Basque Legends; With an Essay on the Basque Language. Wentworth Webster

have seen this game played at Monte Video, in South America; and even the Gauchos considered it a test of good horsemanship. Formerly, it seems, the ring was suspended from the tongue of a bell, which would be set ringing when the ring was carried away. The sword, of course, was the finest rapier.

10 One of those present here interrupted the reciter—“What did she hit the serpent on the tail for?” “Why, to kill him, of course,” was the reply; “ask Mr. Webster if serpents are not killed by hitting them on the tail?”

11 I have a dim recollection of having read something very similar to this either in a Slavonic or a Dalmatian tale.

12 This incident is in the translation of a tale by Chambers, called “Rouge Etin,” in Brueyre’s “Contes de la Grande Bretagne,” p. 64. See notes ad loc.

13 In the Pyrénées the ewes are usually milked, and either “caillé”—a kind of clotted cream—or cheese is made of the milk. The sheep for milking are often put in a stable, or fold, for the night.

14 For the “fairies’ holes,” see Introduction to the “Tales of the Lamiñak,” p. 48.

15 Cf. “Mahistruba,” p. 100; and “Beauty and the Beast,” p. 167.

16 Silk kerchiefs are generally used, especially by women, as head-dresses, and not as pocket-handkerchiefs, all through the south of France.