too ingenious to be true.



XVII. JACK AND HIS SNUFF-BOX.

_Source_.-Mr. F. Hindes Groome, _In Gipsy Tents_, p. 201
_seq._ I have eliminated a superfluous Gipsy who makes her
appearance towards the end of the tale _a propos des boltes_, but
otherwise have left the tale unaltered as one of the few English folk-
tales that have been taken down from the mouths of the peasantry: this
applies also to i., ii., xi.

_Parallels_.-There is a magic snuff-box with a friendly power in
it in Kennedy's _Fictions of the Irish Celts_, p. 49. The choice
between a small cake with a blessing, &c., is frequent (_cf._ No.
xxiii.), but the closest parallel to the whole story, including the
mice, is afforded by a tale in Carnoy and Nicolaides' _Traditions
populaires de l'Asie Mineure_, which is translated as the first
tale in Mr. Lang's _Blue Fairy Book_. There is much in both that
is similar to Aladdin, I beg his pardon, Allah-ed-din.



XVIII. THE THREE BEARS.

_Source_.--_Verbatim et literatim_ from Southey, _The
Doctor, &c._, quarto edition, p. 327.

_Parallels_.--None, as the story was invented by Southey. There