S. Baring-Gould

“ Our interest attaches specially to the golden ball. The story is almost certainly the remains of an old religious myth. The golden ball which one sister has is the sun, the silver ball of the other sister is the moon. [Pg 288] The sun is lost; it sets, and the trolls, the spirits of darkness, play with it under the bed, that is, in the house of night, beneath the earth.
But the sun is not only a golden ball, but it is also a shining stone; and here at the outset we tell our secret: the sun is the true Philosopher’s Stone, that turns all to gold, that gives health, that fills with joy. ”

“ After a while Symeon informed his comrade that he could not rest in the cave, but that he was resolved to serve God in the city. He felt there were souls to be saved in the world, and that he had a call to labour for their conversion.
This announcement filled John with dismay. He wept, and entreated Symeon not to desert him. “What shall I do, alone, in this wild ocean of sand? O my brother, I thought that death alone would have separated us, and now thou tearest thyself away of thine own will. ”

“ It is the voice of a man now dead, coming back in the [Pg 41] hush of a darkened house—from the vault, low and hoarse as an echo. It speaks, and people hearken; it commands, and people obey; law supports and enforces its wishes; no power on earth can alter it. We expect to hear the voice calm, earnest, and speaking true judgment; terrible indeed if it breaks out with a snarl of hate—more terrible still if it gibbers and laughs a hollow, ghost-like laugh. ”

“ The complaint now rapidly gained ground, and before many days Thorgunna was dead. The farmer put her corpse into a coffin; then took all the bed-furniture into the open air, and, raising a pile of wood, flung the clothes on top of it, and was about to fire the pile, when, with a face pale with dismay, forth rushed Thurida to know what in the name of wonder her husband was about to do with those treasures of needlework, the coverlet, sheets, and curtains of the strange lady’s bed. ”

“ A married couple may have been sincerely attached to each other so long as the vital spark was twinkling, but the moment it is extinguished the dead partner becomes, not a sadly sweet reminiscence, but an object of the liveliest terror to the survivor. He or she does everything that ingenuity can suggest to get him or herself out of all association in body and spirit with the late lamented. Death is held to be thoroughly demoralising to the deceased. However exemplary a person he or she may have been in life, after death the ghost is little less than a plaguing, spiteful spirit. ”

“ Is it to be wondered at that the tender-spirited and love-lorn Neddy, when fallen upon by a ferocious woman armed with a thick club, her eyes scintillating with passion, her face flaming, her teeth gnashing, and foam issuing from her purple lips, whilst from her labouring bosom escape oaths and curses, at once profane and insensate—such as sacré bleu, and ventre gris, suggesting the probability that the utterer of the said expressions was a raving maniac ”

“ Political disturbances cannot obliterate them; war sweeps over the land they have adopted, famine devastates it, pestilence decimates its inhabitants, and for a while the ancient tales hide their heads, only to crop up [Pg 238] again green and fresh when the springtide of prosperity returns.
Sometimes a venerable myth disappears for an exceptionally long period, and its vitality is, we suppose, extinguished. But though ages roll by, if it have in it the real essential power of development and assimilation, it is only waiting for its time to start a fresh career, full of concentrated vigour. ”

“ The washerwoman’s ass was consigned, with back-turned ears and palpitating sides, to confinement in a stable. Madame Leclerc retired to her apartment exhausted from her battle, and fainted, with feminine dexterity, into the extended arms of monsieur the florist, her husband, and monsieur the deputy florist, his assistant. By slow degrees the lady was brought round, by means of feathers burned under her nose, and a drop of cordial distilled down her throat. And where was the she-ass, the cause of all this mischief? She had been turned out into a clover-field. Such is the way of the world. ”

“ In Europe, also, the idea of the marvellous stone remains; it is not used allegorically, except in the Grail myth, but it haunts men’s minds; they believe in it, they suppose it must be found, and they try to manufacture it out of all kinds of ingredients. [40]
Neither Arab nor European alchemist, nor Buddhist recluse, dreamed that the stone that gave light, that nourished, that rejoiced, that enriched, was the sun shining above their heads. The conception of the sun as a stone was so old, so rolled and rubbed down, that they had no notion whence it came. ”

“ The false emperor and the empress were seated in the midst of their nobles. As the true Jovinian entered, a large dog, which crouched on the hearth, and had been much cherished by him, flew at his throat, and but for timely intervention would have killed him. A falcon also, seated on her perch, no sooner saw him than she broke her jesses, and flew out of the hall. ”

“ Of my mortal remains, I will and bequeath my bristles to the cobblers, my teeth to squabblers, my ears to the deaf, my tongue to lawyers and chatterboxes, my entrails to tripemen, my hams to gluttons, my stomach to little boys, my tail to little girls, my muscles to effeminate parties, my heels to runners and hunters, my claws to thieves ”

“ A servant much devoted to his master, on his return from a journey, found his lord dead and prepared for burial. Full of grief, he cast himself on the deceased, and kissing his pallid lips poured forth a whirlwind of sighs. The breath thus emitted penetrated to the lungs of the corpse, inflated them, and the dead opened his eyes, winked, and sat up. ”

“ This air is warm or tepid, and it moves and is endowed unmistakably with life, and like an animal is composed of joints and limbs, so that it can turn itself about, and not only so, but it has a soul also; so that we may certainly predicate that it is an animal composed of vapour, and endowed with reason. ”

“ As iron, as brass, or stone, or steel.
For no wrath is equal to a woman’s wrath; and better is it to live in the cage of an African lion, or of a dragon torn from its whelps, than to live in the house with such a woman. ”

