The forty-seventh chapter recounts "How the Schildburgers purchased a mouser, and with it their own ruin":

Now it happened that there were no cats in Schilda, and so many mice that nothing was safe, even in the bread-basket, for whatsoever they put there was sure to be gnawed or eaten; and this grieved them sorely. And upon a time there came a traveller into the village, carrying a cat in his arms, and he entered the hostel. The host asked him, "What sort of a beast is that?" Said he, "It is a mouser." Now the mice at Schilda were so quiet and so tame that they never fled before the people, but ran about all day long, without the slightest fear. So the traveller let the cat run, who, in the sight of the host, soon caught numbers of mice. Now when the people were told this by the host, they asked the man whether the mouser was to be sold, for they would pay him well for it. He said, "It certainly was not to be sold; but seeing that it would be so useful to them, he would let them have it if they would pay him what was right," and he asked a hundred florins for it. The boors were glad to find that he asked so little, and concluded a bargain with him, he agreeing to take half the money down, and to come again in six months to fetch the rest. As soon as the bargain was struck on both sides, they gave the traveller the half of the money, and he carried the mouser into the granary, where they kept their corn, for there were most mice there. The traveller went off with the money at full speed, for he feared greatly lest they should repent them of the bargain, and want their money back again; and as he went along he kept looking behind him to see that no one was following him. Now the boors had forgotten to ask what the cat was to be fed upon, so they sent one after him in haste to ask him the question. But when he with the gold saw that some one was following him, he hastened so much the more, so that the boor could by no means overtake him, whereupon he called out to him from afar off, "What does it eat?" "What you please! What you please!" quoth the traveller. But the peasant understood him to say, "Men and beasts! Men and beasts!" Therefore he returned home in great affliction, and said as much to his worthy masters.

On learning this they became greatly alarmed, and said, "When it has no more mice to eat, it will eat our cattle; and when they are gone, it will eat us! To think that we should lay out our good money in buying such a thing!" And they held counsel together and resolved that the cat should be killed. But no one would venture to lay hold of it for that purpose, whereupon it was determined to burn the granary, and the cat in it, seeing that it was better they should suffer a common loss than all lose life and limb. So they set fire to the granary. But when the cat smelt the fire, it sprang out of a window and fled to another house, and the granary was burned to the ground. Never was there sorrow greater than that of the Schildburgers when they found that they could not kill the cat. They counselled with one another, and purchased the house to which the cat had fled, and burned that also. But the cat sprang out upon the roof, and sat there, washing itself and putting its paws behind its ears, after the manner of cats; and the Schildburgers understood thereby that the cat lifted up its hands and swore an oath that it would not leave their treatment of it unrevenged. Then one of them took a long pole and struck at the cat, but the cat caught hold of the pole, and began to clamber down it, whereupon all the people grew greatly alarmed and ran away, and left the fire to burn as it might. And because no one regarded the fire, nor sought to put it out, the whole village was burned to a house, and notwithstanding that, the cat escaped. And the Schildburgers fled with their wives and children to a neighbouring forest. And at this time was burned their chancery and all the papers therein, which is the reason why their history is not to be found described in a more regular manner.

Thus ended the career of the Schildburgers as a community, according to the veracious chronicle of their marvellous exploits, the first of which, their carrying sunshine into the council-house, is a favourite incident in the noodle-stories of many countries, and has its parallel in the Icelandic story of the Three Brothers of Bakki: They had observed that in winter the weather was colder than in summer, also that the larger the windows of a house were the colder it was. All frost and sharp cold, therefore, they thought sprang from the fact that houses had windows in them. So they built themselves a house on a new plan, without windows in it at all. It followed, of course, that there was always pitch darkness in it. They found that this was rather a fault in the house, but comforted themselves with the certainty that in winter it would be very warm; and as to light, they thought they could contrive some easy means of getting the house lighted. One fine day in the middle of summer, when the sunshine was brightest, they began to carry the darkness out of the house in their caps, and emptied it out when they came into the sunshine, which they then carried into the dark room. Thus they worked hard the whole day, but in the evening, when they had done all their best, they were not a little disappointed to find that it was as dark as before, so much so that they could not tell one hand from the other.[1]

There is a Kashmiri story which bears a slight resemblance to the exploit of the Schildburgers with the cat. A poor old woman used to beg her food by day and cook it at night. Half of the food she would eat in the morning, and the other half in the evening. After a while a cat got to know of this arrangement, and came and ate the meal for her. The old woman was very patient, but at last could no longer endure the cat's impudence, and so she laid hold of it. She argued with herself as to whether she should kill it or not. "If I slay it," she thought, "it will be a sin; but if I keep it alive, it will be to my heavy loss." So she determined only to punish it. She procured some cotton wool and some oil, and soaking the one in the other, tied it on to the cat's tail and then set it on fire. Away rushed the cat across the yard, up the side of the window, and on to the roof, where its flaming tail ignited the thatch and set the whole house on fire. The flames soon spread to other houses, and the whole village was destroyed.[2]

An older form of this incident is found in the introduction to a Persian poetical version of the Book of Sindibad (Sindibad Nama), of which a unique MS. copy, very finely illuminated, but imperfect, is preserved in the Library of the India Office:[3] In a village called Buzina-Gird (i.e., Monkey Town) there was a goat that was in the habit of butting at a certain old woman whenever she came into the street. One day the old woman had been to ask fire from a neighbour, and on her return the goat struck her so violently with his horns when she was off her guard as to draw blood. Enraged at this, she applied the fire which she held to the goat's fleece, which kindled, and the animal ran to the stables of the elephant-keeper, and rubbed his sides against the reeds and willows. They caught fire, which the wind soon spread, and the heads and faces of the warlike elephants were scorched. With the sequel—how the king caused all the monkeys to be slaughtered, as their fat was required to cure the scorched elephants—we have no concern at present.[4]

* * * * *

In Ceylon whole districts, such as Tumpane, in the central province, Morora Korle, in the southern province, and Rayigam Korle, in the western province, are credited with being the abode of fools. A learned writer on the proverbial sayings of the Sinhalese states that these often refer to "popular stories of stupid people to which foolish actions are likened. The stories of the Tumpane villagers who tried to unearth and carry off a well because they saw a bees' nest reflected in the water; of the Morora Korle boatmen who mistook a bend in the river for the sea, left their cargo there, and returned home; of the Rayigam Korle fools who threw stones at the moon to frighten her off one fine moonlight night when they thought she was coming too near, and that there was danger of her burning their crops, are well known, and it is customary to ask a man if he was born in one of these places if he has done anything particularly foolish. The story of the double-fool—i.e., of the man who tried to lighten the boat by carrying his pingo load over his shoulders;[5] of the man who stretched out his hands to be warmed by the fire on the other side of the river; of the rustic's wife who had her own head shaved, so as not to lose the barber's services for the day when he came, and her husband was away from home; of the villagers who tied up their mortars in the village in the belief that the elephant tracks in the rice fields were caused by the mortars wandering about at night; of the man who would not wash his body in order to spite the river; of the people who flogged the elk-skin at home to avenge themselves on the deer that trespassed in the fields at night; and of the man who performed the five precepts—all these are popular stories of foolish people which have passed into proverbs."[6]

The last of the stories referred to in the above extract is as follows: A woman once rebuked her husband for not performing the five (Buddhist) precepts. "I don't know what they are," he replied. "Oh, it's very easy," she said; "all you have to do is to go to the priest and repeat what he says after him." "Is that all?" he answered. "Then I'll go and do it at once." Off he went, and as he neared the temple the priest saw him and called out, "Who are you?" to which he replied, "Who are you?" "What do you want?" demands the priest. "What do you want?" the blockhead answers dutifully. "Are you mad?" roared the priest. "Are you mad?" returned the rustic. "Here," said the priest to his attendants, "take and beat him well;" and notwithstanding that he carefully repeated the words again, taken and thoroughly well thrashed he was, after which he crawled back to his wife and said, "What a wonderful woman you are! You manage to repeat the five precepts every day, and are strong and healthy, while I, who have only said them once, am nearly dead with fever from the bruises."[7]

To this last may be added a story in the Katha Manjari, a Canarese collection, of the stupid fellow and the Ramayana, one of the two great Hindu epics: One day a man was reading the Ramayana in the bazaar, and a woman, thinking her husband might be instructed by hearing it, sent him there. He went, and stood leaning on his crook—for he was a shepherd—when presently a practical joker, seeing his simplicity, jumped upon his shoulders, and he stood with the man on his back until the discourse was concluded. When he reached home, his wife asked him how he liked the Ramayana. "Alas!" said he, "it was not easy; it was a man's load."

