward march of knowl-
edge, and to have achieved a serene and rounded character, go far
to amply crown any life.
## p. 10429 (#257) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10429
"Denn wer den Besten seiner Zeit genug
Gethan, der hat gelebt für alle Zeiten. »
"That which lived
True life, lives on. "
But to have added to this that which should accompany old age,—
"honor, love, and troops of friends," -fills the cup of the most am-
bitious scholar, and leaves little in this world to be desired.
Nauyet Minima
ON THE MIGRATION OF FABLES
From Chips from a German Workshop›
con
"C
OUNT not your chickens before they be hatched," is a well-
known proverb in English; and most people, if asked
what was its origin, would probably appeal to La Fon-
taine's delightful fable, 'La Laitière et le Pot au Lait. ' We all
know Perrette, lightly stepping along from her village to the town,
and in her day-dreams selling her milk for a good sum, then
buying a hundred eggs, then selling the chickens, then buying
a pig, fattening it, selling it again, and buying a cow with a
calf. The calf frolics about, and kicks up his legs-so does Per-
rette; and alas! the pail falls down, the milk is spilt, her riches
gone, and she only hopes when she comes home that she may
escape a flogging from her husband.
Did La Fontaine invent this fable? or did he merely follow
the example of Sokrates, who, as we know from the 'Phædon,'
occupied himself in prison, during the last days of his life, with
turning into verse some of the fables - or as he calls them, the
myths of Æsop.
La Fontaine published the first six books of his fables in
1668; and it is well known that the subjects of most of these
fables were taken from Æsop, Phædrus, Horace, and other clas-
sical fabulists, -if we may adopt this word "fabuliste," which La
Fontaine was the first to introduce into French.
## p. 10430 (#258) ##########################################
10430
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
In 1678 a second of these six books was published, enriched
by five books of new fables; and in 1694 a new edition appeared,
containing one additional book, thus completing the collection of
his charming poems.
The fable of Perrette stands in the seventh book; and was
published, therefore, for the first time in the edition of 1678. In
the preface to that edition, La Fontaine says: "It is not neces-
sary that I should say whence I have taken the subjects of these
new fables. I shall only say, from a sense of gratitude, that I
owe the largest portion of them to Pilpay, the Indian sage. "
If then La Fontaine tells us himself that he borrowed the
subjects of most of his new fables from Pilpay, the Indian sage,
we have clearly a right to look to India in order to see whether,
in the ancient literature of that country, any traces can be dis-
covered of Perrette with the milk-pail.
Sanskrit literature is very rich in fables and stories; no other
literature can vie with it in that respect; nay, it is extremely
likely that fables, in particular animal fables, had their principal
source in India. In the sacred literature of the Buddhists, fables
held a most prominent place. The Buddhist preachers, address-
ing themselves chiefly to the people, to the untaught, the un-
cared-for, the outcast, spoke to them as we still speak to children,
in fables and parables. Many of these fables and parables must
have existed before the rise of the Buddhist religion; others, no
doubt, were added on the spur of the moment, just as Sokrates
would invent a myth or fable whenever that form of argument
seemed to him most likely to impress and convince his hearers.
But Buddhism gave a new and permanent sanction to this whole
branch of moral mythology; and in the sacred canon, as it was
settled in the third century before Christ, many a fable received,
and holds to the present day, its recognized place. After the
fall of Buddhism in India, and even during its decline, the Brah-
mans claimed the inheritance of their enemies, and used their pop-
ular fables for educational purposes. The best known of these
collections of fables in Sanskrit is the 'Pañkatantra,' literally the
Pentateuch or Pentamerone. From it and from other sources
another collection was made, well known to all Sanskrit scholars
by the name of 'Hitopadesa'; i. e. , Salutary Advice. Both these
books have been published in England and Germany, and there
are translations of them in English, German, French, and other
languages.
## p. 10431 (#259) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10431
The first question which we have to answer refers to the
date of these collections; and dates in the history of Sanskrit
literature are always difficult points. Fortunately, as we shall
see, we can in this case fix the date of the 'Pañkatantra' at
least, by means of a translation into ancient Persian, which was
made about five hundred and fifty years after Christ, though
even then we can only prove that a collection somewhat like the
'Pañkatantra' must have existed at that time; but we cannot
refer the book, in exactly that form in which we now possess it,
to that distant period.
If we look for La Fontaine's fable in the Sanskrit stories of
'Pañkatantra,' we do not find, indeed, the milkmaid counting her
chickens before they are hatched, but we meet with the follow-
ing story:-
――――
"There lived in a certain place a Brâhman, whose name was
Svabhâvakripana, which means 'a born miser. ' He had collected a
quantity of rice by begging [this reminds us somewhat of the Bud-
dhist mendicants], and after having dined off it, he filled a pot with
what was left over. He hung the pot on a peg on the wall, placed
his couch beneath, and looking intently at it all the night, he thought,
'Ah, that pot is indeed brimful of rice. Now, if there should be a
famine, I should certainly make a hundred rupees by it. With this
I shall buy a couple of goats. They will have young ones every six
months, and thus I shall have a whole herd of goats. Then with the
goats I shall buy cows. As soon as they have calved, I shall sell
the calves. Then with the cows I shall buy buffaloes; with the buf-
faloes, mares. When the mares have foaled, I shall have plenty of
horses; and when I sell them, plenty of gold. With that gold I shall
get a house with four wings. And then a Brâhman will come to my
house, and will give me his beautiful daughter, with a large dowry.
She will have a son, and I shall call him Somasarman. When he is
old enough to be danced on his father's knee, I shall sit with a book
at the back of the stable, and while I am reading, the boy will see
me, jump from his mother's lap and run towards me to be danced on
my knee. He will come too near the horse's hoof, and full of anger,
I shall call to my wife, "Take the baby; take him! " But she, dis-
tracted by some domestic work, does not hear me.
Then I get up,
and give her such a kick with my foot. ' While he thought this, he
gave a kick with his foot, and broke the pot. All the rice fell over
him, and made him quite white. Therefore I say, 'He who makes
foolish plans for the future will be white all over, like the father of
Somasarman. › »
## p. 10432 (#260) ##########################################
10432
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
(
I shall at once proceed to read you the same story, though
slightly modified, from the 'Hitopadesa. ' The Hitopadesa' pro-
fesses to be taken from the 'Pañkatantra' and some other books;
and in this case it would seem as if some other authority had
been followed. You will see, at all events, how much freedom
there was in telling the old story of the man who built castles in
the air.
"In the town of Devîkotta there lived a Brâhman of the name of
Devasarman. At the feast of the great equinox he received a plate
full of rice. He took it, went into a potter's shop, which was full of
crockery, and overcome by the heat, he lay down in a corner and
began to doze. In order to protect his plate of rice he kept his
stick in his hand, and began to think: 'Now, if I sell this plate of
rice, I shall receive ten cowries [kapardaka]. I shall then, on the
spot, buy pots and plates, and after having increased my capital
again and again, I shall buy and sell betel-nuts and dresses till I
become enormously rich. Then I shall marry four wives, and the
youngest and prettiest of the four I shall make a great pet of. Then
the other wives will be so angry, and begin to quarrel. But I shall
be in a great rage, and take a stick, and give them a good flogging. '
While he said this, he flung his stick away; the plate of rice was
smashed to pieces, and many of the pots in the shop were broken.
The potter, hearing the noise, ran into the shop, and when he saw
his pots broken, he gave the Brâhman a good scolding, and drove
him out of his shop. Therefore I say, 'He who rejoices over plans
for the future will come to grief, like the Brâhman who broke the
pots. "
In spite of the change of a Brahman into a milkmaid, no
one, I suppose, will doubt that we have here in the stories of
the 'Pañkatantra' and 'Hitopadesa' the first germs of La Fon-
taine's fable. But how did that fable travel all the way from
India to France? How did it doff its Sanskrit garment, and don
the light dress of modern French? How was the stupid Brah-
man born again as the brisk milkmaid, cotillon simple et souliers
plats?
It seems a startling case of longevity, that while languages
have changed, while works of art have perished, while empires
have risen and vanished again, this simple children's story
should have lived on, and maintained its place of honor and its
undisputed sway in every school-room of the East and every
nursery of the West. And yet it is a case of longevity so well
## p. 10433 (#261) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10433
attested that even the most skeptical would hardly venture to
question it. We have the passport of these stories viséd at every
place through which they have passed, and as far as I can judge,
parfaitement en règle. The story of the migration of these Indian
fables from East to West is indeed wonderful; more wonderful
and more instructive than many of the fables themselves. Will
it be believed that we, in this Christian country, and in the
nineteenth century, teach our children the first, the most import-
ant lessons of worldly wisdom,- nay, of a more than worldly wis-
dom, from books borrowed from Buddhists and Brahmans, from
heretics and idolaters; and that wise words spoken a thousand,-
nay, two thousand years ago, in a lonely village of India, like
precious seed scattered broadcast over the world, still bear fruit a
hundred and a thousand fold in that soil which is most precious
before God and man,-the soul of a child? No lawgiver, no
philosopher, has made his influence felt so widely, so deeply,
and so permanently as the author of these children's fables. But
who was he? We do not know. His name, like the name of
many a benefactor of the human race, is forgotten.
We only
know he was an Indian -a "nigger," as some people would call
him and that he lived at least two thousand years ago.
-
――――――
--
No doubt, when we first hear of the Indian origin of these
fables, and of their migration from India to Europe, we won-
der whether it can be so; but the fact is, that the story of this
Indo-European migration is not, like the migration of the Indo-
European languages, myths, and legends, a matter of theory,
but of history; and that it was never quite forgotten, either in
the East or in the West. Each translator, as he handed on his
treasure, seems to have been anxious to show how he came
by it.
Several writers who have treated of the origin and spreading
of Indo-European stories and fables, have mixed up two or three
questions which ought to be treated each on its own merits.
The first question is, whether the Aryans, when they broke
up their pro-ethnic community, carried away with them, not only
their common grammar and dictionary, but likewise some myths
and legends, which we find that Indians, Persians, Greeks,
Romans, Celts, Germans, Slaves, when they emerge into the
light of history, share in common? That certain deities occur
in India, Greece, and Germany, having the same names and the
same character, is a fact that can no longer be denied. That
XVIII-653
## p. 10434 (#262) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10434
certain heroes, too, known to Indians, Greeks, and Romans,
point to one and the same origin, both by their name and by
their history, is a fact by this time admitted by all whose admis-
sion is of real value. As heroes are in most cases gods in dis-
guise, there is nothing very startling in the fact that nations
who had worshiped the same gods should also have preserved
some common legend of demigods or heroes,-nay, even, in a
later phase of thought, of fairies and ghosts. The case however
becomes much more problematical when we ask whether stories
also- fables told with a decided moral purpose-formed part of
that earliest Aryan inheritance? This is still doubted by many
who have no doubts whatever as to common Aryan myths and
legends; and even those who, like myself, have tried to establish
by tentative arguments the existence of common Aryan fables,
dating from before the Aryan separation, have done so only by
showing a possible connection between ancient popular saws and
mythological ideas, capable of a moral application. To any one,
for instance, who knows how, in the poetical mythology of the
Aryan tribes, the golden splendor of the rising sun leads to con-
ceptions of the wealth of the Dawn in gold and jewels, and her
readiness to shower them upon her worshipers, the modern Ger-
man proverb "Morgenstunde hat Gold im Munde »* seems to have
a kind of mythological ring; and the stories of benign fairies,
changing everything into gold, sound likewise like an echo from
the long-forgotten forest of our common Aryan home.
