nationalists. The first dreamer, they say, lived in the ideal past, the second in the times of Jewish greatness, and the third devoted himself to the flesh-pots of the present. Thus the old story receives a new application. Petrus Alphonsi could hardly have supposed so much practical wisdom was latent in one of his exempla.

That this story is well known among the Slavic peoples of Europe to-day, we have abundant evidence; and there can be no doubt, I think, that it reached them through translations of western European literary versions. I can see no reason for assuming that this tale, at least, came to them directly from the Orient. Not only could it have been easily transmitted from the Magyars, who had it from the "Hármas Histórias," to their eastern neighbors, but also more directly by means of the Polish and Russian translations of the "Gesta Romanorum," or the Bohemian translation of Steinhöwel.

A Russian version of the story as told by Petrus occurs in A. N. Pupin's “O russkich narodnych skazkach,” in “Otečestv. zapiski,” CV, ii, p. 61. The corresponding tale in the Russian "Pověsti izb Rimskich Dějanij," which does not vary in any important detail from the Petrine original, may be found in Pupin's "Očerk literaturnoj istorii star. pov. i skazok russkich," p. 190. After the tale became a possession of the Slavic folk, the number of persons was frequently reduced to two, and, as is natural, the background of the story was adapted to the national customs and local surroundings.1

Sumtsov (in " Современ. малор. этногр.," 2 : 79) gives a Little Russian version. In the "Сборникъ матеріаловъ для описанія мѣстностей племенъ Кавказа." (16 [1893] : 293-295), there is an interesting version entitled "Kто умные?"

A gipsy and a Russian go travelling together on a long journey, but take with them only a small quantity of food, one loaf of bread, twenty eggs, and one roast pig. At length only the pig remains; and the gipsy, becoming more and more hungry, and all the while afraid the Russian will eat it by himself, finally says, "Friend, let us go to sleep, and whichever of us has the best dream shall eat the whole pig." The Russian agrees, and they both lie down. The gipsy stays awake, however, trying to think up a clever dream, but at last has an inspiration and falls asleep. The Russian has been waiting for this; and as soon as he sees the gipsy sound asleep, he gets up, eats the pig to the very bones, and lies down again. Soon afterward the gipsy wakes up, and calls to his friend, "Come, let's tell our dreams!"—"I had a very poor dream," answers the Russian. "Mine

1 Gregor Krek, Einleitung in die slavische Literaturgeschichte (Graz, 1887), p. 780, note I. The works referred to by Krek and various others, relating to the Slavic versions of the story, it has been impossible for me to obtain. G. Polívka, in a review of the Ethnographical Publications of the Shevchenka Society (in Archiv für slavische Philologie, 22 [1900]: 301), gives one or two other references which I have been unable to trace. 2 Село Спасское, Ставропольской губерніи, Новогригорьевскаго уѣзда. Завѣдующаго Спасскимъ училищемъ, Николая Рябыхъ.

was a splendid one," says the gipsy. "I dreamed I was walking from mountain to mountain, from mountain to mountain, till I came to a very high one, where I could hear the language of the angels. There was a staircase which led up to heaven; and there I ascended and sat down with the angels, who were having a feast. I ate and ate all I wanted, and I still feel as if I wasn't hungry."—"I saw you eating there in heaven," says the Russian, "and I knew you would not want the pig, so I ate it myself." The gipsy rushed to the bag, but the pig was gone: there was not even a smell left.

A version in which the prize is once more a goose, as in the antePetrine tale of Judas, is reported by Radlov among the Tartars.1

a priest, an orator, and a marksman

set out on

Three companions a journey, and on the way the marksman shoots a goose. They halt, make a fire, and roast it, but agree to allot it to the one who has the best dream. While the others are asleep, the marksman gets up and eats it. When the others awake, the priest says: "You are an orator, your dream will be the best. Tell us it." The orator replies: "I became in my dream a dove, and flew to heaven. In the first section I saw the angels; in the second, the souls of the dead prophets."—"When I saw you had become a dove," said the priest, "I changed myself to a hawk and pursued you." Then the marksman said: "When I saw you both had flown away, I said to myself, 'They will not return;' and I got up and ate the goose, and put the bones in the kettle." When they looked in the kettle, there were the goose's bones.

In a Bohemian version there are again but two contestants, and the coveted food is a hare.