* * * * *

The race of Gothamites is indeed found everywhere—in popular tales, if not in actual life; and their sayings and doings are not less diverting when husband and wife are well mated, as in the following story:

An Arab observing one morning that his house was ready to tumble about his ears from decay, and being without the means of repairing it, went with a long face to his wife, and informed her of his trouble. She said, "Why, my dear, need you distress yourself about so small a matter? You have a cow worth thirty dirhams; take her to the market and sell her for that sum. I have some thread, which I will dispose of to-day, and I warrant you that between us both we shall manage very well." The man at once drove the cow to the market, and gave her over for sale to the appraiser of cattle. The salesman showed her to the bystanders, directed their attention to all her good points, expatiated on all her good qualities, and, in short, passed her off as a cow of inestimable value. To all this the simpleton listened with delight and astonishment; he heard his cow praised for qualities that no other cow ever possessed, and determined in his own mind not to lose so rare a bargain, but purchase her himself and balk the chapmen. He therefore called out to the appraiser, and asked him what she was going at. The salesman replied, "At fifteen dirhams and upwards." "By the head of the Prophet," exclaimed the wittol, "had I known that my cow was such a prodigy of excellence, you should not have caught me in the market with her for sale." Now it happened that he had just fifteen dirhams, and no more, and these he thrust upon the broker, exclaiming, "The cow is mine; I have the best claim to her." He then seized the cow and drove her home, exulting all the way as if he had found a treasure. On reaching home he inquired eagerly for his wife, to inform her of his adventure, but was told she was not returned from market. He waited impatiently for her return, when he sprang up to meet her, crying, "Wife, I have done something to-day that will astonish you. I have performed a marvellous exploit!" "Patience!" says his wife. "Perhaps I have done something myself to match it. But hear my story, and then talk of cleverness, if you please." The husband desired her to proceed.

"When I went to market," says she, "I found a man in want of thread. I showed him mine, which he approved of, and having bargained for it, he agreed to pay me according to the weight. I told him it weighed so much, which he seemed to discredit, and weighed it himself. Observing it to fall short of the weight I had mentioned, and fearing I should lose the price I at first expected, I requested him to weigh it over again, and make certain. In the meantime, taking an opportunity unobserved, I stripped off my silver bracelets and put them slily into the scale with my thread. The scale, of course, now preponderated, and I received the full price I had demanded." Having finished her story, she cried out, "Now, what do you think of your wife?" "Amazing! amazing!" said he. "Your capacity is supernatural. And now, if you please, I will give you a specimen of mine," and he related his adventure at the market. "O husband," she exclaimed when he had told his story, "had we not possessed such consummate wisdom and address, how could we have contrived means to repair our old house? In future vex not yourself about domestic concerns, since by the exercise of our talents we need never want for anything!"

The exploits of that precious pair may be compared with the following: An alewife went to the market with a brood of chickens and an old black hen. For the hen and one chicken she could not find a purchaser; so, before leaving the town, she called upon a surgeon, to try to effect a sale. He bought the chicken, but declined taking the hen. She then asked him if he would draw a tooth for it. The tooth was drawn, and he expressed his surprise on finding it was perfectly sound. "Oh," said she, "I knew it was sound; but it was worth while having it drawn for the old hen." She then called upon another surgeon, and had a second tooth drawn, as sound as the other. "What's to pay?" she inquired. "A shilling," said the surgeon. "Very well," rejoined the hostess, with a chuckle; "you left a shilling due in my house the other night, and now we are quits." "Certainly we are," responded the perplexed tooth-drawer, and the delighted old woman returned to her hostelry, to acquaint all her gossips of how cleverly she had outwitted the doctors.

* * * * *

Ferrier says, in his Illustrations of Sterne, that the facetious tales of the Sieur Gaulard laid the foundation of some of the jests in our old English collections. A few of them found their way somehow into Taylor's Wit and Mirth, and this is one: A monsieur chanced to meet a lady of his acquaintance, and asked her how she did and how her good husband fared, at which she wept, saying that her husband was in heaven. "In heaven!" quoth he. "It is the first time that I heard of it, and I am sorry for it with all my heart."

Similar in its point is a story in Archie Armstrong's Banquet of Jests:[8] Sitting over a cup of ale in a winter night, two widows entered into discourse of their dead husbands, and after ripping up their good and bad qualities, saith one of them to the maid, "I prithee, wench, reach us another light, for my husband (God rest his soul!) above all things loved to see good lights about the house. God grant him light everlasting!" "And I pray you, neighbour," said the other, "let the maid lay on some more coals or stir up the fire, for my husband in his lifetime ever loved to see a good fire. God grant him fire everlasting!"

This seems cousin-german to the Arabian story of two men, one of whom hailed from the town of Hama (ancient Hamath), the other from Hums (ancient Emessa). Those towns are not far apart, but the people of the former have the reputation of being very clever, while those of the latter are proverbially as stupid. (And for the proper understanding of the jest it should perhaps be explained that the Arabic verb hama means to "protect" or "defend," the verb hamasa to "roast" or "toast.") These men had some business of importance with the nearest magistrate, and set out together on their journey. The man of Hums, conscious of his own ignorance, begged his companion to speak first in the audience, in order that he might get a hint as to how such a formal matter should be conducted. Accordingly, when they came into the pasha's presence, the man of Hama went forward, and the pasha asked him, "Where are you from?" "Your servant is from Hama," said he. "May Allah PROTECT (hama) your excellency!" The pasha then turned to the other man, and asked, "And where are you from?" to which he answered, "Your servant is from Hums. May Allah ROAST (hamasa) your excellency!"

* * * * *

Not a few of the Bizarrures of the Sieur Gaulard are the prototypes of bulls and foolish sayings of the typical Irishman, which go their ceaseless round in popular periodicals, and are even audaciously reproduced as original in our "comic" journals—save the mark! To cite some examples:

A friend one day told M. Gaulard that the Dean of Besancon was dead. "Believe it not," said he; "for had it been so he would have told me himself, since he writes to me about everything."

M. Gaulard asked his secretary one evening what hour it was. "Sir," replied the secretary, "I cannot tell you by the dial, because the sun is set." "Well," quoth M. Gaulard, "and can you not see by the candle?"

On another occasion the Sieur called from his bed to a servant desiring him to see if it was daylight yet. "There is no sign of daylight," said the servant. "I do not wonder," rejoined the Sieur, "that thou canst not see day, great fool as thou art. Take a candle and look with it out at the window, and thou shalt see whether it be day or not."

In a strange house, the Sieur found the walls of his bedchamber full of great holes. "This," exclaimed he in a rage, "is the cursedest chamber in all the world. One may see day all the night through."

Travelling in the country, his man, to gain the fairest way, rode through a field sowed with pease, upon which M. Gaulard cried to him, "Thou knave, wilt thou burn my horse's feet? Dost thou not know that about six weeks ago I burned my mouth with eating pease, they were so hot?"

A poor man complained to him that he had had a horse stolen from him. "Why did you not mark his visage," asked M. Gaulard, "and the clothes he wore?" "Sir," said the man, "I was not there when he was stolen." Quoth the Sieur, "You should have left somebody to ask him his name, and in what place he resided."

M. Gaulard felt the sun so hot in the midst of a field at noontide in August that he asked of those about him, "What means the sun to be so hot? How should it not keep its heat till winter, when it is cold weather?"

A proctor, discoursing with M. Gaulard, told him that a dumb, deaf, or blind man could not make a will but with certain additional forms. "I pray you," said the Sieur, "give me that in writing, that I may send it to a cousin of mine who is lame."

One day a friend visited the Sieur and found him asleep in his chair. "I slept," said he, "only to avoid idleness; for I must always be doing something."

The Abbe of Poupet complained to him that the moles had spoiled a fine meadow, and he could find no remedy for them. "Why, cousin," said M. Gaulard, "it is but paving your meadow, and the moles will no more trouble you."

M. Gaulard had a lackey belonging to Auvergne, who robbed him of twelve crowns and ran away, at which he was very angry, and said he would have nothing that came from that country. So he ordered all that was from Auvergne to be cast out of the house, even his mule; and to make the animal more ashamed, he caused his servants to take off its shoes and its saddle and bridle.

* * * * *

Although Taylor's Wit and Mirth is the most "original" of our old English jest-books—that is to say, it contains very few stories in common with preceding collections—yet some of the diverting tales he relates are traceable to very distant sources, more especially the following:

A country fellow (that had not walked much in streets that were paved) came to London, where a dog came suddenly out of a house, and furiously ran at him. The fellow stooped to pick up a stone to cast at the dog, and finding them all fast rammed or paved in the ground, quoth he, "What a strange country am I in, where the people tie up the stones and let the dogs loose!"

Three centuries and a half before the Water Poet heard this exquisitely humorous story, the great Persian poet Sa'di related it in his Gulistan (or Rose-garden), which was written A.D. 1278:

A poor poet presented himself before the chief of a gang of robbers, and recited some verses in his praise. The robber-chief, however, instead of rewarding him, as he fondly expected, ordered him to be stripped of his clothes and expelled from the village. The dogs attacking him in the rear, the unlucky bard stooped to pick up a stone to throw at them, and finding the stones frozen in the ground, he exclaimed, "What a vile set of men are these, who set loose the dogs and fasten the stones!"