In order to gain a commanding view of the countries traversed
by these fables, let us take our position at Bagdad in the middle
of the eighth century, and watch from that central point the
movements of our literary caravan in its progress from the far
East to the far West. In the middle of the eighth century,
during the reign of the great Khalif Almansur, Abdallah ibn
Almokaffa wrote his famous collection of fables, the 'Kalila and
Dimnah,' which we still possess. The Arabic text of these fables
has been published by Sylvestre de Sacy, and there is an English
translation of it by Mr. Knatchbull, formerly professor of Arabic
at Oxford. Abdallah ibn Almokaffa was a Persian by birth, who,
after the fall of the Omeyyades, became a convert to Mohamme-
danism, and rose to high office at the court of the Khalifs. Being
*«The morning hour has gold in its mouth: »— "Early to bed and early
to rise, Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise. »
## p. 10435 (#263) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10435
in possession of important secrets of State, he became dangerous
in the eyes of the Khalif Almansur, and was foully murdered. In
the preface, Abdallah ibn Almokaffa tells us that he translated
these fables from Pehlevi, the ancient language of Persia; and
that they had been translated into Pehlevi (about two hundred
years before his time) by Barzûyeh, the physician of Khosru
Nushirvan, the King of Persia, the contemporary of the Emperor
Justinian. The King of Persia had heard that there existed in
India a book full of wisdom; and he had commanded his Vezier,
Buzurjmihr, to find a man acquainted with the languages both of
Persia and India. The man chosen was Barzûyeh. He traveled
to India, got possession of the book, translated it into Persian,
and brought it back to the court of Khosru. Declining all rewards
beyond a dress of honor, he only stipulated that an account of
his own life and opinions should be added to the book.
account, probably written by himself, is extremely curious. It is
a kind of 'Religio Medici' of the sixth century; and shows us
a soul dissatisfied with traditions and formularies, striving after
truth, and finding rest only where many other seekers after truth
have found rest before and after him,-in a life devoted to alle-
viating the sufferings of mankind.
There is another account of the journey of this Persian
physician to India. It has the sanction of Firdúsi, in the great
Persian epic, the 'Shah Nâmeh'; and it is considered by some
as more original than the one just quoted. According to it, the
Persian physician read in a book that there existed in India
trees or herbs supplying a medicine with which the dead could
be restored to life. At the command of the King he went to
India in search of those trees and herbs; but after spending a
year in vain researches, he consulted some wise people on the
subject. They told him that the medicine of which he had read
as having the power to restore men to life, had to be understood
in a higher and more spiritual sense; and that what was really
meant by it were ancient books of wisdom preserved in India,
which imparted life to those who were dead in their folly and
sins. Thereupon the physician translated these books, and one
of them was the collection of fables,- the 'Kalila and Dimnah. '
It is possible that both these stories were later inventions;
the preface also by Ali, the son of Alshah Farési, in which the
names of Bidpai and King Dabshelim are mentioned for the
## p. 10436 (#264) ##########################################
10436
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
first time, is of later date. But the fact remains that Abdallah
ibn Almokaffa, the author of the oldest Arabic collection of our
fables, translated them from Pehlevi, the language of Persia at
the time of Khosru Nushirvan; and that the Pehlevi text which
he translated was believed to be a translation of a book brought
from India in the middle of the sixth century. That Indian book
could not have been the 'Pañkatantra' as we now possess it,
but must have been a much larger collection of fables: for the
Arabic translation, the 'Kalilah and Dimnah,' contains eighteen
chapters instead of the five of the 'Pañkatantra'; and it is only
in the fifth, the seventh, the eighth, the ninth, and the tenth
chapters that we find the same stories which form the five books
of the Pañkatantra in the textus ornatior.
In this Arabic translation, the story of the Brahman and the
pot of rice runs as follows:-
"A religious man was in the habit of receiving every day from
the house of a merchant a certain quantity of butter [oil] and honey;
of which, having eaten as much as he wanted, he put the rest into a
jar, which he hung on a nail in a corner of the room, hoping that
the jar would in time be filled. Now as he was leaning back one
day on his couch, with a stick in his hand, and the jar suspended
over his head, he thought of the high price of butter and honey,
and said to himself, 'I will sell what is in the jar, and buy with the
money which I obtain for it ten goats; which producing each of them
a young one every five months, in addition to the produce of the
kids as soon as they begin to bear, it will not be long before there is
a great flock. ' He continued to make his calculations, and found that
he should at this rate, in the course of two years, have more than
four hundred goats. 'At the expiration of the term I will buy,' said
he, 'a hundred black cattle, in the proportion of a bull or a cow
for every four goats. I will then purchase land, and hire workmen
to plow it with the beasts, and put it into tillage; so that before
five years are over, I shall no doubt have realized a great fortune
by the sale of the milk which the cows will give, and of the produce
of my land. My next business will be to build a magnificent house,
and engage a number of servants, both male and female; and when
my establishment is completed, I will marry the handsomest woman I
can find, who, in due time becoming a mother, will present me with
an heir to my possessions, who, as he advances in age, shall receive
the best masters that can be procured; and if the progress which
he makes in learning is equal to my reasonable expectations, I shall
## p. 10437 (#265) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10437
be amply repaid for the pains and expense which I have bestowed
upon him; but if, on the other hand, he disappoints my hopes, the rod
which I have here shall be the instrument with which I will make
him feel the displeasure of a justly offended parent. ' At these words
he suddenly raised the hand which held the stick towards the jar,
and broke it, and the contents ran down upon his head and face. "
You will have observed the coincidences between the Arabic
and the Sanskrit versions; but also a considerable divergence,
particularly in the winding up of the story. The Brahman and
the holy man both build their castles in the air; but while the
former kicks his wife, the latter only chastises his son. How this
change came to pass we cannot tell. One might suppose that at
the time when the book was translated from Sanskrit into Peh-
levi, or from Pehlevi into Arabic, the Sanskrit story was exactly
like the Arabic story, and that it was changed afterwards. But
another explanation is equally admissible; viz. , that the Pehlevi
or the Arabic translator wished to avoid the offensive behavior of
the husband kicking his wife, and therefore substituted the son
as a more deserving object of castigation.
We have thus traced our story from Sanskrit to Pehlevi, and
from Pehlevi to Arabic; we have followed it in its migrations.
from the hermitages of Indian sages to the court of the kings.
of Persia, and from thence to the residence of the powerful Kha-
lifs at Bagdad. Let us recollect that the Khalif Almansur, for
whom the Arabic translation was made, was a contemporary of
Abderrahman, who ruled in Spain; and that both were but little
anterior to Harun al Rashid and Charlemagne. At that time,
therefore, the way was perfectly open for these Eastern fables,
after they had once reached Bagdad, to penetrate into the seats of
Western learning, and to spread to every part of the new empire
of Charlemagne. They may have done so, for all we know; but
nearly three hundred years pass
before these fables meet us
again in the literature of Europe. The Carlovingian empire had
fallen to pieces, Spain had been rescued from the Mohammedans,
William the Conqueror had landed in England, and the Crusades
had begun to turn the thoughts of Europe towards the East,
when, about the year 1080, we hear of a Jew of the name of Sym-
eon, the son of Seth, who translated these fables from Arabic into
Greek. He states in his preface that the book came originally
from India, that it was brought to King Chosroes of Persia, and
then translated into Arabic. .
The Greek text has been
## p. 10438 (#266) ##########################################
10438
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
published, though very imperfectly, under the title of 'Stephan-
ites and Ichnelates. ' Here our fable is told as follows:
―――
"It is said that a beggar kept some honey and butter in a jar
close to where he slept. One night he thought thus within himself:
'I shall sell this honey and butter for however small a sum; with it
I shall buy ten goats, and these in five months will produce as many
again. In five years they will become four hundred. With them I
shall buy one hundred cows, and with them I shall cultivate some
land. And what with their calves and the harvests, I shall become
rich in five years, and build a house with four wings, ornamented
with gold, and buy all kinds of servants and marry a wife. She will
give me a child, and I shall call him Beauty. It will be a boy, and
I shall educate him properly; and if I see him lazy, I shall give him
such a flogging with this stick! ' With these words he took a stick
that was near him, struck the jar, and broke it, so that the honey
and milk ran down on his beard. "
This Greek translation might, no doubt, have reached La Fon-
taine; but as the French poet was not a great scholar, least of
all a reader of Greek MSS. , and as the fables of Symeon Seth
were not published till 1697, we must look for other channels
through which the old fable was carried along from East to
West.
The fact is, these fables had found several other channels,
through which, as early as the thirteenth century, they reached
the literary market of Europe, and became familiar as household
words, at least among the higher and educated classes.
But Perrette with the milk-pail has not yet arrived at the
end of her journey.
Remember that in all our wander-
ings we have not yet found the milkmaid, but only the Brah-
man or the religious man. What we want to know is, who first
brought about this metamorphosis.
•
•
No doubt La Fontaine was quite the man to seize on any
jewel which was contained in the Oriental fables, to remove the
cumbersome and foreign-looking setting, and then to place the
principal figure in that pretty frame in which most of us have
first become acquainted with it. But in this case the charmer's
wand did not belong to La Fontaine, but to some forgotten
worthy, whose very name it will be difficult to fix upon with
certainty.
We have as yet traced three streams only, all starting from
the Arabic translation of Abdallah ibn Almokaffa,-one in the
## p. 10439 (#267) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10439
eleventh, another in the twelfth, a third in the thirteenth cen-
tury,- all reaching Europe, some touching the very steps of the
throne of Louis XIV. , yet none of them carrying the leaf which
contained the story of Perrette,' or of the Brahman,' to the
threshold of La Fontaine's home. We must therefore try again.
After the conquest of Spain by the Mohammedans, Arabic
literature had found a new home in Western Europe; and among
the numerous works translated from Arabic into Latin or Spanish,
we find towards the end of the thirteenth century (1289) a Span-
ish translation of our fables, called 'Calila é Dymna. ' In this
the name of the philosopher is changed from Bidpai to Bundobel.
This, or another translation from Arabic, was turned into Latin
verse by Raimond de Beziers in 1313 (not published).
Lastly, we find in the same century another translation from
Arabic straight into Latin verse, by Baldo, which became known
under the name of 'Esopus Alter. '
From these frequent translations, and translations of transla-
tions, in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries, we see
quite clearly that these Indian fables were extremely popular,
and were in fact more widely read in Europe than the Bible, or
any other book. They were not only read in translations, but
having been introduced into sermons, homilies, and works on
morality, they were improved upon, acclimatized, localized, till at
last it is almost impossible to recognize their Oriental features
under their homely disguises.
I shall give you one instance only.
Rabelais, in his 'Gargantua,' gives a long description of how
a man might conquer the whole world. At the end of this dia-
logue, which was meant as a satire on Charles V. , we read:
-
"There was here present at that time an old gentleman well expe-
rienced in the wars,- a stern soldier, and who had been in many
great hazards, - named Echephron, who, hearing this discourse, said:
'J'ay grand peur que toute ceste entreprise sera semblable à la farce
du pot au laict duquel un cordavanier se faisoit riche par resverie,
puis le pot cassé, n'eut de quoy disner. »» (I fear me that this great
undertaking will turn out like the farce of the pot of milk, which
made the shoemaker rich in imagination till he broke the pot, and
had to go without his dinner. )
This is clearly our story; only the Brahman has as yet been
changed into a shoemaker only, and the pot of rice or the jar
## p. 10440 (#268) ##########################################
10440
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
of butter and honey into a pitcher of milk. Fortunately, we can
make at least one step further, a step of about two centuries.
