or the present, be permitted to stand
for the sole, as she is beyond all comparison our best, example.

* * * * *

The book of Ernst Willkomm takes a position in strong contrast to the
corresponding works due to the Brothers Grimm, and other great gatherers
of legendary lore. He has a personal poetic interest in the tales which
they have not. He presents himself as the expositor, not only of his
native superstitions, but also, zealously, of the Upper Lusatian
manners. Himself cradled amongst the mountains, he has drawn with
infinite pains, and by slow degrees, as he best could, from the deep
interior life of the people, their jealously withheld credences, and the
traditions which are sacredly associated with every nook of their craggy
district.

"The tract of country," says Willkomm in his Preface, "the true
Highlands of Upper Lusatia, called by the inhabitants themselves the
Upper Country, to which the tales are native, is one very narrowly
circumscribed. It amounts to scarcely ten square (German) miles. I have,
however, selected it for my undertaking," he continues, "because it is
intimately familiar to me; because the innermost character of the small
population who inhabit it is confidentially known to me; because there
is hardly a road or a path in the country which, on the darkest night, I
could not find. Interesting, romantic, magnificent is the piece of earth
which, at the confines of Bohemia, runs over hilly heights and lofty
hill, tops on to the high mountain-chain. But still more interesting, I
maintain with confidence, is the race of people."

It may seem strange at first, that the wise and profound explorers whom
we have so often had occasion to cite, the brothers Grimm, should have
failed to present us with any traditions from a corner of ground around
which they have so successfully laboured. We have hinted already at the
sufficient reason of the blank. Willkomm tells us, that the rest of the
world, which "the cabin'd cribb'd" Lusatian has himself learned to call
"_o' th' outside_," has taken no cognisance of his beautiful hill
country. Lusatia has a literature of her own, and no one is acquainted
with it. "She had, and partly still has, her own, similar to the
Imperial cities, exceeding free and energetic municipal constitution."
But no one cares about it. Celebrated and learned historians, questioned
by Willkomm on the subject, have acknowledged their ignorance in regard