Now here we have a very curious instance of the migration of a popular tale from Persia—perchance it first set out on its travels from India —in the thirteenth century, when grave and reverend seigniors wagged their beards and shook their portly sides at its recital, to London in the days of the Scottish Solomon (more properly dubbed "the wisest fool in Christendom"!), when Taylor, the Water Poet, probably heard it told, in some river-side tavern, amidst the clinking of beer-cans and the fragrant clouds blown from pipes of Trinidado, and "put it in his book!" How it came into England it would be interesting to ascertain. It may have been brought to Europe by the Venetian merchants, who traded largely in the Levant and with the Moors in Northern Africa.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Powell and Magnusson's Legends of Iceland, Second Series, p. 626.

[2] Dictionary of Kashmiri Proverbs and Sayings. Explained and illustrated from the rich and interesting folk-lore of the Valley. By the Rev. J. Hinton Knowles. Bombay: 1885.

[3] This work was composed A.H. 776 (A.D. 1374-5), as the anonymous author takes care to inform us in his opening verses.

[4] A still older form of the story occurs in the Pancha Tantra (Five Sections), a Sanskrit version of the celebrated Fables of Bidpai, in which a gluttonous ram is in the habit of going to the king's kitchen and devouring all food within his reach. One of the cooks beat him with a burning log of wood, and the ram rushed off with his blazing fleece and set the horses' stables on fire, and so forth. The story is most probably of Buddhist extraction.

[5] A Sinhalese variant of the exploit of the man of Norfolk and of the man of Gotham with the sack of meal. "See ante, p. 19." [Transcriber's note: this approximates to the text reference for Chapter II Footnote 1 in this etext.]

[6] Mr. C.J.R. le Mesurier in The Orientalist (Kandy, Ceylon: 1884), pp. 233-4.

[7] The Orientalist, 1884, p. 234. A much fuller version, with subsequent incidents, is given in the same excellent periodical, pp. 36-38.

[8] Archie Armstrong was Court jester to James I. of England. It is needless, perhaps, to say that he had no hand in this book of facetiae, which is composed for the most part of jests taken out of earlier collections.



CHAPTER IV.

GOTHAMITE DROLLERIES (continued).

Tales of sharpers' tricks upon simpletons do not quite fall within the scope of the present series of papers, but there is one, in the Arabian Nights—not found, however, in our common English version of that fascinating story-book—which deserves a place among noodle-stories, since it is so diverting, is not very generally known, and is probably the original of the early Italian novel of the Monk Transformed, which is ascribed to Michele Colombo:

A rustic simpleton was walking homeward dragging his ass after him by the halter, which a brace of sharpers observing, one said to his fellow, "Come with me, and I will take the ass from that man." He then quietly advanced to the ass, unloosed it from the halter, and gave the animal to his companion, who went off with it, after which he put the halter over his own head, and allowed the rustic to drag him for some little distance, until he with the ass was fairly out of sight, when he suddenly stopped, and the man having tugged at the halter several times without effect, looked round, and, amazed to see a human being in place of his beast, exclaimed, "Who art thou?" The sharper answered, "I was thy ass; but hear my story, for it is wonderful. I had a good and pious mother, and one day I came home intoxicated. Grieved to see me in such a state, she gently reproved me, but I, instead of being penetrated with remorse, beat her with a stick, whereupon she prayed to Allah, and, in answer to her supplication, lo! I was transformed into an ass. In that shape I have continued until this day, when my mother, as it appears, has interceded for my restoration to human form, as before." The simpleton, believing every word of this strange story, raised his eyes to heaven, saying, "Of a truth there is no power but from Allah! But, pray, forgive me for having used thee as I have done." The sharper readily granted his forgiveness, and went off to rejoin his companion and dispose of the ass; while the simpleton returned home, and showing his wife the bridle, told her of the marvellous transformation which had occurred. His wife, in hopes of propitiating Heaven, gave alms and offered up many prayers to avert evil from them, on account of their having used a human being as an ass. At length the simpleton, having remained idle at home for some time, went one day to the market to purchase another ass, and on entering the place where all the animals were fastened, he saw with astonishment his old ass offered for sale. Putting his mouth to its ear, he whispered, "Woe to thee, unlucky! Doubtless thou hast again been intoxicated; but, by Allah, I will never buy thee!"

Another noodle-story, of a different class, in the Arabian Nights, may be here cited in full from Sir R.F. Burton's translation of that delightful work, privately printed for the subscribers, and it will serve, moreover, as a fair specimen of the admirable manner in which that ripe scholar has represented in English the quaint style of his original:

[Quoth one of the learned,] I passed once by a school wherein a schoolmaster was teaching children; so I entered, finding him a good-looking man, and a well-dressed, when he rose to me and made me sit with him. Then I examined him in the Koran, and in syntax and prosody, and lexicography; and behold, he was perfect in all required of him; and I said to him, "Allah strengthen thy purpose! Thou art indeed versed in all that is requisite." Thereafter I frequented him a while, discovering daily some new excellence in him, and quoth I to myself, "This is indeed a wonder in any dominie; for the wise are agreed upon a lack of wit in children's teachers."[1] Then I separated myself from him, and sought him and visited him only every few days, till coming to see him one day, as of wont, I found the school shut, and made inquiry of his neighbours, who replied, "Some one is dead in his house." So I said in my mind, "It behoveth me to pay him a visit of condolence," and going to his house, knocked at the door, when a slave-girl came out to me and asked, "What dost thou want?" and I answered, "I want thy master." She replied, "He is sitting alone mourning;" and I rejoined, "Tell him that his friend So-and-so seeketh to console him." She went in and told him; and he said, "Admit him." So she brought me in to him, and I found him seated alone, and his head bound with mourning fillets. So I said to him, "Allah requite thee amply! This is a path all must perforce tread, and it behoveth thee to take patience," adding, "but who is dead unto thee?" He answered, "One who was dearest of the folk to me, and best beloved." "Perhaps thy father?" "No." "Thy brother?" "No." "One of thy kindred?" "No." Then asked I, "What relation was the dead to thee?" and he answered, "My lover." Quoth I to myself, "This is the first proof to swear by of his lack of wit." So I said to him, "Assuredly there be others than she, and fairer;" and he made answer, "I never saw her that I might judge whether or no there be others fairer than she." Quoth I to myself, "This is another proof positive." Then I said to him, "And how couldst thou fall in love with one thou hast never seen?" He replied, "Know that I was sitting one day at the window, when, lo! there passed by a man, singing the following distich:

"'Umm Amr', thy boons Allah repay! Give back my heart, be't where it may!'"

The schoolmaster continued, "When I heard the man humming these words as he passed along the street, I said to myself, 'Except this Umm Amru were without equal in the world, the poets had not celebrated her in ode and canzon.' So I fell in love with her; but two days after, the same man passed, singing the following couplet:

"'Ass and Umm Amr' went their way, Nor she nor ass returned for aye.'

Thereupon I knew that she was dead, and mourned for her. This was three days ago, and I have been mourning ever since." So I left him and fared forth, having assured myself of the weakness of the gerund-grinder's wit[2].

Here, surely, was the very Father of Folly, but what shall we say of judges and magistrates being sometimes (represented as) equally witless? Thus we are told, among the cases decided by a Turkish Kazi, that two men came before him one of whom complained that the other had almost bit his ear off. The accused denied this, and declared that the fellow had bit his own ear. After pondering the matter for some time, the judge told them to come again two hours later. Then he went into his private room, and attempted to bring his ear and his mouth together; but all he did was to fall backwards and break his head. Wrapping a cloth round his head, he returned to court, and the two men coming in again presently, he thus decided the question: "No man can bite his own ear, but in trying to do so he may fall down and break his head."

A Sinhalese story, which is also well known in various forms in India, furnishes a still more remarkable example of forensic sagacity. It is thus related by the able editor of The Orientalist, vol. i., p. 191:

One night some thieves broke into the house of a rich man, and carried away all his valuables. The man complained to the justice of the peace, who had the robbers captured, and when brought before him, inquired of them whether they had anything to say in their defence. "Sir," said they, "we are not to blame in this matter; the robbery was entirely due to the mason who built the house; for the walls were so badly made, and gave way so easily, that we were quite unable to resist the temptation of breaking in." Orders were then given to bring the mason to the court-house. On his arrival he was informed of the charge brought against him. "Ah," said he, "the fault is not mine, but that of the coolie, who made mortar badly." When the coolie was brought, he laid the blame on the potter, who, he said, had sold him a cracked chattie, in which he could not carry sufficient water to mix the mortar properly. Then the potter was brought before the judge, and he explained that the blame should not be laid upon him, but upon a very pretty woman, who, in a beautiful dress, was passing at the time he was making the chattie, and had so riveted his attention, that he forgot all about the work. When the woman appeared, she protested that the fault was not hers, for she would not have been in that neighbourhood at all had the goldsmith sent home her earrings at the proper time; the charge, she argued, should properly be brought against him. The goldsmith was brought, and as he was unable to offer any reasonable excuse, he was condemned to be hanged. Those in the court, however, begged the judge to spare the goldsmith's life; "for," said they, "he is very sick and ill-favoured, and would not make at all a pretty spectacle." "But," said the judge, "somebody must be hanged." Then they drew the attention of the court to the fact that there was a fat Moorman in a shop opposite, who was a much fitter subject for an execution, and asked that he might be hanged in the goldsmith's stead. The learned judge, considering that this arrangement would be very satisfactory, gave judgment accordingly.