This step backwards brings us to the thirteenth century, and
there we find our old Indian friend again, and this time really
changed into a milkmaid The book I refer to is written in
Latin, and is called 'Dialogus Creaturarum optime moralizatus';
in English, the 'Dialogue of Creatures Moralized. ' It was a
book intended to teach the principles of Christian morality by
examples taken from ancient fables. It was evidently a most
successful book, and was translated into several modern lan-
guages. There is an old translation of it in English, first printed
by Rastell, and afterwards reprinted in 1816. I shall read you
from it the fable in which, as far as I can find, the milkmaid
appears for the first time on the stage, surrounded already by
much of that scenery which, four hundred years later, received
its last touches at the hand of La Fontaine.
"DIALOGO C. - For as it is but madnesse to trust to moche in
surete, so it is but foly to hope to moche of vanyteys, for vayne be
all erthly thinges longynge to men, as sayth Davyd, Psal. xciiii. :
Wher of it is tolde in fablys that a lady uppon a tyme delyvered to
her mayden a galon of mylke to sell at a cite, and by the way, as she
sate and restid her by a dyche side, she began to thinke that with the
money of the mylke she wold bye an henne, the which shulde bringe
forth chekyns, and when they were growyn to hennys she wolde sell
them and by piggis, and eschaunge them in to shepe, and the shepe
in to oxen, and so whan she was come to richesse she sholde be
maried right worshipfully unto some worthy man, and thus she re-
ioycid. And whan she was thus mervelously comfortid and ravisshed
inwardly in her secrete solace, thinkynge with howe greate ioye she
shuld be ledde towarde the chirche with her husbond on horsebacke,
she sayde to her self: 'Goo we, goo we. ' Sodaynlye she smote the
ground with her fote, myndynge to spurre the horse, but her fote
slypped, and she fell in the dyche, and there lay all her mylke, and
so she was farre from her purpose, and never had that she hopid to
have. "
Here we have arrived at the end of our journey. It has been
a long journey across fifteen or twenty centuries, and I am afraid
our following Perrette from country to country, and from lan-
guage to language, may have tired some of my hearers. I shall,
therefore, not attempt to fill the gap that divides the fable of the
thirteenth century from La Fontaine. Suffice it to say, that the
## p. 10441 (#269) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10441
milkmaid, having once taken the place of the Brahman, main-
tained it against all comers. We find her as Doña Truhana in
the famous 'Conde Lucanor,' the work of the Infante Don Juan
Manuel who died in 1347; the grandson of St. Ferdinand, the
nephew of Alfonso the Wise; though himself not a king, yet
more powerful than a king; renowned both by his sword and by.
his pen, and possibly not ignorant of Arabic, the language of
his enemies. We find her again in the 'Contes et Nouvelles' of
Bonaventure des Periers, published in the sixteenth century,— a
book which we know that La Fontaine was well acquainted with.
We find her, after La Fontaine, in all the languages of Europe.
You see now before your eyes the bridge on which our fables
came to us from East to West. The same bridge which brought
us Perrette brought us hundreds of fables, all originally sprung
up in India, many of them carefully collected by Buddhist priests
and preserved in their sacred canon, afterwards handed on to the
Brahmanic writers of a later age, carried by Barzûyeh from India
to the court of Persia, then to the courts of the Khalifs at Bag-
dad and Cordova, and of the Emperors at Constantinople. Some
of them no doubt perished on their journey, others were mixed
up together, others were changed till we should hardly know
them again. Still, if you once know the eventful journey of Per-
rette, you know the journey of all the other fables that belong to
this Indian cycle. Few of them have gone through so many
changes; few of them have found so many friends, whether in
the courts of kings or in the huts of beggars. Few of them
have been to places where Perrette has not also been. This is
why I selected her and her passage through the world as the best
illustration of a subject which otherwise would require a whole
course of lectures to do it justice.
## p. 10442 (#270) ##########################################
10442
WILHELM MÜLLER
(1794-1827)
LOVE no lyric poet excepting Goethe so much as Wilhelm
Müller," wrote Heine; and indeed, as he himself gladly
acknowledged, Heine owed to Müller many a tricksy lyric
charm. Müller was born at Dessau on October 7th, 1794, and there
he died on September 30th, 1827. In this brief space of thirty years
he succeeded in leaving upon the hearts of the German people an
impress of his poetic personality, that seems destined to last while
songs are sung and nature still has charms. He died just as his
genius was maturing. His spirit was pre-
paring for higher flights when it passed
from earth altogether. He is thus a poet
for the young-for those who delight in
"young love and old wine. " The heart of
youth finds in Müller's poems the expres-
sion of its own vague longings and un-
defined emotions; and the heart of the
aged, if it has preserved its freshness, is
quickened by the genial flow of his simple,
passionate verse.
WILHELM MÜLLER
Müller, like thousands of spirits far less
fine than his, was touched to patriotic issues
at the time of the great uprising against
Napoleon. He had begun the study of phi-
lology and history at Berlin when the wars for freedom broke out.
During 1813 and 1814, following the call of the Prussian king, he
served his country as a volunteer, as Kleist and Körner did. He
then quietly resumed the study of Old German at the Berlin Univer-
sity. This taste for old Germanic lore reveals that tendency of mind
which in his son, Professor Max Müller, has reached its scholarly
fruition. In the father's case these studies were placed first of all at
the service of the Muses; through them he acquired that intimate
knowledge of the essential qualities of early German culture, which
enabled him so perfectly to catch the tone of the German folk-song.
In the circle of young Berlin poets, his talent found stimulus and
encouragement. In 1815 this group of friends issued the Bundes-
blätter' (Leaves of Union), and here are to be found the earliest
poems of Wilhelm Müller.
## p. 10443 (#271) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10443
In 1817 there came to Müller, as to Geibel later, the ardently
desired opportunity of standing upon classic soil. He went to Italy.
and the literary result of his trip was the graceful book published
in 1820, and entitled 'Rom, Römer, und Römerinnen' (Rome, and
Roman Men and Women). Upon his return in 1819, he was called to
his native city of Dessau as a teacher of ancient languages. At the
same time he held the post of librarian of the newly founded Ducal
Library. His philological works were chiefly contributions to ency-
clopædias and other compilations. He translated Marlowe's 'Faus-
tus,' and Achim von Arnim wrote the preface; Fauriel's collection of
modern Greek folk-songs he also put into German. Perhaps the
most valuable of his scholarly undertakings was the 'Library of Ger-
man Poets of the Seventeenth Century,' in ten volumes.
But it is not upon these things that Müller's fame rests.
He was
first of all a poet; and this became evident to the public at large
when in 1821 he published 'Gedichte aus den Hinterlassenen Papieren
eines Reisenden Waldhornisten' (Poems from the Posthumous Papers
of a Traveling Bugler). In the same year appeared the first of the
famous 'Griechenlieder' (Songs of the Greeks), in which the profound
sympathy of the German people with the Greek struggle for freedom
found stirring expression. With his love for the heroes of ancient
Greece he combined a splendid enthusiasm for Byron, Kanaris, and
Marco Bozzaris. This uprising of Greece appealed to all poets, and
the magic of Byron's name seemed to make it peculiarly their affair.
All the bards of the land of song burst into impassioned verse in
defense of the classic country and Pierian spring which had been
the original source of their own inspiration. The Songs of the
Greeks' aided powerfully in rousing indignation against the Turks;
and just as Greek admirers of Byron had sent marble to be used
for the poet's monument in London, so the Greek Parliament voted
a ship-load of Pentelican marble for the monument which has been
erected to Müller in Dessau.
If the 'Songs of the Greeks' are less well known to the world
at large than two other series of Müller's lyrics, this is primarily due
to Franz Schubert. The two cycles of exquisite lyrics entitled 'Die
Schöne Müllerin' (The Pretty Maid of the Mill) and 'Die Winterreise'
(The Winter Journey) caught the heart and ear of Schubert, and he
wedded them to immortal music. We are made to share the fresh
joy of the wandering miller, who, following the guidance of his
beloved brook, finds the fickle beauty of the mill and loves her;
and we share, too, his sorrow when her heart turns to the hunts-
man, clad in green, and her faithful lover buries his grief and love
in the waters of the still singing brook. There is thus a dramatic
interest that binds together these simple songs. In this cycle, as in
the Winter Journey,' one feels the deep sustaining joy of the poet
<
## p. 10444 (#272) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10444
in all outdoor nature: it is symbolized in the loving intimacy
between the miller and the brook, between th wanderer and the
linden-tree. Taken with the music, the two cycles form little lyric
dramas; the words can no longer be recalled without the melody,
and these combined creations of Müller and Schubert are among the
most beautiful and delicate works of art that have sprung from the
lyric genius of Germany. And so, although no poet voice had a
more vigorous ring when it sang in the cause of freedom, it is prob-
able that Müller will be chiefly remembered as the singer of winter
journeys and wanderers' joys, of mill-stream melodies and the lays
of love.
FROM THE PRETTY MAID OF THE MILL'
Translated by Charles Harvey Genung and Edward Breck
WANDERING
O WANDER is the miller's joy,
To wander!
T
He must a wretched miller be
Who would not wander merrily,
And wander!
We learned it from the water brook,
The water!
It takes no rest by night or day,
But ever wends its laughing way,
The water!
We learn it from the mill-wheel too,
The mill-wheel!
That will not stand a moment still,
But tireless turns the mighty mill,
The mill-wheel!
The stones themselves forget their weight,
The millstones!
They join the merry dancing crew,
And try to move much faster too,
The millstones!
To wander, wander is my joy,
To wander!
Good master and good mistress, pray,
Let me in peace now go my way
And wander!
## p. 10445 (#273) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
WHITHER?
I HEARD a brooklet gushing
From out the rocky spring,
Down through the valley rushing
With clear and laughing ring.
I know not what came o'er me,
What longing filled my breast:
Down to the vale it bore me,
And onward without rest.
Far downward, ever onward,
I followed its dancing gleam,
And louder still and clearer
Sang ever the happy stream.
And this way must I wander?
O brooklet, whither, say?
Thou hast with thy sweet rushing
My reason charmed away.
What, prate I then of rushing?
That can no rushing be!
'Tis the voice of the water-nixies,
That sing their songs to me.
Ah, heed not song nor rushing,
But wander onward still;
There must be merry mill-wheels
In every flashing rill.
HALT !
I SPY a mill forth peeping
By the alder-lined mere;
The rushing and singing
Of mill-wheels I hear.
Hey, welcome, hey, how welcome,
Sweet old song of the mill!
And the house with its windows
Is so cozy and still.
And the sunshine above me
Makes heaven seem gay!
Ah, brooklet, lovely brooklet,
Was it this thou wouldst say?
10445
## p. 10446 (#274) ##########################################
10446
WILHELM MÜLLER
THANKSGIVING TO THE BROOK
WAS it this thou wouldst say,
My friend, by thy lay?
By ringing and singing,
Was it this thou wouldst say?
To the miller's maid go!
Thou meanest it so.
Ah! Have I not guessed it?
To the miller's maid go!
Can her wish it be,
Or foolest thou me?
Oh, this only tell me,
If her wish it be.
Howe'er it was meant,
I'll rest me content;
I have found what I sought for,
Howe'er it was meant.