As a gipsy and his master are walking along, the master shoots a hare, but the gipsy claims it. To settle the dispute the master says, "I'll have it roasted to-night, and whichever of us has the better dream shall eat the hare to-morrow." The gipsy objects that one can have good dreams only in a soft comfortable bed; so the master invites him home, and has the · cook prepare him a couch in the kitchen. Merely to see the hare roasting has made his mouth water. He pretends to fall asleep, but furtively watches to see where the cook puts the hare after it is done. At midnight he gets up and devours it. In the morning he asks the master what sort of dream he has had. "I dreamed," replies the master, "I was walking among fragrant roses, and I came to a golden staircase leading up to heaven." "I dreamed I saw you from a distance," says the gipsy. "You went up to heaven, and I knew you would not come back, so I ate the hare myself." The master was so pleased by this answer, that he ordered an extra slice of ham to be given to the gipsy, but bade him never to go shooting hares again."

1 W. Radloff, Die Sprache der türkischen Stämme Süd-Siberiens, 1. Abt., Proben der Volkslitteratur. Übersetzung. IV Theil. (St. Petersburg, 1872) Tartaren der Kreise Tara, Tobolsk und Tümen (5. "Die drei Gefährten"), p. 130.

Joz. L'. Holuby, Povesti a rozprávočky z Bošackej doliny, No. XXXIV, "Cigáňov sen," in Slovenskí Pohl'ady, 16 (1896): 326–327.

In Croatia the story is told that a Greek and a Bačvanin, on the way to Pest, stopped at an inn to eat the liver of a lamb they had purchased.

"But this is not enough for both of us," said the Greek, and proposed the dream covenant. The Bačvanin, however, before going to sleep, ate half the liver. In the morning he said to the Greek, "You are the elder, tell me what you dreamed."—"I saw heaven open like pure gold," replied the Greek, "and there was a golden staircase down to earth; and God called me to Paradise, and I went up." — "I dreamed the same thing," said the Bačvanin; "but, I said to myself, he will never come back from there, so I had better eat what is left." The Greek was angry, and explained that he really had had no such dream, he was only joking. "While you were joking," answered the Bačvanin, "I wasn't. Look what remains of the liver." 1

Matouš Václavek ("Několik pohádek a pověstí z moravského Valašska," Prague, 1897, p. 89, No. 35) gives another Slavic version; and Polívka 2 refers to another in an article in the "Sbornik" of the Agram Academy. This last appears to be also in a collection edited by Vuk Vr ević (Ragusa, 1894).3 A Serbian version appears in Vuk Stevanović Karadzić's "Srpske Narodne Pripovijetke" (1897, p. 366, No. 5). The well-known Rumanian author, Anton Pann, who has given several popular tales a literary dress, tells the same story in his "Poveştea vorleci cu trei calători şi cele trei Păni." These works I have unfortunately been unable to obtain. There are further references in "Zs. für Österreichsche Volkskunde," 3: 377 and 4 160; and "Volkskunde" 18: 83.

Finally, from Slavonia comes the only version of our story which cannot be told entire "in the presence of Mrs. Boffin."

An avaricious Serbian priest was returning from a festival with his gipsy servant named Makarya. The priest's knapsack was filled with meat and wine; but though it was a long journey, and Makarya complained of being hungry, the priest would not touch his food. At length he promised to buy his servant a goulash; but whenever they came to an inn, he pretended to fall asleep, and so avoided paying for the goulash. At night they reached home. The priest, in order to escape sharing his food with Makarya, whose hunger had now increased mightily, said they would go to sleep, and whichever dreamed the better dream should have all the food and wine they had brought with them and also sleep with the priest's wife. "I shall dream of meat, cakes, wine, and birds," said Makarya; "but you are learned and wise, and will dream something clever." But his hunger would not let him rest, and as soon as he saw the priest was fast asleep, he got up, ate the food and drank the wine in the knapsack, and lay with

1 Mijat Stojanović, Sala i zbilja, u Senju, 1879, p. 24. Perhaps the story of the man who ate the Leberlein is related to this; see Paul's Grundriss, II, i, 135.

Zs. des Vereins für Volkskunde, 16: 210.