If some of the last-cited stories are not precisely Gothamite drolleries, though all are droll enough in their way, there can be no doubt whatever that we have a Sinhalese brother to the men of Gotham in the following: A villager in Ceylon, whose calf had got its head into a pot and could not get it out again, sent for a friend, celebrated for his wisdom, to release the poor animal. The sagacious friend, taking in the situation at a glance, cut off the calf's head, broke the pot, and then delivered the head to the owner of the calf, saying, "What will you do when I am dead and gone?"—And we have another Gothamite in the Kashmiri who bought as much rice as he thought would suffice for a year's food, and finding he had only enough for eleven months, concluded it was better to fast the other month right off, which he did accordingly; but he died just before the month was completed, leaving eleven months' rice in his house.

* * * * *

The typical noodle of the Turks, the Khoja Nasru-'d-Din, is said to have been a subject of the independent prince of Karaman, at whose capital, Konya, he resided, and he is represented as a contemporary of Timur (Tamerlane), in the middle of the fourteenth century. The pleasantries which are ascribed to him are for the most part common to all countries, but some are probably of genuine Turkish origin. To cite a few specimens: The Khoja's wife said to him one day, "Make me a present of a kerchief of red Yemen silk, to put on my head." The Khoja stretched out his arms and said, "Like that? Is that large enough?" On her replying in the affirmative he ran off to the bazaar, with his arms still stretched out, and meeting a man on the road, he bawled to him, "Look where you are going, O man, or you will cause me to lose my measure!"

Another day the Khoja's wife washed his caftan and spread it upon a tree in the garden of the house. That night the Khoja goes out, and thinks he sees in the moonlight a man motionless upon a tree in the garden. "Give me my bow and arrows," said he to his wife, and having received them, he shot the caftan, piercing it through and through, and then returned into the house. Next morning, when he discovered that it was his own caftan he had shot at, he exclaimed, "By Allah, had I happened to be in it, I should have killed myself!"

The Ettrick Shepherd's well-known story of the two Highlanders and the wild boar has its exact parallel in the Turkish jest-book, as follows: One day the Khoja went with his friend Sheragh Ahmed to the den of a wolf, in order to take the cubs. Said the Khoja to Ahmed, "Do you go in, and I will watch without;" and Ahmed went in, to take the cubs in the absence of the old wolf. But she came back presently, and had got half-way into her den when the Khoja seized hold of her tail. The wolf in her struggles cast up a great dust into the eyes of Ahmed, who called out to the Khoja, "Hallo! what does all this dust mean?" The Khoja replied, "If the wolf's tail breaks, you will soon know what the dust means!"

Several of the jests closely resemble "Joe Millers" told of Irishmen, such as this: It happened one night, after the Khoja and a guest had lain down to sleep, that the taper went out. "O Khoja Effendi," said the guest, "the taper is gone out. But there is a taper at your right side. Pray bring it and let us light it." Quoth the Khoja, "You must surely be a fool to think that I should know my right hand in the dark." And this: A thief having stolen a piece of salted cheese from the Khoja, he ran immediately and seated himself on the border of a fountain. Said the people to him, "O Khoja, what have you come here to look for in such a hurry?" The Khoja replied, "The thief will certainly come here to drink as soon as he has eaten my salted cheese; I always do so myself."

And here is one of the Gothamite class: One evening the Khoja went to the well to draw water, and seeing the moon reflected in the water, he exclaimed, "The moon has fallen into the well; I must pull it out." So he let down the rope and hook, and the hook became fastened to a stone, whereupon he exerted all his strength, and the rope broke, and he fell upon his back. Looking into the sky, he saw the moon, and cried out joyfully, "Praise be to Allah! I am sorely bruised, but the moon has got into its place again."

There is a well-worn jest of an Irishman who, being observed by a friend to look exceedingly blank and perplexed, was asked what ailed him. He replied that he had had a dream. "Was it a good or a bad dream?" "Faith," said he, "it was a little of both; but I'll tell ye. I dreamt that I was with the Pope, who was the finest gentleman in the whole district; and after we had conversed a while, his Holiness axed me, Would I drink? Thinks I to myself, 'Would a duck swim?' So, seeing the whisky and the lemons and the sugar on the side-board, I said, I didn't mind if I took a drop of punch. 'Cold or hot?' says his Holiness. 'Hot, your Holiness,' says I. So on that he steps down to the kitchen for the boiling water, but, bedad, before he came back, I woke straight up; and now it's distressing me that I didn't take it cold!"

We have somewhat of a parallel to this in a Turkish jest: The Khoja dreamt that some one gave him nine pieces of money, but he was not content, and said, "Make it ten." Then he awoke and found his hands empty. Instantly closing his eyes again, and holding out his hand, he said, "I repent; give me the nine pieces[3]."

But the Chinese relate the very counterpart of our Irishman's story. A confirmed drunkard dreamt that he had been presented with a cup of excellent wine, and set it by the fire to warm[4], that he should better enjoy the flavour of it; but just as he was about to drink off the delicious draught he awoke. "Fool that I am," he cried, "why was I not content to drink it cold?"[5]

* * * * *

The Chinese seem to have as keen a sense of humour as any other people. They tell a story, for instance, of a lady who had been recently married, and on the third day saw her husband returning home, so she slipped quietly behind him and gave him a hearty kiss. The husband was annoyed, and said she offended all propriety. "Pardon! pardon!" said she. "I did not know it was you." Thus the excuse may sometimes be worse than the offence. There is exquisite humour in the following noodle-story: Two brothers were tilling the ground together. The elder, having prepared dinner, called his brother, who replied in a loud voice, "Wait till I have hidden my spade, and I shall at once be with you." When he joined his elder brother, the latter mildly reproached him, saying, "When one hides anything, one should keep silence, or at least should not cry aloud about it, for it lays one open to be robbed." Dinner over, the younger went back to the field, and looked for his spade, but could not find it; so he ran to his brother and whispered mysteriously in his ear, "My spade is stolen!"—The passion for collecting antique relics is thus ridiculed: A man who was fond of old curiosities, though he knew not the true from the false, expended all his wealth in purchasing mere imitations of the lightning-stick of Tchew-Koung, a glazed cup of the time of the Emperor Cheun, and the mat of Confucius; and being reduced to beggary, he carried these spurious relics about with him, and said to the people in the streets, "Sirs, I pray you, give me some coins struck by Tai-Koung."

* * * * *

Indian fiction abounds in stories of simpletons, and probably the oldest extant drolleries of the Gothamite type are found in the Jatakas, or Buddhist Birth-stories. Assuredly they were own brothers to our mad men of Gotham, the Indian villagers who, being pestered by mosquitoes when at work in the forest, bravely resolved, according to Jataka 44, to take their bows and arrows and other weapons and make war upon the troublesome insects until they had shot dead or cut in pieces every one; but in trying to shoot the mosquitoes they only shot, struck, and injured one another. And nothing more foolish is recorded of the Schildburgers than Somadeva relates, in his Katha Sarit Sagara, of the simpletons who cut down the palm-trees: Being required to furnish the king with a certain quantity of dates, and perceiving that it was very easy to gather the dates of a palm which had fallen down of itself, they set to work and cut down all the date-palms in their village, and having gathered from them their whole crop of dates, they raised them up and planted them again, thinking they would grow.

In illustration of the apothegm that "fools who attend only to the words of an order, and do not understand the meaning, cause much detriment," is the story of the servants who kept the rain off the trunks: The camel of a merchant gave way under its load on a journey. He said to his servants, "I will go and buy another camel to carry the half of this camel's load. And you must remain here, and take particular care that if it clouds over the rain does not wet the leather of these trunks, which are full of clothes." With these words the merchant left the servants by the side of the camel and went off, and suddenly a cloud came up and began to discharge rain. Then the fools said, "Our master told us to take care that the rain did not touch the leather of the trunks;" and after they had made this sage reflection they dragged the clothes out of the trunks and wrapped them round the leather. The consequence was that the rain spoiled the clothes. Then the merchant returned, and in a rage said to his servants, "You rascals! Talk of water! Why, the whole stock of clothes is spoiled by the rain!" And they answered him, "You told us to keep the rain off the leather of the trunks. What fault have we committed?" He answered, "I told you that if the leather got wet the clothes would be spoiled. I told you so in order to save the clothes, not the leather."

The story of the servant who looked after the door is a farther illustration of the same maxim. A merchant said to his foolish servant, "Take care of the door of my shop; I am going home for a short time." After his master was gone, the fool took the shop-door on his shoulder and went off to see an actor perform. As he was returning his master met him, and gave him a scolding, and he answered, "I have taken care of this door, as you told me."