I sought work, indeed,
I've now all I need;
For my hands, for my heart,
I've all that I need!
CURIOSITY
I'LL ask no pretty flower,
I'll ask no starry sphere;
For none of them can tell me
What I so long to hear.
Besides, I'm not a gardener,
The stars all hang too high;
My brooklet here shall tell me
If my fond heart doth lie.
O brooklet, my beloved,
Why singest thou no more?
I ask for one word only,
One answer o'er and o'er.
"Yes" is the word I long for,
The other word is "no";
In one of these two answers
Is all my weal or woe.
## p. 10447 (#275) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10447
O brooklet, my beloved,
Why shouldst thou wayward be?
I'll promise not to tell it-
Say, brooklet, loves she me?
IMPATIENCE
I'D CARVE it deep in every forest tree,
On every stone I'd grave it lastingly;
In every garden plot the words I'd sow,
With seed that soon my sweet device would show,
That she should see my faithful heart's endeavor:
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
A magpie young and lusty I would teach,
Until he sang aloud that sweetest speech,
And sang it with my voice's counterpart,
With all the yearning of my loving heart;
He'd sing it then to her and cease it never:
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
I'd fling it forth to every morning breeze,
I'd sigh it softly to the swaying trees;
Oh, that it shone from every blossom fair!
Oh, that she breathed it in the perfumed air!
Are mill-wheels all that thou canst move, O river?
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
I thought it looked from out my loving eyes,
And burned upon my cheeks in telltale guise;
Imprinted on my speechless lips it were,
And every breath I drew cried out to her;
But she, alas, heeds naught of my endeavor:
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
GOOD-MORNING
GOOD-MORNING, pretty miller's lass!
Why hide thy head, whene'er I pass,
Behind the curtain yonder?
Dost think my greetings boldness show?
Disturb thee then my glances so?
Then onward I must wander.
## p. 10448 (#276) ##########################################
10448
WILHELM MÜLLER
Oh, let me linger by the brook,
And only at thy window look,
Below there, just below there!
Thou flaxen head, now hide no more!
Come forth from out your oval door,
Ye morning stars that show there!
Ye slumber-laden eyes so blue,
Ye flowers wet with morning dew,
Doth ruddy sunlight blind you?
Were they so sweet, the joys of sleep,
That now you close and droop and weep,
Because they're left behind you?
Now shake ye off the dreamland haze,
And fresh and free your heads upraise,
To greet the shining morrow!
Aloft the lark doth gayly soar,
And at the deep heart's inmost core
Awake love's care and sorrow.
SHOWERS OF TEARS
WE SAT nestled close to each other,
In shady alder nook;
We gazed long and fondly together
Down into the murmuring brook.
The moon uprose in heaven,
The stars began to glow,
And gazed long and fondly together
At the silvery mirror below.
'Twas not the moon that I gazed at,
And not the starry skies:
Her picture was all I gazed at,
And all I saw was her eyes.
I saw them there winking and blinking
Deep down in my brooklet so true;
The flowers on the margin, the blue ones,
Are winking and blinking there too.
And in the waters sunken
The whole wide heaven shone,
And into its glistening bosom
It seemed to lure me on.
## p. 10449 (#277) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10449
And over the clouds and the starlight
The brook rippled joyous and free,
And called me, ringing and singing:-
"Come hither, O brother, to me! "
XVIII-654
And blurred were my eyes with hot tear-drops;
Before me the brook seemed to spin;
She said, "A shower is coming:
Good-night I'm going in. "
――――
MINE!
BROOKLET, cease that song of thine!
Mill-wheels, stop your whirr and whine!
All ye merry wood-songsters fine,
Make no sign;
Silent be and close your eyne!
Every line
WITHERED FLOWERS
Ан, ALL уe flowers
I'll design-
It shall but one rhyme enshrine:
For the miller's lovely maid is mine!
Mine!
Springtime, are there then no fairer flowers thine?
Sunlight, canst thou then no brighter shine?
Ah, alone I must repine
With that sweetest of all words, "Mine,»
Understood by none in all this world divine!
That she once gave,
Ye shall be buried
•
With me in the grave.
Why gaze ye sadly
Upon me so,
As if with pity
Ye saw my woe?
-
Ah, all ye flowers
Of pale regret,
Ah, all ye flowers,
How came ye wet?
## p. 10450 (#278) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10450
But tears can't freshen
The flowers like rain,
Cannot make dead passion
To bloom again.
The winter's dying,
And spring will appear,
And flowers will blossom
Around me here.
And flowers will cover
My new-made grave,—
Ah, all the flowers,
That she once gave!
And when she wanders
The church-yard through,
And softly murmurs,
"His love was true! "-
Then, all ye flowers,
Oh bloom, oh blow!
For May is coming,
And gone is the snow.
THE MILLER AND THE BROOK
The Miller:
WHEN a heart so constant
Must break and must die,
The lilies all withered
And broken lie.
In clouds then the full moon
Must veil her head,
And hide from all mortals
The tears she doth shed.
In heaven the angels
Their eyes gently close;
They're sobbing and soothing
The soul to repose.
The Brook:
When love has o'ermastered
Its hopes and fears,
## p. 10451 (#279) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10451
A new star, bright shining,
In heaven appears.
Then blossom three roses,
Half white, half red,
That never shall wither
In garden bed.
And in heaven the angels
Their pinions will clip,
And earthwards each morning
Will fairily trip.
The Miller:
Ah, brooklet, lovely brooklet,
Thou'rt faithful and true;
Ah, brooklet, but thou know'st not
What love can do.
Ah, down there, far down there,
'Tis cool and deep.
Ah, brooklet, lovely brooklet,
Now sing me to sleep.
CRADLE SONG OF THE BROOK
SWEETLY sleep, sweetly sleep!
I'll thy vigil keep!
Wanderer, so weary, thou'rt now at home.
Securely rest
Asleep on my breast,
Till the brooklets mingle with ocean foam.
Thy bed shall be cool
In moss-lined pool,
In the chamber of sparkling blue crystal clear;
Come, wavelets, wave,
His cradle lave,
Soothe him and rock him, my comrade so dear.
When the sound of horn
From the greenwood's borne,
I will rush and I'll gush, that thou mayst not hear.
Peep ye not through,
Little flow'rets blue!
You make all the dreams of my sleeper so drear.
## p. 10452 (#280) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10452
Away, away
From my margin stay,
Wicked maiden, lest from thy shadow he wake!
But throw me down
Thy kerchief brown,
So for his eyes I'll a bandage make!
Now good-night, now good-night!
Till all's made right,
Forget all thy hopes, and forget thy fate!
The moon shines bright,
The mists take flight,
And the heaven above me how wide and how great!
VINETA
F
ROM the sea's deep hollow faintly pealing,
Far-off evening bells come sad and slow;
Faintly rise, the wondrous tale revealing
Of the old enchanted town below.
On the bosom of the flood reclining,
Ruined arch and wall and broken spire,
Down beneath the watery mirror shining,
Gleam and flash in flakes of golden fire.
And the boatman, who at twilight hour,
Once that magic vision shall have seen,
Heedless how the crags may round him lower,
Evermore will haunt the charmèd scene.
From the heart's deep hollow faintly pealing,
Far I hear them, bell-notes sad and slow,
Ah! a wild and wondrous tale revealing
Of the drownèd wreck of love below.
There a world in loveliness decaying
Lingers yet in beauty ere it die;
Phantom forms across my senses playing,
Flash like golden fire-flakes from the sky.
Lights are gleaming, fairy bells are ringing,
And I long to plunge and wander free
Where I hear those angel-voices singing
In those ancient towers below the sea.
Translation of J. A. Froude.
## p. 10453 (#281) ##########################################
10453
-
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
(CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK)
(1850-)
W
HEN Miss Murfree's first work appeared, not only was her
pseudonym, Charles Egbert Craddock, accepted by her edi-
tors without suspicion as her proper name, but the public
was equally deceived. The firm, quiet touch, the matter wholly free
from subjectiveness, the robust humor, and the understanding of
masculine life, had no trace of femininity.
Her first book, Where the Battle was
Fought, which finally appeared in 1884,
was the effort of a very young writer, con-
taining more of promise than fulfillment,
though the peculiarities of style and char-
acter were prophetic of her later manner.
No publisher desired it until the great favor
accorded to 'In the Tennessee Mountains'
opened the way. In the maturer story was
struck a more confident note. Miss Murfree
had found her field, and henceforth the
Tennessee mountains and their inhabitants
were to occupy her descriptive powers.
These men and women are for the first part
rude people, kept in unlikeness to the outside world not only by their
distance from civilization, but by the mist of tradition in which they
live. Here is a colony of people who have their own ideas of eti-
quette, and as strict a code as that of Versailles in the time of
Louis XIV. ,- their own notions of comfort and wealth, and their own
civil and moral laws. Here they dwell in their mountain fastnesses,
distilling illicit whisky with as clear a conscience as they plant the
corn from which they make it, or as the Northern farmer makes
cider from his apples-in their opinion an exact parallel. Passion-
ately religious, full of picturesque poetry,-which they learn from
the Bible, their only familiar book,-no wonder the "Prophet of the
Great Smoky Mountain" thrilled his audiences when he described the
scenes enacted in the Old Testament as having been transacted on
the very hillsides where he preached, and that the majestic imagery
of the Book was heightened by the majestic surroundings.
MARY N. MURFREE
## p. 10454 (#282) ##########################################
10454
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
But good material," in a literary sense, as are the Tennessee
mountaineers, no sort of idealization nor surface acquaintance, how-
ever aided by artistic intuition, could have made them natural to the
outside world. It was the office of one who knew them as Miss Mur-
free knew them, not only from the inside view but the view of a
social superior, which enabled her to give the picture a perspective.
Nowhere is this gift better indicated than in the artistic story 'Drift-
ing down Lost Creek,' in which the elements of interest are thor-
oughly worked up, the motive of the delicate romance touched with
a perfect consciousness of the author's audience; while there is such
a regard for the verities, that the whole story turns on the every-
day feminine loyalty of a mountain girl to her lover. On Big Injin
Mountain is an episode of a sturdier kind, more dramatic both in
matter and in manner than 'Drifting down Lost Creek'; but at its
close, when the rude mountaineers display a tenderness for the man
they have misunderstood, the reader, gentle or simple, is perforce
thrilled into sympathy,- for this is a passage to which the better
part of human nature, wherever found, responds.
In Miss Murfree's writings we are perhaps too often reminded of
the pictorial art which she undoubtedly possesses, by the effect she
evolves from the use of words. She has a clear vision and a dra-
matic temperament; and it is a temptation, not always resisted, to
emphasize physical surroundings in order to heighten situations. The
moment a lull occurs in the action of her personages, the mountain
solitudes come in to play their part, the sylvan glades, the chro-
matic hues, the foaming cataracts, the empurpled shadows. Even the
wild animals assume the functions of dramatis persona, and are an
inarticulate chorus to interpret the emotions of the human actors.
on Missions delivered in Westminster Abbey, December 3d, 1873, he
says:-
•
"There is one kind of faith that revels in words, there is another that can
hardly find utterance: the former is like riches that come to us by inherit-
ance, the latter is like the daily bread which each of us has to win by the
sweat of his brow. The former we cannot expect from new converts; we
ought not to expect it or exact it, for fear it might lead to hypocrisy and
superstition. .
