to their father. The pillar of salt, into which their mother was
changed, answers all the king's questions. It is not said that she
regained her human form ("Die verwandelten Kinder," Stier's
_Ungarische Volksmaerchen_, p. 58). In a Siebenburg story, "Die beiden
goldenen Kinder," the children are killed by an envious woman who
becomes queen in their mother's place. From their remains spring two
golden pine-trees which are burnt; a sheep eats two of the sparks and
has two golden lambs that are killed; from two pieces of the entrails
step forth the golden-haired children (Haltrich's _Siebenbuergische
Maerchen_, pp. 2, 3). In this tale the children are restored to their
father, the king, by the intervention of God himself (p. 4), who in
these _Siebenbuergische Maerchen_ plays a part just as often as
"Khuda" does in the Indian tales, taking for the purpose the form of a
"good old man," and often wearing a grey mantle that reminds one of
Odin. In the Netherlandish story of "The knight with the swan"
(Thorpe's _Northern Mythology_, vol. III. p. 302), King Oriant's
mother persuades the king his wife gave him seven puppies instead of
seven children (each born with a silver chain round its neck in "proof
of their mother's nobility"). She sends the children to the forest to
be destroyed. They are left there alive, and are fostered by an old
man. When the queen-mother learns this, she sends servants to kill
them. These are content with depriving six of the children of their
silver chains, on which the children instantly become swans. (The
seventh child is absent and so is saved.) A goldsmith makes two
beakers out of one of the chains, and keeps the others intact. When
the chains are hung again round the five swans' necks, and the beaker
shown to the sixth, they regain their human forms. See also paragraph
8 of the notes to Phulmati Rani.

4. With the children in the fruit and flowers compare in these
stories, Phulmati Rani, p. 3: Loving Laili, p. 81: the Bel-Princess,
p. 146, and paragraph 5 of the notes to that story, p. 283: and in
_Old Deccan Days_, "Surya Bai," p. 86: and "Anar Rani and her two
maids," p. 95. With these may be compared the Polish Madey (Naake's
_Slavonic Fairy Tales_, p. 220). Madey is a robber who commits fearful
crimes; he repents, and sticks his "murderous club" upright in the
ground, swearing to kneel before it till the boy who has caused his
repentance returns as a bishop. Years go by: the boy, now a bis