This jest had found its way into Europe three centuries ago. It is related of Giufa, the typical Sicilian booby, and probably came to England from Italy. This is how it is told in the Sacke Full of Newes, a jest-book originally printed in the sixteenth century: "In the countrey dwelt a Gentlewoman who had a French man dwelling with her, and he did ever use to go to Church with her; and upon a time he and his mistresse were going to church, and she bad him pull the doore after him and follow her to the church; and so he took the doore betweene his armes, and lifted it from the hooks, and followed his mistresse with it. But when she looked behinde her and saw him bring the doore upon his back, 'Why, thou foolish knave,' qd she, 'what wilt thou do with the door?' 'Marry, mistresse,' qd he, 'you bad me pull the doore after me.' 'Why, fool,' qd she, 'I did command thee that thou shouldest make fast the doore after thee, and not bring it upon thy back after me.' But after this there was much good sport and laughing at his simplicity and foolishnesse therein."

In the capacity of a merchant the simpleton does very wonderful things, and plumes himself on his sagacity, as we have already seen in the case of the Arab and his cow. And here are a brace of similar stories: A foolish man once went to the island of Kataha to trade, and among his wares was a quantity of fragrant aloes-wood. After he had sold his other goods, he could not find any one to take the aloes-wood off his hands, for the people who live there are not acquainted with that article of commerce. Then seeing people buying charcoal from the woodmen, he burnt his stock of aloes-wood and reduced it to charcoal. He sold it for the price which charcoal usually fetched, and returning home, boasted of his cleverness, and became the laughing-stock of everybody.—Another blockhead went to the market to sell cotton, but no one would buy it from him, because it was not properly cleaned. In the meanwhile he saw in the bazaar a goldsmith selling gold which he had purified by heating it, and he saw it taken by a customer. Seeing that, he threw his cotton into the fire in order to purify it, and it was all burned to ashes.

There must be few who have not heard of the Irishman who was hired by a Yarmouth maltster to help in loading a ship. As the vessel was about to sail, the Irishman cried out from the quay, "Captain, I lost your shovel overboard, but I cut a big notch on the rail-fence, round the stern, just where it went down, so you will find it when you come back."—A similar story is told of an Indian simpleton. He was sailing in a ship when he let a silver cup fall from his hand into the water. Having taken notes of the spot by observing the eddies and other signs in the water, he said to himself, "I will bring it up from the bottom when I return." As he was recrossing the sea, he saw the eddies and other signs, and thinking he recognised the spot, he plunged into the water again and again, to recover his cup, but he only got well laughed at for his pains.

We have an amusing commentary on the maxim that "distress is sure to come from being in the company of fools" in the following, from the Canarese story-book entitled Kathe Manjari: A foolish fellow travelled with a shopkeeper. When it became dark, the fool lay down in the road to sleep, but the shopkeeper took shelter in a hollow tree. Presently some thieves came along the road, and one struck his feet against the fool's legs, upon which he exclaimed to his companions, "What is this? Is it a piece of wood?" The fool was angry, and said, "Go away! go away! Is there a knot, well tied, containing five annas, in the loins of a plank in your house?" The thieves then seized him, and took away his annas. As they were moving off, they asked if the money was good or bad, to which the noodle replied, "Ha! ha! is it of my money you speak in that way, and want to know whether it is good or bad? Look— there is a shopkeeper in that tree," pointing with his finger—"show it to him." Then the thieves went up to the shopkeeper and robbed him of two hundred pagodas.

In our next story, of the villagers who ate the buffalo, is exemplified the fact that "fools, in the conceit of their folly, while they deny what need not be denied, reveal what it is their interest to suppress, in order to get themselves believed." Some villagers took a buffalo belonging to a certain man, and killed it in an enclosure outside the village, under a banyan tree, and dividing the flesh, ate it up. The owner of the buffalo went and complained to the king, and he had the villagers who had eaten the animal brought before him. The proprietor of the buffalo said before the king, in their presence, "These men took my buffalo under a banyan tree near the tank, and killed and ate it before my eyes," whereupon an old fool among the villagers said, "There is no tank or banyan tree in our village. He says what is not true; where did we kill his buffalo or eat it?" When the man heard this, he replied, "What! are there not a banyan tree and a tank on the east side of the village? Moreover, you ate my buffalo on the eighth day of the lunar month." The old fool then said, "There is no east side or eighth day in our village." On hearing this, the king laughed, and said, to encourage the fool, "You are a truthful person; you never say anything false; so tell me the truth: did you eat that buffalo, or did you not?" The old fool answered, "I was born three years after my father died, and he taught me skill in speaking. So I never say what is untrue, my king. It is true that we ate his buffalo, but all the rest that he alleges is false." When the king heard this, he and his courtiers could not restrain their laughter; but he restored the price of the buffalo to the man, and fined the villagers.

But sometimes even kings have been arrant noodles, and their credulity quite as amusing—or amazing—as that of their subjects. Once on a time there was a king who had a handsome daughter, and he summoned his physicians, and said to them, "Make some preparation of salutary drugs, which will cause my daughter to grow up quickly, so that she may be married to a good husband." The physicians, wishing to get a living out of this royal fool, replied, "There is a medicine which will do this, but it can only be procured in a distant country; and while we are sending for it, we must shut up your daughter in concealment, for this is the treatment laid down in such cases." The king having consented, they placed his daughter in concealment for several years, pretending that they were engaged in procuring the medicine; and when she was grown up, they presented her to the king, saying that she had been made to grow by the preparation; so the king was highly pleased, and gave them much wealth.

Between an Indian raja and an Indian dhobie, or washerman, there is the greatest possible difference socially, but individually—when both are noodles—there may be sometimes very little to choose; indeed, of the two, all things considered, the difference, if any, is perhaps in favour of the humble cleanser of body-clothes. A favourite story in various parts of India, near akin to that last cited, is of a poor washerman and his young ass. This simpleton one day, passing a school kept by a mullah, or Muhammedan doctor of laws, heard him scolding his pupils, exclaiming that they were still asses, although he had done so much to make them men. The washerman thought that here was a rare chance, for he happened to have the foal of the ass that carried his bundles of clothes, which, since he had no child, he should get the learned mullah to change into a boy. Thus thinking, he goes next day to the mullah, and asks him to admit his foal into his school, in order that it should be changed into the human form and nature. The preceptor, seeing the poor fellow's simplicity, answered that the task was very laborious, and he must have a fee of a hundred rupis. So the washerman went home, and soon returned leading his foal, which, with the money, he handed over to the teacher, who told him to come again on such a day and hour, when he should find that the change he desired had been effected. But the washerman was so impatient that he went to the teacher several times before the day appointed, and was informed that the foal was beginning to learn manners, that its ears were already become very much shorter, and, in short, that it was making satisfactory progress.

It happened, when the day came on which he was to receive his young ass transformed into a fine, well-educated boy, the simpleton was kept busy with his customers' clothes, but on the day following he found time to go to the teacher, who told him it was most unfortunate he had not come at the appointed hour, since the youth had quitted the school yesterday, refusing to submit any longer to authority; but the teacher had just learned that he had been made kazi (or judge) in Cawnpore. At first the washerman was disposed to be angry, but reflecting that, after all, the business was better even than he anticipated, he thanked the preceptor for all his care and trouble, and returned home. Having informed his wife of his good luck, they resolved to visit their quondam young foal, and get him to make them some allowance out of his now ample means. So, shutting up their house, they travelled to Cawnpore, which they reached in safety. Being directed to the kazi's court, the washerman, leaving his wife outside, entered, and discovered the kazi seated in great dignity, and before him were the pleaders, litigants, and officers of the court. He had brought a bridle in one hand and a wisp of hay in the other; but being unable, on account of the crowd, to approach the kazi, he got tired of waiting, so, holding up the bridle and the hay, he cried out, "Khoor! khoor! khoor!" as he used to do in calling his donkeys, thinking this would induce the kazi to come to him. But, instead of this, he was seized by the kazi's order and locked up for creating a disturbance.

When the business of the court was over, the kazi, pitying the supposed madman, sent for him to learn the reason of his strange behaviour, and in answer to his inquiries the simpleton said, "You don't seem to know me, sir, nor recognise this bridle, which has been in your mouth so often. You appear to forget that you are the foal of one of my asses, that I got changed into a man, for the fee of a hundred rupis, by a learned mullah who transforms asses into educated men. You forget what you were, and, I suppose, will be as little submissive to me as you were to the mullah when you ran away from him." All present were convulsed with laughter: such a "case" was never heard of before. But the kazi, seeing how the mullah had taken advantage of the poor fellow's simplicity, gave him a present of a hundred rupis, besides sufficient for the expenses of his journey home, and so dismissed him.

A party of rogues once found as great a blockhead in a rich Indian herdsman, to whom they said, "We have asked the daughter of a wealthy inhabitant of the town in marriage for you, and her father has promised to give her." He was much pleased to hear this, and gave them an ample reward for their trouble. After a few days they came again and told him that his marriage had taken place. Again he gave them rich presents for their good news. Some more days having passed, they said to him, "A son has been born to you," at which he was in ecstacies and gave them all his remaining wealth; but the next day, when he began to lament, saying, "I am longing to see my son," the people laughed at him on account of his having been cheated by the rogues, as if he had acquired the stupidity of cattle from having so much to do with them.