We want less of creeds but more of trust, less of cere-
mony but more of work, less of solemnity but more of genial honesty, less of
doctrine but more of love. There is a faith as small as a grain of mustard
seed; but that grain alone can remove mountains, and more than that, it can
move hearts. »
Theories are forgotten, and sciences are outgrown; but to have
been the inspiring leader of many in the onward march of knowl-
edge, and to have achieved a serene and rounded character, go far
to amply crown any life.
## p. 10429 (#257) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10429
"Denn wer den Besten seiner Zeit genug
Gethan, der hat gelebt für alle Zeiten. »
"That which lived
True life, lives on. "
But to have added to this that which should accompany old age,—
"honor, love, and troops of friends," -fills the cup of the most am-
bitious scholar, and leaves little in this world to be desired.
Nauyet Minima
ON THE MIGRATION OF FABLES
From Chips from a German Workshop›
con
"C
OUNT not your chickens before they be hatched," is a well-
known proverb in English; and most people, if asked
what was its origin, would probably appeal to La Fon-
taine's delightful fable, 'La Laitière et le Pot au Lait. ' We all
know Perrette, lightly stepping along from her village to the town,
and in her day-dreams selling her milk for a good sum, then
buying a hundred eggs, then selling the chickens, then buying
a pig, fattening it, selling it again, and buying a cow with a
calf. The calf frolics about, and kicks up his legs-so does Per-
rette; and alas! the pail falls down, the milk is spilt, her riches
gone, and she only hopes when she comes home that she may
escape a flogging from her husband.
Did La Fontaine invent this fable? or did he merely follow
the example of Sokrates, who, as we know from the 'Phædon,'
occupied himself in prison, during the last days of his life, with
turning into verse some of the fables - or as he calls them, the
myths of Æsop.
La Fontaine published the first six books of his fables in
1668; and it is well known that the subjects of most of these
fables were taken from Æsop, Phædrus, Horace, and other clas-
sical fabulists, -if we may adopt this word "fabuliste," which La
Fontaine was the first to introduce into French.
## p. 10430 (#258) ##########################################
10430
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
In 1678 a second of these six books was published, enriched
by five books of new fables; and in 1694 a new edition appeared,
containing one additional book, thus completing the collection of
his charming poems.
The fable of Perrette stands in the seventh book; and was
published, therefore, for the first time in the edition of 1678. In
the preface to that edition, La Fontaine says: "It is not neces-
sary that I should say whence I have taken the subjects of these
new fables. I shall only say, from a sense of gratitude, that I
owe the largest portion of them to Pilpay, the Indian sage. "
If then La Fontaine tells us himself that he borrowed the
subjects of most of his new fables from Pilpay, the Indian sage,
we have clearly a right to look to India in order to see whether,
in the ancient literature of that country, any traces can be dis-
covered of Perrette with the milk-pail.
Sanskrit literature is very rich in fables and stories; no other
literature can vie with it in that respect; nay, it is extremely
likely that fables, in particular animal fables, had their principal
source in India. In the sacred literature of the Buddhists, fables
held a most prominent place. The Buddhist preachers, address-
ing themselves chiefly to the people, to the untaught, the un-
cared-for, the outcast, spoke to them as we still speak to children,
in fables and parables. Many of these fables and parables must
have existed before the rise of the Buddhist religion; others, no
doubt, were added on the spur of the moment, just as Sokrates
would invent a myth or fable whenever that form of argument
seemed to him most likely to impress and convince his hearers.
But Buddhism gave a new and permanent sanction to this whole
branch of moral mythology; and in the sacred canon, as it was
settled in the third century before Christ, many a fable received,
and holds to the present day, its recognized place. After the
fall of Buddhism in India, and even during its decline, the Brah-
mans claimed the inheritance of their enemies, and used their pop-
ular fables for educational purposes. The best known of these
collections of fables in Sanskrit is the 'Pañkatantra,' literally the
Pentateuch or Pentamerone. From it and from other sources
another collection was made, well known to all Sanskrit scholars
by the name of 'Hitopadesa'; i. e. , Salutary Advice. Both these
books have been published in England and Germany, and there
are translations of them in English, German, French, and other
languages.
## p. 10431 (#259) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10431
The first question which we have to answer refers to the
date of these collections; and dates in the history of Sanskrit
literature are always difficult points. Fortunately, as we shall
see, we can in this case fix the date of the 'Pañkatantra' at
least, by means of a translation into ancient Persian, which was
made about five hundred and fifty years after Christ, though
even then we can only prove that a collection somewhat like the
'Pañkatantra' must have existed at that time; but we cannot
refer the book, in exactly that form in which we now possess it,
to that distant period.
If we look for La Fontaine's fable in the Sanskrit stories of
'Pañkatantra,' we do not find, indeed, the milkmaid counting her
chickens before they are hatched, but we meet with the follow-
ing story:-
――――
"There lived in a certain place a Brâhman, whose name was
Svabhâvakripana, which means 'a born miser. ' He had collected a
quantity of rice by begging [this reminds us somewhat of the Bud-
dhist mendicants], and after having dined off it, he filled a pot with
what was left over. He hung the pot on a peg on the wall, placed
his couch beneath, and looking intently at it all the night, he thought,
'Ah, that pot is indeed brimful of rice. Now, if there should be a
famine, I should certainly make a hundred rupees by it. With this
I shall buy a couple of goats. They will have young ones every six
months, and thus I shall have a whole herd of goats. Then with the
goats I shall buy cows. As soon as they have calved, I shall sell
the calves. Then with the cows I shall buy buffaloes; with the buf-
faloes, mares. When the mares have foaled, I shall have plenty of
horses; and when I sell them, plenty of gold. With that gold I shall
get a house with four wings. And then a Brâhman will come to my
house, and will give me his beautiful daughter, with a large dowry.
She will have a son, and I shall call him Somasarman. When he is
old enough to be danced on his father's knee, I shall sit with a book
at the back of the stable, and while I am reading, the boy will see
me, jump from his mother's lap and run towards me to be danced on
my knee. He will come too near the horse's hoof, and full of anger,
I shall call to my wife, "Take the baby; take him! " But she, dis-
tracted by some domestic work, does not hear me.
Then I get up,
and give her such a kick with my foot. ' While he thought this, he
gave a kick with his foot, and broke the pot. All the rice fell over
him, and made him quite white. Therefore I say, 'He who makes
foolish plans for the future will be white all over, like the father of
Somasarman. › »
## p. 10432 (#260) ##########################################
10432
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
(
I shall at once proceed to read you the same story, though
slightly modified, from the 'Hitopadesa. ' The Hitopadesa' pro-
fesses to be taken from the 'Pañkatantra' and some other books;
and in this case it would seem as if some other authority had
been followed. You will see, at all events, how much freedom
there was in telling the old story of the man who built castles in
the air.
"In the town of Devîkotta there lived a Brâhman of the name of
Devasarman. At the feast of the great equinox he received a plate
full of rice. He took it, went into a potter's shop, which was full of
crockery, and overcome by the heat, he lay down in a corner and
began to doze. In order to protect his plate of rice he kept his
stick in his hand, and began to think: 'Now, if I sell this plate of
rice, I shall receive ten cowries [kapardaka]. I shall then, on the
spot, buy pots and plates, and after having increased my capital
again and again, I shall buy and sell betel-nuts and dresses till I
become enormously rich. Then I shall marry four wives, and the
youngest and prettiest of the four I shall make a great pet of. Then
the other wives will be so angry, and begin to quarrel. But I shall
be in a great rage, and take a stick, and give them a good flogging. '
While he said this, he flung his stick away; the plate of rice was
smashed to pieces, and many of the pots in the shop were broken.
The potter, hearing the noise, ran into the shop, and when he saw
his pots broken, he gave the Brâhman a good scolding, and drove
him out of his shop. Therefore I say, 'He who rejoices over plans
for the future will come to grief, like the Brâhman who broke the
pots. "
In spite of the change of a Brahman into a milkmaid, no
one, I suppose, will doubt that we have here in the stories of
the 'Pañkatantra' and 'Hitopadesa' the first germs of La Fon-
taine's fable. But how did that fable travel all the way from
India to France? How did it doff its Sanskrit garment, and don
the light dress of modern French? How was the stupid Brah-
man born again as the brisk milkmaid, cotillon simple et souliers
plats?
It seems a startling case of longevity, that while languages
have changed, while works of art have perished, while empires
have risen and vanished again, this simple children's story
should have lived on, and maintained its place of honor and its
undisputed sway in every school-room of the East and every
nursery of the West. And yet it is a case of longevity so well
## p. 10433 (#261) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10433
attested that even the most skeptical would hardly venture to
question it. We have the passport of these stories viséd at every
place through which they have passed, and as far as I can judge,
parfaitement en règle. The story of the migration of these Indian
fables from East to West is indeed wonderful; more wonderful
and more instructive than many of the fables themselves. Will
it be believed that we, in this Christian country, and in the
nineteenth century, teach our children the first, the most import-
ant lessons of worldly wisdom,- nay, of a more than worldly wis-
dom, from books borrowed from Buddhists and Brahmans, from
heretics and idolaters; and that wise words spoken a thousand,-
nay, two thousand years ago, in a lonely village of India, like
precious seed scattered broadcast over the world, still bear fruit a
hundred and a thousand fold in that soil which is most precious
before God and man,-the soul of a child? No lawgiver, no
philosopher, has made his influence felt so widely, so deeply,
and so permanently as the author of these children's fables. But
who was he? We do not know. His name, like the name of
many a benefactor of the human race, is forgotten.
We only
know he was an Indian -a "nigger," as some people would call
him and that he lived at least two thousand years ago.
-
――――――
--
No doubt, when we first hear of the Indian origin of these
fables, and of their migration from India to Europe, we won-
der whether it can be so; but the fact is, that the story of this
Indo-European migration is not, like the migration of the Indo-
European languages, myths, and legends, a matter of theory,
but of history; and that it was never quite forgotten, either in
the East or in the West. Each translator, as he handed on his
treasure, seems to have been anxious to show how he came
by it.
Several writers who have treated of the origin and spreading
of Indo-European stories and fables, have mixed up two or three
questions which ought to be treated each on its own merits.
The first question is, whether the Aryans, when they broke
up their pro-ethnic community, carried away with them, not only
their common grammar and dictionary, but likewise some myths
and legends, which we find that Indians, Persians, Greeks,
Romans, Celts, Germans, Slaves, when they emerge into the
light of history, share in common? That certain deities occur
in India, Greece, and Germany, having the same names and the
same character, is a fact that can no longer be denied. That
XVIII-653
## p. 10434 (#262) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10434
certain heroes, too, known to Indians, Greeks, and Romans,
point to one and the same origin, both by their name and by
their history, is a fact by this time admitted by all whose admis-
sion is of real value. As heroes are in most cases gods in dis-
guise, there is nothing very startling in the fact that nations
who had worshiped the same gods should also have preserved
some common legend of demigods or heroes,-nay, even, in a
later phase of thought, of fairies and ghosts. The case however
becomes much more problematical when we ask whether stories
also- fables told with a decided moral purpose-formed part of
that earliest Aryan inheritance? This is still doubted by many
who have no doubts whatever as to common Aryan myths and
legends; and even those who, like myself, have tried to establish
by tentative arguments the existence of common Aryan fables,
dating from before the Aryan separation, have done so only by
showing a possible connection between ancient popular saws and
mythological ideas, capable of a moral application. To any one,
for instance, who knows how, in the poetical mythology of the
Aryan tribes, the golden splendor of the rising sun leads to con-
ceptions of the wealth of the Dawn in gold and jewels, and her
readiness to shower them upon her worshipers, the modern Ger-
man proverb "Morgenstunde hat Gold im Munde »* seems to have
a kind of mythological ring; and the stories of benign fairies,
changing everything into gold, sound likewise like an echo from
the long-forgotten forest of our common Aryan home.