“ The weather continued the same, so that we found it impossible to resist the cold much longer, and deemed it prudent to return.
“Although the sky was very heavy and dark, we discovered, on our return, the entrance to a valley; if the weather had been more favourable we should doubtless have had the pleasure of investigating it; but we doubt whether we should have found Thorir’s dale. As we descended we found the wind in our face, which threw the snow so much against us that we could not discover the traces of our ascent.” ”

“ If we consider that the substances we absorb into our bodies become part of ourselves, and that our systems are undergoing a perpetual assimilation of the particles taken into us and renovation thereby, so that every seven years we have totally changed our substance, it is evident that, in the words of a learned friend of Doctor Cohausen, “This entire Hermippus, since he lived over one hundred years, must have been completely composed of the transmutated breath and porous exhalations of little girls; so that his career must have closed by evaporation.” ”

“ The doctor quotes with approval the opinion of Van Helmont, that the air absorbed into the lungs penetrates the whole system, and circulates through every part, to the very hair, catching up volatile salts on its passage. Thence he concludes that the exhalations of little girls, who are brimming over with vitality, and heaven knows what life-giving salts, must be charged with some of their redundant vitality; and if this breath be inhaled by an old man, he assumes into himself, and absorbs into his constitution, that life which had been cast off as superfluous by the children. ”

“ Nicolas rambled over the country, dirty, dishevelled, and naked, asking and enforcing alms. He was well known to the monks of the monasteries throughout the neighbourhood as an importunate beggar at their doors. The lonely traveller hastily flung him an offering, glad to escape so easily. On one occasion Nicolas waylaid the steward of the monastery of Sterium, and arresting the horse he rode, reproached him with stinginess. The monk, who was armed with a cudgel, bounded from his saddle, fell on Nicolas, and beat him unmercifully, then mounted and joyfully pursued his road. ”

“ Our own Milton has done poor Eve justice in lines which need no quotation.
Pygmalion, says the classic story, which is really a Phœnician myth of creation, made a woman of marble or ivory, and Aphrodite, in answer to his prayers, endowed the statue with life. We do not believe it. No woman was ever marble. She may seem hard and cold, but she only requires a sturdy male voice to bid her
Descend, be stone no more! ”

“ Among nature’s men, before they have gone through the mill of civilisation, plenty to eat and to drink, and some one to talk to, are the essentials of happiness. They see that the dead have none of these requisites, they consider that they are miserable without them. The writer remembers how, when he was a boy, and attended a funeral of a relative in November, he could not sleep all night—a bitter, frosty night—with the thought how cold it must be to the dead in the vault, without blankets, hot bottle, or fire. ”

“ The she-ass, unable to express the ardour of her affection by any other means, brayed thrice in the most tender and impassioned manner. The jackass replied with corresponding sentiment. He panted to approach her, but was restrained by his halter. To love, however, nothing is impossible; or, as the Latin syntax has it, “Amor omnia vincit.” He tossed his head, broke the cord, and trotted after the mistress of his affections.
Madame Leclerc adjured Neddy. Ladies do not like their servants to encourage followers. She shook her head at the lover and bade him return. ”

“ When the little creature became erect, the skin began to fall from the head and neck, and gradually unveiling the body, exhibited the maiden, beautiful as a flowery meadow, or the blue summer sky, or the north lit up with the flush of the dancing lights, or the rainbow which follows the fertilising shower. ”

“ The bitterness of hate has left no poison in its cavities, in it the fleeting passion has set no seal, emotion left no trace, pity relaxed no nerve. The impulses which brought forth so full a leafage of action are lost, as the sap from the bare tree. ”

“ The first requisite is certainty, for human nature is so constituted that if there be a chance of escape, ninety-nine out of a hundred will be found to run the risk. A slight punishment, if certain, is infinitely more likely to produce the required results than the most terrible exhibition of cruelty upon representative criminals. If certainty be a main requisite, speediness is also necessary; lasting and cruel punishments harden but do not reclaim.
Of this our forefathers in the middle ages were profoundly ignorant. ”

“ Gage was soon intimate with the bishop, Dom Bernard de Salazar, a very worthy prelate, perhaps a little wee bit too fond of the good things of this present life, but otherwise most exemplary, very energetic, and as bold as a saint in reforming abuses which had crept into the Church.
Talk of abuses, and you may be sure that woman is at the bottom of them! A certain czar, whenever he heard of a misfortune, at once asked, “Who was she?” knowing that some woman had originated it. ”

“ He started on his journey with a very pretty girl as his companion, whom he seduced from her home, whose hair he cut short with his own hands, and whom he disguised in male costume. But the parents of the damsel, anxious at her loss, made search for her, and found her, to their dismay and disgust, in company with Nicolas, dressed as a boy, sharing his bed and board, yelling “Kyrie eleison!” with him through the Greek villages, and making the best of their way to the sea to escape to Italy. ”

“ The youth, under the impression that high art is never appreciated at first sight, made himself scarce for some hours. The father, on his return, used every effort to obliterate the flowering of ink which his son had drawn over the amber breeches, but with only a limited degree of success—so limited, in fact, that the nobleman for whom they were destined utterly refused to invest his person in them, and they were returned on the tailor’s hands. ”

“ Christina’s conduct became daily more outrageous. She crept into bakers’ ovens, and there howled with pain at the heat, but would not come forth, till dragged out by the heels. Sometimes she would run into a fire and kick the brands about with her bare feet. When she saw water hot in large vessels for a washing, in she leaped, souse, and then shrieked with the pain. In winter she would run into the river and remain there squealing with cold, till the parish priest came and ordered her out. ”

“ Wives, poor bodies! do not come off well, for a crabbed husband will sometimes control and torment his good woman after he is dead and buried, or even play a bitter jest, as did one man, who left his wife 500 guineas, but with the stipulation that she was not to enjoy it till after her death, when the sum was to be expended on her funeral. ”