It is not generally known that the incident which forms the subject of the droll Scotch song "The Barring of the Door," which also occurs in the Nights of Straparola, is of Eastern origin. In an Arabian tale, a blockhead, having married his pretty cousin, gave the customary feast to their relations and friends. When the festivities were over, he conducted his guests to the door, and from absence of mind neglected to shut it before returning to his wife. "Dear cousin," said his wife to him when they were alone, "go and shut the street door." "It would be strange indeed," he replied, "if I did such a thing. Am I just made a bridegroom, clothed in silk, wearing a shawl and a dagger set with diamonds, and am I to go and shut the door? Why, my dear, you are crazy. Go and shut it yourself." "Oh, indeed!" exclaimed the wife. "Am I, young, robed in a dress, with lace and precious stones—am I to go and shut the street door? No, indeed! It is you who are become crazy, and not I. Come, let us make a bargain," she continued; "and let the first who speaks go and fasten the door." "Agreed," said the husband, and immediately he became mute, and the wife too was silent, while they both sat down, dressed as they were in their nuptial attire, looking at each other and seated on opposite sofas. Thus they remained for two hours. Some thieves happened to pass by, and seeing the door open, entered and laid hold of whatever came to their hands. The silent couple heard footsteps in the house, but opened not their mouths. The thieves came into the room and saw them seated motionless and apparently indifferent to all that might take place. They continued their pillage, therefore, collecting together everything valuable, and even dragging away the carpets from beneath them; they laid hands on the noodle and his wife, taking from their persons every article of jewellery, while they, in fear of losing the wager, said not a word. Having thus cleared the house, the thieves departed quietly, but the pair continued to sit, uttering not a syllable. Towards morning a police officer came past on his tour of inspection, and seeing the door open, walked in. After searching all the rooms and finding no person, he entered their apartment, and inquired the meaning of what he saw. Neither of them would condescend to reply. The officer became angry, and ordered their heads to be cut off. The executioner's sword was about to perform its office, when the wife cried out, "Sir, he is my husband. Do not kill him!" "Oh, oh," exclaimed the husband, overjoyed and clapping his hands, "you have lost the wager; go and shut the door." He then explained the whole affair to the police officer, who shrugged his shoulders and went away.[6]

A party of noodles are substituted for the husband and wife in a Turkish version of the tale, in the History of the Forty Vazirs. Some bang-eaters,[7] while out walking, found a sequin. They said, "Let us go to a cook, and buy food and eat." So they went and entered a cook's shop and said, "Master, give us a sequin's worth of food." The cook prepared all kinds of food, and loaded a porter with it; and the bang-eaters took him without the city, where there was a ruined tomb, which they entered and sat down in, and the porter deposited the food and went away. The bang-eaters began to partake of the food, when suddenly one of them said, "The door is open; do one of you shut it, else some other bang-eaters will come in and annoy us: even though they be friends, they will do the deeds of foes." One of them replied, "Go thou and shut the door," and they fell a-quarrelling. At length one said, "Come, let us agree that whichever of us speaks or laughs shall rise and fasten the door." They all agreed to this proposal, and left the food and sat quite still. Suddenly a great number of dogs came in; not one of the bang-eaters stirred or spoke, for if one spoke he would have to rise and shut the door, so they spoke not. The dogs made an end of the food, and ate it all up. Just then another dog leapt in from without, but no food remained. Now one of the bang-eaters had partaken of everything, and some of the food remained about his mouth and on his beard. That newly come dog licked up the particles of food that were on the bang-eater's breast, and while he was licking up those about his mouth, he took his lip for a piece of meat and bit it. The bang-eater did not stir, for he said within himself, "They will tell me to shut the door." But to ease his soul he cried, "Ough!" inwardly cursing the dog. When the other bang-eaters heard him make that noise, they said, "Rise, fasten the door." He replied, "After loss, attention! Now that the food is gone, and my lip is wounded, what is the use of shutting that door?" and crying, "Woe! alas!" they each went in a different direction.[8]

A similar story is known in Kashmir: Five friends chanced to meet, and all having leisure, they decided to go to the bazaar and purchase a sheep's head, and have a great feast in the house of one of the party, each of whom subscribed four annas. The head was bought, but while they were returning to the house it was remembered that there was not any butter. On this one of the five proposed that the first of them that should break silence by speaking should go for the butter. Now it was no light matter to have to retrace one's steps back to the butter-shop, as the way was long and the day was very hot. So they all five kept strict silence. Pots were cleaned, the fire was prepared, and the head laid thereon. Now and then one would cough, and another would groan, but never a tongue uttered a word, though the fire was fast going out, and the head was getting burnt, owing to there being no fat or butter wherewith to grease the pot. Thus matters were when a policeman passed by, and, attracted by the smell of cooking, looked in at the window, and saw these five men perfectly silent and sitting around a burnt sheep's head. Not knowing the arrangement, he supposed that these men were either mad or were thieves, and so he inquired how they came there, and how they obtained the head. Not a word was uttered in reply. "Why are you squatting there in that stupid fashion?" shouted the policeman. Still no reply. Then the policeman, full of rage that these wretched men should thus mock at his authority, took them all off straight to the police inspectors office. On arrival the inspector asked them the reason of their strange behaviour, but he also got no reply. This rather tried the patience and temper of the man of authority, who was generally feared, and flattered, and bribed. So he ordered one of the five to be immediately flogged. The poor fool bore it bravely, and uttered never a sound; but when the blows repeatedly fell on the same wounded parts, he could endure no longer, and cried out, "Oh! oh! Why do you beat me? Enough, enough! Is it not enough that the sheep's head has been spoiled?"

His four associates now cried out, "Go to the bazaar and fetch the butter."[9]

There is quite as droll a version current among the people of Ceylon, to the following effect: A gentleman once had in his employment twenty-five idiots. In the old times it was customary with Sinhalese high families not to allow their servants to eat from plates, but every day they were supplied with plantain leaves, from which they took their food. After eating, they were accustomed to shape the leaf into the form of a cup and drink out of it. Now in this gentleman's house the duty of providing the leaves devolved upon the twenty-five idiots, who were scarcely fit for any other work. One day, when they had gone into the garden to cut the leaves, they spoke among themselves and said, "Why should we, every one of us, trouble ourselves to fetch plantain leaves, when one only could very easily do it? Let us therefore lie down on the ground and sleep like dead men, and let him who first utters a sound or opens his eyes undertake the work." It was no sooner said than done. The men lay in a heap like so many logs. At breakfast-time that day the hungry servants went to the kitchen for their rice, only to be disappointed. No leaves were forthcoming on which to distribute the food, and a complaint was made to the master that the twenty-five idiots had not returned to the house since they went out in the morning. Search was at once made, and they were found fast asleep in the garden. After vainly endeavouring to rouse them, the master concluded that they were dead, and ordered his servants to dig a deep hole and bury them. A grave was then dug, and the idiots were, one by one, thrown into it, but still there was no noise or motion on their part. At length, when they were all put into the grave, and were being covered up, a tool employed by one of the servants hit sharply by accident against the leg of one of the idiots, who then involuntarily moaned. Thereupon all the others exclaimed, "You were the first to utter a sound; therefore from henceforth you must take upon yourself the duty of providing the plantain leaves."[10]

It has already been remarked that a literary Italian version of the Silent Couple is found in the Nights of Straparola, but there are other variants orally current among the common people in different parts of Italy. This is one from Venice: There were once a husband and a wife. The former said one day to the latter, "Let us have some fritters." She replied, "What shall we do for a frying-pan?" "Go and borrow one from my godmother." "You go and get it; it is only a little way off." "Go yourself, and I will take it back when we are done with it." So she went and borrowed the pan, and when she returned said to her husband, "Here is the pan, but you must carry it back." So they cooked the fritters, and after they had eaten, the husband said, "Now let us go to work, both of us, and the one who speaks first shall carry back the pan." Then she began to spin, and he to draw his thread—for he was a shoemaker—and all the time keeping silence, except that when he drew his thread he said, "Leulero! leulero!" and she, spinning, answered, "Picici! picici! picicio!" And they said not another word. Now there happened to pass that way a soldier with a horse, and he asked a woman if there was any shoemaker in that street. She said there was one near by, and took him to the house. The, soldier asked the shoemaker to come and cut his horse a girth, and he would pay him. The latter made no answer but "Leulero! leulero!" and his wife "Picici! picici! picicio!" Then the soldier said, "Come and cut my horse a girth, or I will cut your head off." The shoemaker only answered, "Leulero! leulero!" and his wife "Picici! picici! picicio!" Then the soldier began to grow angry, and seized his sword, and said to the shoemaker, "Either come and cut my horse a girth, or I will cut your head off." But to no purpose. The shoemaker did not wish to be the first one to speak, and only replied, "Leulero! leulero!" and his wife "Picici! picici! picicio!" Then the soldier got mad in good earnest, seized the shoemaker's head, and was going to cut it off. When his wile saw that, she cried out, "Ah, don't, for mercy's sake!" "Good!" exclaimed her husband, "good! Now you go and carry the pan back to my godmother, and I will go and cut the horse's girth."