In order to gain a commanding view of the countries traversed
by these fables, let us take our position at Bagdad in the middle
of the eighth century, and watch from that central point the
movements of our literary caravan in its progress from the far
East to the far West. In the middle of the eighth century,
during the reign of the great Khalif Almansur, Abdallah ibn
Almokaffa wrote his famous collection of fables, the 'Kalila and
Dimnah,' which we still possess. The Arabic text of these fables
has been published by Sylvestre de Sacy, and there is an English
translation of it by Mr. Knatchbull, formerly professor of Arabic
at Oxford. Abdallah ibn Almokaffa was a Persian by birth, who,
after the fall of the Omeyyades, became a convert to Mohamme-
danism, and rose to high office at the court of the Khalifs. Being
*«The morning hour has gold in its mouth: »— "Early to bed and early
to rise, Makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise. »
## p. 10435 (#263) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10435
in possession of important secrets of State, he became dangerous
in the eyes of the Khalif Almansur, and was foully murdered. In
the preface, Abdallah ibn Almokaffa tells us that he translated
these fables from Pehlevi, the ancient language of Persia; and
that they had been translated into Pehlevi (about two hundred
years before his time) by Barzûyeh, the physician of Khosru
Nushirvan, the King of Persia, the contemporary of the Emperor
Justinian. The King of Persia had heard that there existed in
India a book full of wisdom; and he had commanded his Vezier,
Buzurjmihr, to find a man acquainted with the languages both of
Persia and India. The man chosen was Barzûyeh. He traveled
to India, got possession of the book, translated it into Persian,
and brought it back to the court of Khosru. Declining all rewards
beyond a dress of honor, he only stipulated that an account of
his own life and opinions should be added to the book.
account, probably written by himself, is extremely curious. It is
a kind of 'Religio Medici' of the sixth century; and shows us
a soul dissatisfied with traditions and formularies, striving after
truth, and finding rest only where many other seekers after truth
have found rest before and after him,-in a life devoted to alle-
viating the sufferings of mankind.
There is another account of the journey of this Persian
physician to India. It has the sanction of Firdúsi, in the great
Persian epic, the 'Shah Nâmeh'; and it is considered by some
as more original than the one just quoted. According to it, the
Persian physician read in a book that there existed in India
trees or herbs supplying a medicine with which the dead could
be restored to life. At the command of the King he went to
India in search of those trees and herbs; but after spending a
year in vain researches, he consulted some wise people on the
subject. They told him that the medicine of which he had read
as having the power to restore men to life, had to be understood
in a higher and more spiritual sense; and that what was really
meant by it were ancient books of wisdom preserved in India,
which imparted life to those who were dead in their folly and
sins. Thereupon the physician translated these books, and one
of them was the collection of fables,- the 'Kalila and Dimnah. '
It is possible that both these stories were later inventions;
the preface also by Ali, the son of Alshah Farési, in which the
names of Bidpai and King Dabshelim are mentioned for the
## p. 10436 (#264) ##########################################
10436
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
first time, is of later date. But the fact remains that Abdallah
ibn Almokaffa, the author of the oldest Arabic collection of our
fables, translated them from Pehlevi, the language of Persia at
the time of Khosru Nushirvan; and that the Pehlevi text which
he translated was believed to be a translation of a book brought
from India in the middle of the sixth century. That Indian book
could not have been the 'Pañkatantra' as we now possess it,
but must have been a much larger collection of fables: for the
Arabic translation, the 'Kalilah and Dimnah,' contains eighteen
chapters instead of the five of the 'Pañkatantra'; and it is only
in the fifth, the seventh, the eighth, the ninth, and the tenth
chapters that we find the same stories which form the five books
of the Pañkatantra in the textus ornatior.
In this Arabic translation, the story of the Brahman and the
pot of rice runs as follows:-
"A religious man was in the habit of receiving every day from
the house of a merchant a certain quantity of butter [oil] and honey;
of which, having eaten as much as he wanted, he put the rest into a
jar, which he hung on a nail in a corner of the room, hoping that
the jar would in time be filled. Now as he was leaning back one
day on his couch, with a stick in his hand, and the jar suspended
over his head, he thought of the high price of butter and honey,
and said to himself, 'I will sell what is in the jar, and buy with the
money which I obtain for it ten goats; which producing each of them
a young one every five months, in addition to the produce of the
kids as soon as they begin to bear, it will not be long before there is
a great flock. ' He continued to make his calculations, and found that
he should at this rate, in the course of two years, have more than
four hundred goats. 'At the expiration of the term I will buy,' said
he, 'a hundred black cattle, in the proportion of a bull or a cow
for every four goats. I will then purchase land, and hire workmen
to plow it with the beasts, and put it into tillage; so that before
five years are over, I shall no doubt have realized a great fortune
by the sale of the milk which the cows will give, and of the produce
of my land. My next business will be to build a magnificent house,
and engage a number of servants, both male and female; and when
my establishment is completed, I will marry the handsomest woman I
can find, who, in due time becoming a mother, will present me with
an heir to my possessions, who, as he advances in age, shall receive
the best masters that can be procured; and if the progress which
he makes in learning is equal to my reasonable expectations, I shall
## p. 10437 (#265) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10437
be amply repaid for the pains and expense which I have bestowed
upon him; but if, on the other hand, he disappoints my hopes, the rod
which I have here shall be the instrument with which I will make
him feel the displeasure of a justly offended parent. ' At these words
he suddenly raised the hand which held the stick towards the jar,
and broke it, and the contents ran down upon his head and face. "
You will have observed the coincidences between the Arabic
and the Sanskrit versions; but also a considerable divergence,
particularly in the winding up of the story. The Brahman and
the holy man both build their castles in the air; but while the
former kicks his wife, the latter only chastises his son. How this
change came to pass we cannot tell. One might suppose that at
the time when the book was translated from Sanskrit into Peh-
levi, or from Pehlevi into Arabic, the Sanskrit story was exactly
like the Arabic story, and that it was changed afterwards. But
another explanation is equally admissible; viz. , that the Pehlevi
or the Arabic translator wished to avoid the offensive behavior of
the husband kicking his wife, and therefore substituted the son
as a more deserving object of castigation.
We have thus traced our story from Sanskrit to Pehlevi, and
from Pehlevi to Arabic; we have followed it in its migrations.
from the hermitages of Indian sages to the court of the kings.
of Persia, and from thence to the residence of the powerful Kha-
lifs at Bagdad. Let us recollect that the Khalif Almansur, for
whom the Arabic translation was made, was a contemporary of
Abderrahman, who ruled in Spain; and that both were but little
anterior to Harun al Rashid and Charlemagne. At that time,
therefore, the way was perfectly open for these Eastern fables,
after they had once reached Bagdad, to penetrate into the seats of
Western learning, and to spread to every part of the new empire
of Charlemagne. They may have done so, for all we know; but
nearly three hundred years pass
before these fables meet us
again in the literature of Europe. The Carlovingian empire had
fallen to pieces, Spain had been rescued from the Mohammedans,
William the Conqueror had landed in England, and the Crusades
had begun to turn the thoughts of Europe towards the East,
when, about the year 1080, we hear of a Jew of the name of Sym-
eon, the son of Seth, who translated these fables from Arabic into
Greek. He states in his preface that the book came originally
from India, that it was brought to King Chosroes of Persia, and
then translated into Arabic. .
The Greek text has been
## p. 10438 (#266) ##########################################
10438
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
published, though very imperfectly, under the title of 'Stephan-
ites and Ichnelates. ' Here our fable is told as follows:
―――
"It is said that a beggar kept some honey and butter in a jar
close to where he slept. One night he thought thus within himself:
'I shall sell this honey and butter for however small a sum; with it
I shall buy ten goats, and these in five months will produce as many
again. In five years they will become four hundred. With them I
shall buy one hundred cows, and with them I shall cultivate some
land. And what with their calves and the harvests, I shall become
rich in five years, and build a house with four wings, ornamented
with gold, and buy all kinds of servants and marry a wife. She will
give me a child, and I shall call him Beauty. It will be a boy, and
I shall educate him properly; and if I see him lazy, I shall give him
such a flogging with this stick! ' With these words he took a stick
that was near him, struck the jar, and broke it, so that the honey
and milk ran down on his beard. "
This Greek translation might, no doubt, have reached La Fon-
taine; but as the French poet was not a great scholar, least of
all a reader of Greek MSS. , and as the fables of Symeon Seth
were not published till 1697, we must look for other channels
through which the old fable was carried along from East to
West.
The fact is, these fables had found several other channels,
through which, as early as the thirteenth century, they reached
the literary market of Europe, and became familiar as household
words, at least among the higher and educated classes.
But Perrette with the milk-pail has not yet arrived at the
end of her journey.
Remember that in all our wander-
ings we have not yet found the milkmaid, but only the Brah-
man or the religious man. What we want to know is, who first
brought about this metamorphosis.
•
•
No doubt La Fontaine was quite the man to seize on any
jewel which was contained in the Oriental fables, to remove the
cumbersome and foreign-looking setting, and then to place the
principal figure in that pretty frame in which most of us have
first become acquainted with it. But in this case the charmer's
wand did not belong to La Fontaine, but to some forgotten
worthy, whose very name it will be difficult to fix upon with
certainty.
We have as yet traced three streams only, all starting from
the Arabic translation of Abdallah ibn Almokaffa,-one in the
## p. 10439 (#267) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10439
eleventh, another in the twelfth, a third in the thirteenth cen-
tury,- all reaching Europe, some touching the very steps of the
throne of Louis XIV. , yet none of them carrying the leaf which
contained the story of Perrette,' or of the Brahman,' to the
threshold of La Fontaine's home. We must therefore try again.
After the conquest of Spain by the Mohammedans, Arabic
literature had found a new home in Western Europe; and among
the numerous works translated from Arabic into Latin or Spanish,
we find towards the end of the thirteenth century (1289) a Span-
ish translation of our fables, called 'Calila é Dymna. ' In this
the name of the philosopher is changed from Bidpai to Bundobel.
This, or another translation from Arabic, was turned into Latin
verse by Raimond de Beziers in 1313 (not published).
Lastly, we find in the same century another translation from
Arabic straight into Latin verse, by Baldo, which became known
under the name of 'Esopus Alter. '
From these frequent translations, and translations of transla-
tions, in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries, we see
quite clearly that these Indian fables were extremely popular,
and were in fact more widely read in Europe than the Bible, or
any other book. They were not only read in translations, but
having been introduced into sermons, homilies, and works on
morality, they were improved upon, acclimatized, localized, till at
last it is almost impossible to recognize their Oriental features
under their homely disguises.
I shall give you one instance only.
