Hélène Guerber - Contes et légendes. 1re Partie

The original of this story is the common English nursery tale, "The Three Bears and Little Silver Hair."

This is one of the most popular of the Bohemian folk stories. It has been translated into many languages, and an elaborate version of it can be found in Laboulaye's "Fairy Book."

The story of the "Moss Rose" has been developed from the following beautiful lines by Krummacher:—

Another version of this story can be found in "Les Contes de Fées de Charles Perrault," where it is entitled "Les Souhaits Ridicules."

A Russian folk story. The cat is considered a foreigner who has just arrived from Siberia, while the fox, the bear, and the wolf are quite at home in the forest.

This is the Russian version of the myth of the Snow Maiden, which appears in the folk tales of all northern nations. Small at the beginning of the season, the child's rapid growth is emblematic of the rapid increase of the cold, and her sudden disappearance in the woods is typical of the melting of the last snows, which linger longest in the dense forests where the sunbeams cannot penetrate.

Jumping through the fire is a vestige of heathenism.

One of the Austro-Hungarian folk tales. Different versions of this story have been given, among others by Wratislaw, in his "Sixty Folk Tales from exclusively Slavonic Sources," and by Laboulaye in his well-known "Fairy Book."

This is one of the Dutch Mediæval Legends. The only Stavoren now existing is a little fishing town on the northeast coast of the Zuyder Zee. This gulf was caused by "the terrific inundations of the thirteenth century," when thousands of people perished. It was only after this inundation took place that the city of Amsterdam arose on the southwest shore of the Zuyder Zee. The story, with the exception of the inundation, is purely mythical.