In a Sicilian version the man and wife fry some fish, and then set about their respective work—shoemaking and spinning—and the one who finishes first the piece of work begun is to eat the fish. While they are singing and whistling at their work, a friend comes along, who knocks at the door, but receives no answer. Then he enters and speaks to them, but still no reply. Finally, in anger, he sits down at the table, and eats up all the fish himself.[11]

Thus, it will be observed, the droll incident which forms the subject of the old Scotch song of "The Barring of the Door" is of world-wide celebrity.

* * * * *

Gothamite stories appear to have been familiar throughout Europe during the later Middle Ages, if we may judge from a chapter of the Gesta Romanorum in which the monkish compiler has curiously "moralised" the actions of three noodles:

We read in the "Lives of the Fathers" that an angel showed to a certain holy man three men labouring under a triple fatuity. The first made a faggot of wood, and because it was too heavy for him to carry, he added to it more wood, hoping by such means to make it light. The second drew water with great labour from a very deep well with a sieve, which he incessantly filled. The third carried a beam in his chariot, and, wishing to enter his house, whereof the gate was so narrow and low that it would not admit him, he violently whipped his horse until they both fell together into a deep well. Having shown this to the holy man, the angel said, "What think you of these three men?" "That they are fools," answered he. "Understand, however," returned the angel, "that they represent the sinners of this world. The first describes that kind of men who from day to day do add new sins to the old, because they cannot bear the weight of those which they already have. The second man represents those who do good, but do it sinfully, and therefore it is of no benefit. And the third person is he who would enter the kingdom of heaven with all his world of vanities, but is cast down into hell."

* * * * *

And now a few more Indian and other stories of the Gothamite class to conclude the present section. In Malava there were two Brahman brothers, and the wealth inherited from their father was left jointly between them. And while they were dividing that wealth they quarrelled about one having too little and one having too much, and they made a teacher learned in the Vedas arbitrator, and he said to them, "You must divide everything your father left into two halves, so that you may not quarrel about the inequality of the division." When the two fools heard this, they divided every single thing into two equal parts—house, beds, in fact, all their property, including their cattle. Henry Stephens (Henri Estienne), in the Introduction to his Apology for Herodotus,[12] relates some very amusing noodle-stories, such as of him who, burning his shins before the fire, and not having wit enough to go back from it, sent for masons to remove the chimney; of the fool who ate the doctor's prescription, because he was told to "take it;" of another wittol who, having seen one spit upon iron to try whether it was hot, did likewise with his porridge; and, best of all, he tells of a fellow who was hit on the back with a stone as he rode upon his mule, and cursed the animal for kicking him. This last exquisite jest has its analogue in that of the Irishman who was riding on an ass one fine day, when the beast, by kicking at the flies that annoyed him, got one of its hind feet entangled in the stirrup, whereupon the rider dismounted, saying, "Faith, if you're going to get up, it's time I was getting down."

The poet Ovid alludes to the story of Ino persuading the women of the country to roast the wheat before it was sown, which may have come to India through the Greeks, since we are told in the Katha Sarit Sagara of a foolish villager who one day roasted some sesame seeds, and finding them nice to eat, he sowed a large quantity of roasted seeds, hoping that similar ones would come up. The story also occurs in Coelho's Contes Portuguezes, and is probably of Buddhistic origin. And an analogous story is told of an Irishman who gave his hens hot water, in order that they should lay boiled eggs!

FOOTNOTES:

[1] This notion, that schoolmasters "lack wit," however absurd, seems to have been entertained from ancient times, and to be still prevalent in the East; the so-called jests of Hierokles are all at the expense of pedants; and the Turkish typical noodle is Khoja (i.e., Teacher) Nasru-'d-Din, some of whose "witless devices" shall be cited presently.

[2] Elf Laylawa Layla, or, The Book of a Thousand Nights and a Night. Translated, with Introduction, Notes on the Manners and Customs of Moslem Men, and a Terminal Essay on the History of The Nights, by R.F. Burton. Vol. v.

[3] The Khoja, however, was not such a fool as we might conclude from the foregoing examples of his sayings and doings; for, being asked one day what musical instrument he liked best, he answered, "I am very fond of the music of plates and saucepans."

[4] In China wine is almost invariably taken hot, according to Davis, in his work on the Chinese.

[5] This and the following specimens of Chinese stories of simpletons are from "Contes et Bon Mots extraits d'un livre chinois intitule Siao li Siao, traduit par M. Stanislas Julien," (Journal Asiatique, tom. iv., 1824).

[6] In another Arabian version, the man desires his wife to moisten some stale bread she has set before him for supper, and she refuses. After an altercation it is agreed that the one who speaks first shall get up and moisten the bread. A neighbour comes in, and, to his surprise, finds the couple dumb; he kisses the wife, but the man says nothing; he gives the man a blow, but still he says nothing; he has the man taken before the kazi, but even yet he says nothing; the kazi orders him to be hanged, and he is led off to execution, when the wife rushes up and cries out, "Oh, save my poor husband!" "You wretch," says the man, "go home and moisten the bread!"

[7] Bang is a preparation of hemp and coarse opium.

[8] From Mr. E.J.W. Gibb's translation of the Forty Vazirs (London: 1886).

[9] Knowles' Dictionary of Kashmiri Proverbs and Sayings, pp. 197-8. The article bought by the five men is called a hir, which Mr. Knowles says "is the head of any animal used for food," and a sheep's head were surely fitting food for such noodles. Mr. Knowles makes it appear that the whole affair of keeping silence was a mere jest, but we have before seen that it is decidedly meant for a noodle-story.

[10] The Orientalist, 1884, p. 136.

[11] Crane's Italian Popular Tales, pp. 284-5.

[12] A separate work from the Apologie pour Herodote Such was the exasperation of the French clerics at the bitter truths set forth in it, that the author had to flee the country. An English translation, entitled "A World of Wonders; or, an introduction to a Treatise tovching the Conformitie of Ancient and Modern Wonders; or, a Preparative Treatise to the 'Apologie for Herodotus,'" etc., was published at London in 1607, folio, and at Edinburgh 1608, also folio. The Apologie pour Herodote was printed at the Hague.



CHAPTER V.

THE SILLY SON.

Among the favourite jests of all peoples, from Iceland to Japan, from India to England, are the droll adventures and mishaps of the silly son, who contrives to muddle everything he is set to do. In vain does his poor mother try to direct him in "the way he should go": she gets him a wife, as a last resource; but a fool he is still, and a fool he will always be. His blunders and disasters are chronicled in penny chap-books and in nursery rhymes, of infinite variety. Who has not heard how

Simple Simon went a-fishing For to catch a whale, But all the water he had got Was in his mother's pail?

an adventure which recalls another nursery rhyme regarding Simon's still more celebrated prototypes:

Three men of Gotham Went to sea in a bowl; If the bowl had been stronger, My tale had been longer.

Then there is the prose history of Simple Simon's Misfortunes; or, his Wife Marjory's Outrageous Cruelty, which tells (1) of Simon's wedding, and how his wife Marjory scolded him for putting on his roast-meat clothes (i.e., Sunday clothes) the very next morning after he was married; (2) how she dragged him up the chimney in a basket, a-smoke-drying, wherein they used to dry bacon, which made him look like a red herring; (3) how Simon lost a sack of corn as he was going to the mill to have it ground; (4) how Simon went to market with a basket of eggs, but broke them by the way: also how he was put into the stocks; (5) how Simon's wife cudgelled him for not bringing her money for the eggs; (6) how Simon lost his wife's pail and burnt the bottom of her kettle; (7) how Simon's wife sent him to buy two pounds of soap, but going over the bridge, he let his money fall in the river: also how a ragman ran away with his clothes. No wonder if, after this crowning misfortune, poor Simon "drank a bottle of sack, to poison himself, as being weary of his life"!

Again, we have The Unfortunate Son; or, a Kind Wife is worth Gold, being full of Mirth and Pastime, which commences thus:

There was a man but one son had, And he was all his joy; But still his fortune was but bad, Though he was a pretty boy.

His father sent him forth one day To feed a flock of sheep, And half of them were stole away While he lay down asleep!

Next day he went with one Tom Goff To reap as he was seen, When he did cut his fingers off, The sickle was so keen!

Another of the chap-book histories of noodles is that of Simple John and his Twelve Misfortunes, an imitation of Simple Simon; it was still popular amongst the rustics of Scotland fifty years ago.