Rabelais, in his 'Gargantua,' gives a long description of how
a man might conquer the whole world. At the end of this dia-
logue, which was meant as a satire on Charles V. , we read:
-
"There was here present at that time an old gentleman well expe-
rienced in the wars,- a stern soldier, and who had been in many
great hazards, - named Echephron, who, hearing this discourse, said:
'J'ay grand peur que toute ceste entreprise sera semblable à la farce
du pot au laict duquel un cordavanier se faisoit riche par resverie,
puis le pot cassé, n'eut de quoy disner. »» (I fear me that this great
undertaking will turn out like the farce of the pot of milk, which
made the shoemaker rich in imagination till he broke the pot, and
had to go without his dinner. )
This is clearly our story; only the Brahman has as yet been
changed into a shoemaker only, and the pot of rice or the jar
## p. 10440 (#268) ##########################################
10440
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
of butter and honey into a pitcher of milk. Fortunately, we can
make at least one step further, a step of about two centuries.
This step backwards brings us to the thirteenth century, and
there we find our old Indian friend again, and this time really
changed into a milkmaid The book I refer to is written in
Latin, and is called 'Dialogus Creaturarum optime moralizatus';
in English, the 'Dialogue of Creatures Moralized. ' It was a
book intended to teach the principles of Christian morality by
examples taken from ancient fables. It was evidently a most
successful book, and was translated into several modern lan-
guages. There is an old translation of it in English, first printed
by Rastell, and afterwards reprinted in 1816. I shall read you
from it the fable in which, as far as I can find, the milkmaid
appears for the first time on the stage, surrounded already by
much of that scenery which, four hundred years later, received
its last touches at the hand of La Fontaine.
"DIALOGO C. - For as it is but madnesse to trust to moche in
surete, so it is but foly to hope to moche of vanyteys, for vayne be
all erthly thinges longynge to men, as sayth Davyd, Psal. xciiii. :
Wher of it is tolde in fablys that a lady uppon a tyme delyvered to
her mayden a galon of mylke to sell at a cite, and by the way, as she
sate and restid her by a dyche side, she began to thinke that with the
money of the mylke she wold bye an henne, the which shulde bringe
forth chekyns, and when they were growyn to hennys she wolde sell
them and by piggis, and eschaunge them in to shepe, and the shepe
in to oxen, and so whan she was come to richesse she sholde be
maried right worshipfully unto some worthy man, and thus she re-
ioycid. And whan she was thus mervelously comfortid and ravisshed
inwardly in her secrete solace, thinkynge with howe greate ioye she
shuld be ledde towarde the chirche with her husbond on horsebacke,
she sayde to her self: 'Goo we, goo we. ' Sodaynlye she smote the
ground with her fote, myndynge to spurre the horse, but her fote
slypped, and she fell in the dyche, and there lay all her mylke, and
so she was farre from her purpose, and never had that she hopid to
have. "
Here we have arrived at the end of our journey. It has been
a long journey across fifteen or twenty centuries, and I am afraid
our following Perrette from country to country, and from lan-
guage to language, may have tired some of my hearers. I shall,
therefore, not attempt to fill the gap that divides the fable of the
thirteenth century from La Fontaine. Suffice it to say, that the
## p. 10441 (#269) ##########################################
FREDERICK MAX MÜLLER
10441
milkmaid, having once taken the place of the Brahman, main-
tained it against all comers. We find her as Doña Truhana in
the famous 'Conde Lucanor,' the work of the Infante Don Juan
Manuel who died in 1347; the grandson of St. Ferdinand, the
nephew of Alfonso the Wise; though himself not a king, yet
more powerful than a king; renowned both by his sword and by.
his pen, and possibly not ignorant of Arabic, the language of
his enemies. We find her again in the 'Contes et Nouvelles' of
Bonaventure des Periers, published in the sixteenth century,— a
book which we know that La Fontaine was well acquainted with.
We find her, after La Fontaine, in all the languages of Europe.
You see now before your eyes the bridge on which our fables
came to us from East to West. The same bridge which brought
us Perrette brought us hundreds of fables, all originally sprung
up in India, many of them carefully collected by Buddhist priests
and preserved in their sacred canon, afterwards handed on to the
Brahmanic writers of a later age, carried by Barzûyeh from India
to the court of Persia, then to the courts of the Khalifs at Bag-
dad and Cordova, and of the Emperors at Constantinople. Some
of them no doubt perished on their journey, others were mixed
up together, others were changed till we should hardly know
them again. Still, if you once know the eventful journey of Per-
rette, you know the journey of all the other fables that belong to
this Indian cycle. Few of them have gone through so many
changes; few of them have found so many friends, whether in
the courts of kings or in the huts of beggars. Few of them
have been to places where Perrette has not also been. This is
why I selected her and her passage through the world as the best
illustration of a subject which otherwise would require a whole
course of lectures to do it justice.
## p. 10442 (#270) ##########################################
10442
WILHELM MÜLLER
(1794-1827)
LOVE no lyric poet excepting Goethe so much as Wilhelm
Müller," wrote Heine; and indeed, as he himself gladly
acknowledged, Heine owed to Müller many a tricksy lyric
charm. Müller was born at Dessau on October 7th, 1794, and there
he died on September 30th, 1827. In this brief space of thirty years
he succeeded in leaving upon the hearts of the German people an
impress of his poetic personality, that seems destined to last while
songs are sung and nature still has charms. He died just as his
genius was maturing. His spirit was pre-
paring for higher flights when it passed
from earth altogether. He is thus a poet
for the young-for those who delight in
"young love and old wine. " The heart of
youth finds in Müller's poems the expres-
sion of its own vague longings and un-
defined emotions; and the heart of the
aged, if it has preserved its freshness, is
quickened by the genial flow of his simple,
passionate verse.
WILHELM MÜLLER
Müller, like thousands of spirits far less
fine than his, was touched to patriotic issues
at the time of the great uprising against
Napoleon. He had begun the study of phi-
lology and history at Berlin when the wars for freedom broke out.
During 1813 and 1814, following the call of the Prussian king, he
served his country as a volunteer, as Kleist and Körner did. He
then quietly resumed the study of Old German at the Berlin Univer-
sity. This taste for old Germanic lore reveals that tendency of mind
which in his son, Professor Max Müller, has reached its scholarly
fruition. In the father's case these studies were placed first of all at
the service of the Muses; through them he acquired that intimate
knowledge of the essential qualities of early German culture, which
enabled him so perfectly to catch the tone of the German folk-song.
In the circle of young Berlin poets, his talent found stimulus and
encouragement. In 1815 this group of friends issued the Bundes-
blätter' (Leaves of Union), and here are to be found the earliest
poems of Wilhelm Müller.
## p. 10443 (#271) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10443
In 1817 there came to Müller, as to Geibel later, the ardently
desired opportunity of standing upon classic soil. He went to Italy.
and the literary result of his trip was the graceful book published
in 1820, and entitled 'Rom, Römer, und Römerinnen' (Rome, and
Roman Men and Women). Upon his return in 1819, he was called to
his native city of Dessau as a teacher of ancient languages. At the
same time he held the post of librarian of the newly founded Ducal
Library. His philological works were chiefly contributions to ency-
clopædias and other compilations. He translated Marlowe's 'Faus-
tus,' and Achim von Arnim wrote the preface; Fauriel's collection of
modern Greek folk-songs he also put into German. Perhaps the
most valuable of his scholarly undertakings was the 'Library of Ger-
man Poets of the Seventeenth Century,' in ten volumes.
But it is not upon these things that Müller's fame rests.
He was
first of all a poet; and this became evident to the public at large
when in 1821 he published 'Gedichte aus den Hinterlassenen Papieren
eines Reisenden Waldhornisten' (Poems from the Posthumous Papers
of a Traveling Bugler). In the same year appeared the first of the
famous 'Griechenlieder' (Songs of the Greeks), in which the profound
sympathy of the German people with the Greek struggle for freedom
found stirring expression. With his love for the heroes of ancient
Greece he combined a splendid enthusiasm for Byron, Kanaris, and
Marco Bozzaris. This uprising of Greece appealed to all poets, and
the magic of Byron's name seemed to make it peculiarly their affair.
All the bards of the land of song burst into impassioned verse in
defense of the classic country and Pierian spring which had been
the original source of their own inspiration. The Songs of the
Greeks' aided powerfully in rousing indignation against the Turks;
and just as Greek admirers of Byron had sent marble to be used
for the poet's monument in London, so the Greek Parliament voted
a ship-load of Pentelican marble for the monument which has been
erected to Müller in Dessau.
If the 'Songs of the Greeks' are less well known to the world
at large than two other series of Müller's lyrics, this is primarily due
to Franz Schubert. The two cycles of exquisite lyrics entitled 'Die
Schöne Müllerin' (The Pretty Maid of the Mill) and 'Die Winterreise'
(The Winter Journey) caught the heart and ear of Schubert, and he
wedded them to immortal music. We are made to share the fresh
joy of the wandering miller, who, following the guidance of his
beloved brook, finds the fickle beauty of the mill and loves her;
and we share, too, his sorrow when her heart turns to the hunts-
man, clad in green, and her faithful lover buries his grief and love
in the waters of the still singing brook. There is thus a dramatic
interest that binds together these simple songs. In this cycle, as in
the Winter Journey,' one feels the deep sustaining joy of the poet
<
## p. 10444 (#272) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10444
in all outdoor nature: it is symbolized in the loving intimacy
between the miller and the brook, between th wanderer and the
linden-tree. Taken with the music, the two cycles form little lyric
dramas; the words can no longer be recalled without the melody,
and these combined creations of Müller and Schubert are among the
most beautiful and delicate works of art that have sprung from the
lyric genius of Germany. And so, although no poet voice had a
more vigorous ring when it sang in the cause of freedom, it is prob-
able that Müller will be chiefly remembered as the singer of winter
journeys and wanderers' joys, of mill-stream melodies and the lays
of love.
FROM THE PRETTY MAID OF THE MILL'
Translated by Charles Harvey Genung and Edward Breck
WANDERING
O WANDER is the miller's joy,
To wander!
T
He must a wretched miller be
Who would not wander merrily,
And wander!
We learned it from the water brook,
The water!
It takes no rest by night or day,
But ever wends its laughing way,
The water!
We learn it from the mill-wheel too,
The mill-wheel!
That will not stand a moment still,
But tireless turns the mighty mill,
The mill-wheel!
The stones themselves forget their weight,
The millstones!
They join the merry dancing crew,
And try to move much faster too,
The millstones!
To wander, wander is my joy,
To wander!
Good master and good mistress, pray,
Let me in peace now go my way
And wander!
## p. 10445 (#273) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
WHITHER?
I HEARD a brooklet gushing
From out the rocky spring,
Down through the valley rushing
With clear and laughing ring.
I know not what came o'er me,
What longing filled my breast:
Down to the vale it bore me,
And onward without rest.
Far downward, ever onward,
I followed its dancing gleam,
And louder still and clearer
Sang ever the happy stream.
And this way must I wander?
O brooklet, whither, say?
Thou hast with thy sweet rushing
My reason charmed away.
What, prate I then of rushing?
That can no rushing be!
'Tis the voice of the water-nixies,
That sing their songs to me.
Ah, heed not song nor rushing,
But wander onward still;
There must be merry mill-wheels
In every flashing rill.
HALT !
I SPY a mill forth peeping
By the alder-lined mere;
The rushing and singing
Of mill-wheels I hear.
Hey, welcome, hey, how welcome,
Sweet old song of the mill!
And the house with its windows
Is so cozy and still.
And the sunshine above me
Makes heaven seem gay!
Ah, brooklet, lovely brooklet,
Was it this thou wouldst say?
10445
## p. 10446 (#274) ##########################################
10446
WILHELM MÜLLER
THANKSGIVING TO THE BROOK
WAS it this thou wouldst say,
My friend, by thy lay?