• Compare Vlad. Corović in Srpski kniževni Glasnik, 15: 378 et seq.

the priest's wife (whom he assured he was acting under her husband's orders). Then he fell asleep. At dawn the priest awoke and asked Makarya what he had dreamed. The servant replied, "I dreamed that I drank the wine, ate the meat, and lay with your wife." - "But listen to me," cried the priest. "I, my dear fellow, stood on yonder hill, when suddenly the heavens opened, there was a glimmer of gold, angels let down a ladder and took me up into heaven."—"It's true," said Makarya. "I saw you up there, and thought you would never return, so I ate the meat and wine you had in the knapsack; — konda je moj kurac vaš a Gavrijel je vama reko, da se kurcem, u kojem vina jeba, ne smije u nebo. Stoga sam otišao popadiji pa sam vaš kurac istresao!"'1

When one looks back over all these variants of the "Three Dreams" story, a little tedious in the bulk, but interesting enough in detail, -one is struck by the variety of tunes that have been played on a few notes, and especially the number of wise precepts that have been drawn from it, not always, to be sure, with impeccable logic by the mediæval moralists; and, secondly, one is struck by the persistence of certain main motifs; such as two of the travellers combining against one, and the journeys to heaven and hell, whence there is no return. So long as the transmission of the tale is literary, the perpetuation. of these details is natural, although allowance is to be made for the larger element of conscious arbitrary reworking of the material among literary adapters than among the folk; but that the dream of a celestial translation should persist in folk-versions like the Sicilian and the Slavonian, in which all the details differ from the norm or "Disciplina Clericalis" version, except the fundamental idea of unsuspected cleverness turning the tables on the deceiver, is remarkable. Such persistence of a motif which is not necessarily inherent in the story, indicates that the story itself existed as a unit, and was probably circulated as a unit, and was not in its various phases the result of a more or less independent and spontaneous working of the popular mind; so that, if we could recover its whole history, we should be able to arrange all the versions on an orderly family-tree, or suspend them from an x, which would be Petrus Alphonsi.

The story of the travellers who dream for a small quantity of food belongs, properly speaking, no doubt, to the larger group of tales in which three persons strive for the possession of a precious article, frequently a ring. It belongs also, on another side, to a group of tales in which the characteristic motif is that one of two or more companions who is supposed to be the stupidest proves the cleverest.

"Ino pop, ino cigo sauja" (The priest dreams one thing, the gipsy another), Sudslavische Volksüberlieferungen, etc., No. 4, in 'Ar@pwrоpureia, 2 (1905): 306–308.

1 Compare, e.g., the story of the four Brahmin, three of whom were learned in science, the fourth endowed only with common sense. Against the advice of the fourth, the three restore to life a dead lion, and are devoured for their pains. — Pantschatantra (ed. Benfey, 1859), 2 : 332–334. C. Swainson, (Folk Lore and Provincial Names of British

But our story has maintained itself intact since before the time of Petrus Alphonsi, with the dreams as its fundamental motif. Sometimes, especially in the Slavic versions, there are two persons instead of three, sometimes the participants are of equal rank and intelligence (though usually the race is won by the dark horse), and often the accessory details show the greatest possible variety; but always the main feature of the story that remains constant is the ingenious dreamer outdone by the practical dreamer.

With the single exception of Cintio's "Ecatommiti," the story has avoided the highways of sophisticated literature. It is essentially a folk-story. Even such "learned" works as the "Disciplina Clericalis" and the "Gesta Romanorum," compiled primarily for the use of preachers, were founded on popular psychology. The later printed volumes in which it appeared were all intended ultimately, if not directly, for popular consumption. Characteristically enough, the mediæval contes moralisés were succeeded by the jest-books of the Renaissance; and the "dream-bread" story took its place in both. It is interesting to see what pious and useful lessons the mediæval preachers extracted from it or attached to it, - lessons which to the advanced intelligence of modern times seem sadly or amusingly illogical. But the medieval mind was logical according to its own lights. One may wonder what the author of the "Gesta Romanorum secretly thought of the elaborate moralizations he attached to every tale: perhaps he was dreadfully in earnest with them, perhaps he took them not quite so seriously. At all events, he was sincere in his intent to teach; and of his success there can be no possible doubt. The mediæval man delighted immensely in stories as stories. If you wanted to teach him, you combined instruction and narration, a story and a moral. Therefore a good moral deserved a good story; and vice versa. And there was no need to split hairs over strictly logical consistency.

The purely folk-versions of the story, on the other hand, illustrate the people's fondness for a story with a good clear point. Unlike the ordinary fabliau, it is strictly decent, and can be told in any company; though, like everything else, it can be given an indecent turn if the teller desires. In varying forms it has pleased its audience for over eight hundred years, and, if we count its Oriental forebears, for many hundred years more. And it is still alive, a rudis fabella sed efficax.1 Birds) gives a story which is perhaps related to the "Three Dreams" type: the cock, the cuckoo, and the black cock bought a cow, and agreed to award it to whichever awoke first in the morning (p. 120).

1 A version appears in a little book, Hebrew Jokes (New York, Wehman Bros.).