* * * * *

The adventures of Silly Matt, the Norwegian counterpart of our typical English booby, as related in Asbjornson's collection of Norse folk-tales, furnish some curious examples of the transmission of popular fictions:

The mother of Silly Matt tells him one day that he should build a bridge across the river and take toll of every one who wished to go over it; so he sets to work with a will, and when the bridge is finished, stands at one end—"at the receipt of custom." Three men come up with loads of hay, and Matt demands toll of them, so they each give him a wisp of hay. Next comes a pedlar, with all sorts of small wares in his pack, and Matt gets from him two needles. On his return home his mother asks him what he has got that day. "Hay and needles," says Matt. Well! and what had he done with the hay? "I put some of it in my mouth," quoth he, "and as it tasted like grass, I threw it into the river." She says he ought to have spread it on the byre-floor. "Very good," replies the dutiful Matt; "I'll remember that next time." And what had he done with the needles? He stuck them into the hay. "Ah," says the mother, "you should rather have stuck them in and out of your cap, and brought them home to me." Well! well! Matt will not forget to do so next time. The following day a man comes to the bridge with a sack of meal and gives Matt a pound of it; then comes a smith, who gives him a gimlet: the meal he spread on the byre-floor, and the gimlet he stuck in and out of his cap. His mother tells him he should have come home for a bucket to hold the meal, and the gimlet he should have put up his sleeve. Very good! Matt will not forget next time. Another day some men come to the bridge with kegs of brandy, of which Matt gets a pint, and pours it into his sleeve; next comes a man driving some goats and their young ones, and gives Matt a kid, which he treads down into a bucket. His mother says he should have led the goat home with a cord round its neck, and put the brandy in a pail. Next day he gets a pat of butter and drags it home with a string. After this his mother despairs of his improvement, till it occurs to her that he might not be such a noodle if he had a wife. So she bids him go and see whether he cannot find some lass who will take him for a husband. Should he meet any folk on his way, he ought to say to them, "God's peace!" Matt accordingly sets off in quest of a wife, and meets a she-wolf and her seven cubs. "God's peace!" says Matt, and then returns home. When his mother learns of this, she tells him he should have cried, "Huf! huf! you jade wolf!" Next day he goes off again, and meeting a bridal party, he cries, "Huf! huf! you jade wolf!" and goes back to his mother and acquaints her of this fresh adventure. "O you great silly!" says she; "you should have said, 'Ride happily, bride and bridegroom!'" Once more Matt sets out to seek a wife, and seeing on the road a bear taking a ride on a horse, he exclaims joyfully, "Ride happily, bride and bridegroom!" and then returns home. His mother, on hearing of this new piece of folly, tells him he should have cried, "To the devil with you!" Again he sets out, and meeting a funeral procession, he roars, "To the devil with you!" His mother says he should have cried, "May your poor soul have mercy!" and sends him off for the fifth time to look for a lass. On the road he sees some gipsies busy skinning a dead dog, upon which he piously exclaims, "May your poor soul have mercy!" His mother now goes herself to get him a wife, finds a lass that is willing to marry him, and invites her to dinner. She privately tells Matt how he should comport himself in the presence of his sweetheart; he should cast an eye at her now and then. Matt understands her instruction most literally: stealing into the sheepfold, he plucks out the eyes of all the sheep and goats, and puts them in his pocket. When he is seated beside his sweetheart, he casts a "sheep's eye" at her, which hits her on the nose.[1]

This last incident, as we have seen, occurs in the Tales of the Men of Gotham ("ante, p. 41" in original. This section is to be found immediately after the reference to Chapter II, Footnote 9 in this e-text), and it is also found in a Venetian story (Bernoni, Fiabe, No. 11) entitled "The Fool," of which the following is the first part:

Once upon a time there was a mother who had a son with little brains. One morning she said, "We must get up early, for we have to make bread." So they both rose early, and began to make bread. The mother made the loaves, but took no pains to make them the same size. Her son said to her finally, "How small you have made this loaf, mother." "Oh," said she, "it does not matter whether they are big or little, for the proverb says, 'Large and small, all must go to mass.'" "Good! good!" said her son. When the bread was made, instead of taking it to the baker's, the son took it to the church, for it was the hour for mass, saying, "My mother said that, 'large and small, all must go to mass.'" So he threw the loaves down in the middle of the church. Then he went home to his mother, and said, "I have done what you told me to do," "Good! Did you take the bread to the baker's?" "O mother, if you had seen how they all looked at me!" "You might also have cast an eye on them in return," said his mother. "Wait; wait. I will cast an eye at them too," he exclaimed, and went to the stable and cut out the eyes of all the animals, and putting them in a handkerchief, went to the church, and when any man or woman looked at him, he threw an eye at them.[2]

Silly Matt has a brother in Russia, according to M. Leger's Contes Populaires Slaves, published at Paris in 1882: An old man and his wife had a son, who was about as great a noodle as could be. One day his mother said to him, "My son, thou shouldst go about among people, to get thyself sharpened and rubbed down a little." "Yes, mother," says he; "I'm off this moment." So he went to the village, and saw two men threshing pease. He ran up to them, and rubbed himself now on one and then on the other. "No nonsense!" cried the men. "Get away." But he continued to rub himself on them, till at last they would stand it no longer, and beat him with their flails so lustily that he could hardly crawl home. "What art thou crying about, child?" asked his mother. He related his misfortune. "Ah, my child," said she, "how silly thou art! Thou shouldst have said to them, 'God aid you, good men! Do you wish me to help you to thresh?' and then they would have given thee some pease for thy trouble, and we should have had them to cook and eat." On another occasion the noodle again went through the village, and met some people carrying a dead man. "May God aid you, good men!" he exclaimed. "Do you wish me to help you to thresh?" But he got himself well thrashed once more for this ill-timed speech. When he reached home, he howled, "They've felled me to the ground, beaten me, and plucked my beard and hair!" and told of his new mishap. "Ah, noodle!" said his mother, "thou shouldst have said, 'God give peace to his soul!' Thou shouldst have taken off thy bonnet, wept, and fallen upon thy knees. They would then have given thee meat and drink." Again he went to the village, and met a marriage procession. So he took off his bonnet, and cried with all his might, "God grant peace to his soul!" and then burst into tears. "What brute is this?" said the wedding company. "We laugh and amuse ourselves, and he laments as if he were at a funeral." So they leaped out of the carriages, and beat him soundly on the ribs. Home he returned, crying, "They've beaten me, thrashed me, and torn my beard and hair!" and related what had happened. "My son," said his mother, "thou shouldst have leaped and danced with them." The next time he went to the village he took his bagpipe under his arm. At the end of the street a cart-shed was on fire. The noodle ran to the spot, and began to play on his bagpipe and to dance and caper about, for which he was abused as before. Going back to his mother in tears, he told her how he had fared. "My son," said she, "thou shouldst have carried water and thrown it on the fire, like the other folks." Three days later, when his ribs were well again, the noodle went through the village once more, and seeing a man roasting a little pig, he seized a vessel of water, ran up with it, and threw the water on the fire. This time also he was beaten, and when he got home, and told his mother of his ill-luck, she resolved never again to allow him to go abroad; so he remains by the fireside, as great a fool as ever.

This species of noodle is also known in Japan. He is the hero of a farce entitled Hone Kaha, or Ribs and Skin, which has been done into English by Mr. Basil Hall Chamberlain, in his Classical Poetry of the Japanese. The rector of a Buddhist temple tells his curate that he feels he is now getting too old for the duties of his office, and means to resign the benefice in his favour. Before retiring to his private chamber, he desires the curate to let him know if any persons visit the temple, and bids him, should he be in want of information regarding any matter, to come to him. A parishioner calls to borrow an umbrella. The curate lends him a new one, and then goes to the rector and informs him of this visitor. "You have done wrong," says the rector. "You ought to have said that you should have been happy to comply with such a small request, but, unfortunately, the rector was walking out with it the other day, when, at a place where four roads meet, a sudden gust of wind blew the skin to one side and the ribs to another; we have tied the ribs and skin together in the middle, and hung it from the ceiling. Something like that," adds the rector, "something with an air of truth about it, is what you should have said." Next comes another parishioner, who wishes to borrow a horse. The curate replies with great politeness, "The request with which you honour me is a mere trifle, but the rector took it out with him a few days since, and coming to the junction of four cross roads, a gust of wind blew the ribs to one side and the skin to another, and we have tied them together, and hung them from the ceiling; so I fear it would not suit your purpose." "It is a horse I want," said the man. "Precisely—a horse: I am aware of it," quoth the curate, and the man went off, not a little perplexed, after which the curate reports this new affair to the rector, who says it was to an umbrella, not to a horse, that such a story was applicable. Should any one come again to borrow a horse, he ought to say, "I much regret that I cannot comply with your request. The fact is, we lately turned him out to grass, and becoming frolicsome, he dislocated his thigh, and is now lying, covered with straw, in a corner of the stable." "Something like that," adds the rector, "something with an air of truth about it, is what you should say." A third parishioner comes to invite the rector and the curate to a feast at his house. "For myself," says the curate, "I promise to come; but I fear it will not be convenient for the rector to accompany me." "I presume then," says the man, "that he has some particular business on hand?" "No, not any particular business," answers the curate; "but the truth is, we lately turned him out to grass, and becoming frisky, he dislocated his thigh, and now lies in a corner of the stable, covered with straw." "I spoke of the rector," says the parishioner. "Yes, of the rector. I quite understand," responds the curate, very complaisantly, upon which the man goes away, not knowing what to make of such a strange account of the rector's condition. This last affair puts the rector into a fury, and he cuffs his intended successor, exclaiming, "When was I ever frisky, I should like to know?"