By ringing and singing,
Was it this thou wouldst say?
To the miller's maid go!
Thou meanest it so.
Ah! Have I not guessed it?
To the miller's maid go!
Can her wish it be,
Or foolest thou me?
Oh, this only tell me,
If her wish it be.
Howe'er it was meant,
I'll rest me content;
I have found what I sought for,
Howe'er it was meant.
I sought work, indeed,
I've now all I need;
For my hands, for my heart,
I've all that I need!
CURIOSITY
I'LL ask no pretty flower,
I'll ask no starry sphere;
For none of them can tell me
What I so long to hear.
Besides, I'm not a gardener,
The stars all hang too high;
My brooklet here shall tell me
If my fond heart doth lie.
O brooklet, my beloved,
Why singest thou no more?
I ask for one word only,
One answer o'er and o'er.
"Yes" is the word I long for,
The other word is "no";
In one of these two answers
Is all my weal or woe.
## p. 10447 (#275) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10447
O brooklet, my beloved,
Why shouldst thou wayward be?
I'll promise not to tell it-
Say, brooklet, loves she me?
IMPATIENCE
I'D CARVE it deep in every forest tree,
On every stone I'd grave it lastingly;
In every garden plot the words I'd sow,
With seed that soon my sweet device would show,
That she should see my faithful heart's endeavor:
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
A magpie young and lusty I would teach,
Until he sang aloud that sweetest speech,
And sang it with my voice's counterpart,
With all the yearning of my loving heart;
He'd sing it then to her and cease it never:
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
I'd fling it forth to every morning breeze,
I'd sigh it softly to the swaying trees;
Oh, that it shone from every blossom fair!
Oh, that she breathed it in the perfumed air!
Are mill-wheels all that thou canst move, O river?
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
I thought it looked from out my loving eyes,
And burned upon my cheeks in telltale guise;
Imprinted on my speechless lips it were,
And every breath I drew cried out to her;
But she, alas, heeds naught of my endeavor:
Thine is my heart, and shall be thine forever.
GOOD-MORNING
GOOD-MORNING, pretty miller's lass!
Why hide thy head, whene'er I pass,
Behind the curtain yonder?
Dost think my greetings boldness show?
Disturb thee then my glances so?
Then onward I must wander.
## p. 10448 (#276) ##########################################
10448
WILHELM MÜLLER
Oh, let me linger by the brook,
And only at thy window look,
Below there, just below there!
Thou flaxen head, now hide no more!
Come forth from out your oval door,
Ye morning stars that show there!
Ye slumber-laden eyes so blue,
Ye flowers wet with morning dew,
Doth ruddy sunlight blind you?
Were they so sweet, the joys of sleep,
That now you close and droop and weep,
Because they're left behind you?
Now shake ye off the dreamland haze,
And fresh and free your heads upraise,
To greet the shining morrow!
Aloft the lark doth gayly soar,
And at the deep heart's inmost core
Awake love's care and sorrow.
SHOWERS OF TEARS
WE SAT nestled close to each other,
In shady alder nook;
We gazed long and fondly together
Down into the murmuring brook.
The moon uprose in heaven,
The stars began to glow,
And gazed long and fondly together
At the silvery mirror below.
'Twas not the moon that I gazed at,
And not the starry skies:
Her picture was all I gazed at,
And all I saw was her eyes.
I saw them there winking and blinking
Deep down in my brooklet so true;
The flowers on the margin, the blue ones,
Are winking and blinking there too.
And in the waters sunken
The whole wide heaven shone,
And into its glistening bosom
It seemed to lure me on.
## p. 10449 (#277) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10449
And over the clouds and the starlight
The brook rippled joyous and free,
And called me, ringing and singing:-
"Come hither, O brother, to me! "
XVIII-654
And blurred were my eyes with hot tear-drops;
Before me the brook seemed to spin;
She said, "A shower is coming:
Good-night I'm going in. "
――――
MINE!
BROOKLET, cease that song of thine!
Mill-wheels, stop your whirr and whine!
All ye merry wood-songsters fine,
Make no sign;
Silent be and close your eyne!
Every line
WITHERED FLOWERS
Ан, ALL уe flowers
I'll design-
It shall but one rhyme enshrine:
For the miller's lovely maid is mine!
Mine!
Springtime, are there then no fairer flowers thine?
Sunlight, canst thou then no brighter shine?
Ah, alone I must repine
With that sweetest of all words, "Mine,»
Understood by none in all this world divine!
That she once gave,
Ye shall be buried
•
With me in the grave.
Why gaze ye sadly
Upon me so,
As if with pity
Ye saw my woe?
-
Ah, all ye flowers
Of pale regret,
Ah, all ye flowers,
How came ye wet?
## p. 10450 (#278) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10450
But tears can't freshen
The flowers like rain,
Cannot make dead passion
To bloom again.
The winter's dying,
And spring will appear,
And flowers will blossom
Around me here.
And flowers will cover
My new-made grave,—
Ah, all the flowers,
That she once gave!
And when she wanders
The church-yard through,
And softly murmurs,
"His love was true! "-
Then, all ye flowers,
Oh bloom, oh blow!
For May is coming,
And gone is the snow.
THE MILLER AND THE BROOK
The Miller:
WHEN a heart so constant
Must break and must die,
The lilies all withered
And broken lie.
In clouds then the full moon
Must veil her head,
And hide from all mortals
The tears she doth shed.
In heaven the angels
Their eyes gently close;
They're sobbing and soothing
The soul to repose.
The Brook:
When love has o'ermastered
Its hopes and fears,
## p. 10451 (#279) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10451
A new star, bright shining,
In heaven appears.
Then blossom three roses,
Half white, half red,
That never shall wither
In garden bed.
And in heaven the angels
Their pinions will clip,
And earthwards each morning
Will fairily trip.
The Miller:
Ah, brooklet, lovely brooklet,
Thou'rt faithful and true;
Ah, brooklet, but thou know'st not
What love can do.
Ah, down there, far down there,
'Tis cool and deep.
Ah, brooklet, lovely brooklet,
Now sing me to sleep.
CRADLE SONG OF THE BROOK
SWEETLY sleep, sweetly sleep!
I'll thy vigil keep!
Wanderer, so weary, thou'rt now at home.
Securely rest
Asleep on my breast,
Till the brooklets mingle with ocean foam.
Thy bed shall be cool
In moss-lined pool,
In the chamber of sparkling blue crystal clear;
Come, wavelets, wave,
His cradle lave,
Soothe him and rock him, my comrade so dear.
When the sound of horn
From the greenwood's borne,
I will rush and I'll gush, that thou mayst not hear.
Peep ye not through,
Little flow'rets blue!
You make all the dreams of my sleeper so drear.
## p. 10452 (#280) ##########################################
WILHELM MÜLLER
10452
Away, away
From my margin stay,
Wicked maiden, lest from thy shadow he wake!
But throw me down
Thy kerchief brown,
So for his eyes I'll a bandage make!
Now good-night, now good-night!
Till all's made right,
Forget all thy hopes, and forget thy fate!
The moon shines bright,
The mists take flight,
And the heaven above me how wide and how great!
VINETA
F
ROM the sea's deep hollow faintly pealing,
Far-off evening bells come sad and slow;
Faintly rise, the wondrous tale revealing
Of the old enchanted town below.
On the bosom of the flood reclining,
Ruined arch and wall and broken spire,
Down beneath the watery mirror shining,
Gleam and flash in flakes of golden fire.
And the boatman, who at twilight hour,
Once that magic vision shall have seen,
Heedless how the crags may round him lower,
Evermore will haunt the charmèd scene.
From the heart's deep hollow faintly pealing,
Far I hear them, bell-notes sad and slow,
Ah! a wild and wondrous tale revealing
Of the drownèd wreck of love below.
There a world in loveliness decaying
Lingers yet in beauty ere it die;
Phantom forms across my senses playing,
Flash like golden fire-flakes from the sky.
Lights are gleaming, fairy bells are ringing,
And I long to plunge and wander free
Where I hear those angel-voices singing
In those ancient towers below the sea.
Translation of J. A. Froude.
## p. 10453 (#281) ##########################################
10453
-
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
(CHARLES EGBERT CRADDOCK)
(1850-)
W
HEN Miss Murfree's first work appeared, not only was her
pseudonym, Charles Egbert Craddock, accepted by her edi-
tors without suspicion as her proper name, but the public
was equally deceived. The firm, quiet touch, the matter wholly free
from subjectiveness, the robust humor, and the understanding of
masculine life, had no trace of femininity.
Her first book, Where the Battle was
Fought, which finally appeared in 1884,
was the effort of a very young writer, con-
taining more of promise than fulfillment,
though the peculiarities of style and char-
acter were prophetic of her later manner.
No publisher desired it until the great favor
accorded to 'In the Tennessee Mountains'
opened the way. In the maturer story was
struck a more confident note. Miss Murfree
had found her field, and henceforth the
Tennessee mountains and their inhabitants
were to occupy her descriptive powers.
These men and women are for the first part
rude people, kept in unlikeness to the outside world not only by their
distance from civilization, but by the mist of tradition in which they
live. Here is a colony of people who have their own ideas of eti-
quette, and as strict a code as that of Versailles in the time of
Louis XIV. ,- their own notions of comfort and wealth, and their own
civil and moral laws. Here they dwell in their mountain fastnesses,
distilling illicit whisky with as clear a conscience as they plant the
corn from which they make it, or as the Northern farmer makes
cider from his apples-in their opinion an exact parallel. Passion-
ately religious, full of picturesque poetry,-which they learn from
the Bible, their only familiar book,-no wonder the "Prophet of the
Great Smoky Mountain" thrilled his audiences when he described the
scenes enacted in the Old Testament as having been transacted on
the very hillsides where he preached, and that the majestic imagery
of the Book was heightened by the majestic surroundings.
MARY N. MURFREE
## p. 10454 (#282) ##########################################
10454
MARY NOAILLES MURFREE
But good material," in a literary sense, as are the Tennessee
mountaineers, no sort of idealization nor surface acquaintance, how-
ever aided by artistic intuition, could have made them natural to the
outside world. It was the office of one who knew them as Miss Mur-
free knew them, not only from the inside view but the view of a
social superior, which enabled her to give the picture a perspective.
Nowhere is this gift better indicated than in the artistic story 'Drift-
ing down Lost Creek,' in which the elements of interest are thor-
oughly worked up, the motive of the delicate romance touched with
a perfect consciousness of the author's audience; while there is such
a regard for the verities, that the whole story turns on the every-
day feminine loyalty of a mountain girl to her lover. On Big Injin
Mountain is an episode of a sturdier kind, more dramatic both in
matter and in manner than 'Drifting down Lost Creek'; but at its
close, when the rude mountaineers display a tenderness for the man
they have misunderstood, the reader, gentle or simple, is perforce
thrilled into sympathy,- for this is a passage to which the better
part of human nature, wherever found, responds.
In Miss Murfree's writings we are perhaps too often reminded of
the pictorial art which she undoubtedly possesses, by the effect she
evolves from the use of words. She has a clear vision and a dra-
matic temperament; and it is a temptation, not always resisted, to
emphasize physical surroundings in order to heighten situations. The
moment a lull occurs in the action of her personages, the mountain
solitudes come in to play their part, the sylvan glades, the chro-
matic hues, the foaming cataracts, the empurpled shadows. Even the
wild animals assume the functions of dramatis persona, and are an
inarticulate chorus to interpret the emotions of the human actors.
