The Science of Fairy Tales / An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology

In spite, however, of such unwonted incredulity, Map, having once begun by telling this story, proceeds to tell another like it, which he seems to have no difficulty in believing. The second tale concerns a hero of the Welsh border, Wild Edric, of whose historic reality as one of the English rebels against William the Conqueror there is ample proof. It appears that Edric, returning from hunting, lost his way in the Forest of Dean, and accompanied only by one boy, reached about midnight a large house which turned out to be a drinking-shop, such as the English, Map says, call a guildhouse. On approaching it he saw a light, and looking in, he beheld a number of women dancing. They were beautiful in countenance, bigger and taller than ordinary women. He noticed one among them fairer than the rest, and (Walter, perhaps, had Fair Rosamund in his mind when he says) more to be desired than all the darlings of kings. Edric rushed round the house and, finding an entrance, dashed in and with the help of his boy dragged her out, despite a furious resistance in which the nails and teeth of her companions made themselves felt. She brooded in sullen silence for three whole days; but on the fourth day she exclaimed to her new master: ?Bless you, my dearest, and you will be blessed too, and enjoy health and prosperity until you reproach me on account of my sisters, or the place, or the grove whence you have snatched me away, or anything connected with it. For the very day you do so your happiness will forsake you. I shall be taken away; and you will suffer repeated misfortune, and long for your own death.? He pledged himself to fidelity; and to their splendid nuptials nobles came from far and near. King William heard of the wonder, and bade the newly wedded pair to London, where he was then holding his court, that he might test the truth of the tale. They proved it to him by many witnesses from their own country; but the chief testimony was that of the lady's superhuman beauty; and he dismissed them in admiration to their home. After many years of happiness Edric returned one evening late from hunting, and could not find his wife. He spent some time in vainly calling for her before she came. ?Of course,? he began, angrily, ?you have not been detained so long by your sisters, have you?? The rest of his wrath fell upon the empty air; for at the mention of her sisters she vanished. And neither her husband's self-reproaches, nor his tears, nor any search could ever find her again.[216]

A point far more interesting than the actual mode of capture is the taboo. The condition on which the heroine remains with her captor-spouse is, in stories of the Hasan of Bassorah type, his preservation of the feather-garb; in those of the Melusina type (with which we are now dealing), his observance of the taboo. In the tales just cited from Walter Map we have two important forms of the taboo, and in the legend of Melusina herself we have a third. The latter is an example of the ordinary objection on the part of supernatural beings to be seen otherwise than just how and when they please, which we have dealt with in a previous chapter; and little need be added to what I have already said on the subject. The other two are, however, worth some consideration.