version (quoted by M. Deulin from _Fabliaux et
Contes_ published by St. Meon, vol. iv. p. 386) amplifies all that is
least refined in _Sendabar_ and in _Sindibad_. St. Martin grants the
wishes, there are four of them, and nobody is one penny the better. With
Philippe de Vigneules (1505-1514, the seventy-eighth of his hundred
_Nouvelles_), God grants three wishes to a wedded pair. The woman wishes
a new leg for her pot, the man wishes her _le pied au ventre_, and then
wishes it back again. M. Deulin found this form in living popular
tradition, at Leuze in Hainaut.

The _Souhaits_ of La Fontaine (_Fables_, vii. 6) has this peculiarity,
that the giver of the wishes, as in Marie de France and in _Sindibad_,
is a Follet or brownie, or familiar spirit, obliged to leave his
friends. He offers them three wishes; first, they ask for wealth and are
embarrassed by their riches, then for a restoration of their mediocrity,
then for wisdom.

'C'est un tresor qui n'embarrasse point.'

La Fontaine's source is obscure; had he known _Syntipas_, he might (or
might not) have introduced the story among his _Contes_. Perhaps it was
too rude even for that unabashed collection.

As for Perrault, he probably drew from a popular tradition his _Aune de
Boudin_. Collin de Plancy (_OEuvres Choisies de Ch. Perrault_, Paris,
1826, 240) gives a curious rustic version. Three brothers dance with the
Fairies, who offer them a wish apiece. The eldest, as heir of the
paternal property, wants no more, but, as wish he must, asks that their
calf may cure the colic of every invalid who seizes it by the tail. (How
manifestly Indian in origin is this introduction of the sacred beast
whose tail is grasped by the pious Hindoo in his latest hours!) The
youngest brother wishes the horns of cow and calf on his brother's head,
the second wishes a bull's head on his brother's shoulders, and the
Fairies make these wild wishes of none avail.

Manifestly the fundamental idea is capable of infinite transformations,
literary or popular: a good example is the play of _Le Bucheron_, by
Guichard and Philidor, acted in 1763.

The story has no connection with the three successful wishes by aid of
which the devil is defeated in a number of popular tales belonging to a
different cycle. All these are inspired, however, by the great god
Wunsch, who presides over Wishing Gates.

'Would I could wish my wishes all to rest,
And know to wish the wish that should be best,