EVOLUTION IN FOLK LORE. 49 



the dogs, who had at last gnawed their ropes apart, made their 

 appearance and sprang upon the white cows. 



First they attacked the queen and tore her to pieces, and then, 

 turning upon the rest of the herd, they killed many and put the 

 others to night, so that the hunter was saved. 



Such is the form of the legend as I received it from the gen- 

 tleman referred to above, whose culture and the position he held 

 in society warrants me in believing him to be an authority on 

 this matter. 



He was born in 1805, and must have heard the legend at least 

 as early as 1810. He received it from his negro nurse, a slave, 

 whom his father had bought direct from the coast of Africa. 

 Assuming the woman to be of a responsible age, which she must 

 have been to have had the care of children, it was unquestion- 

 ably current on the coast of Africa in the latter part of the 

 eighteenth century, and probably for a long antecedent period. 



The most unique feature of this tale, and that which made it 

 especially attractive to children, was the hunters musical call of 

 the dogs, and the song of the axes. The narrator sang these, re- 

 peating them many times in the course of the story to a curious 

 refrain which I have attempted to reproduce in the music given 

 above. 



This, indeed, was the chief charm of the story, and so well 

 was it executed that one could almost hear the ring of the axes 

 as they rebounded from the tree, while the changes of voice 

 in the cries of the hunter represented his increasing anxiety and 

 fear as time went on and no aid came to him. It is difficult to 

 describe the effect thus produced ; to appreciate it, it was neces- 

 sary to hear it. 



Nearly a hundred years later this story was current again in 

 Georgia, where it was made public by the facile pen of Mr. Joel 

 Chandler Harris, better known as the author of the Uncle Remus 

 stories. As will be seen on examination, it has changed consid- 

 erably, but its principal points remain unaltered. I regret that 

 I can not reproduce Mr. Harris's story in full, but a copyright 

 prevents me from doing more than making a few brief quo- 

 tations. 



This story, which Mr. Harris entitles " The Little Boy and his 

 Dogs," appeared in the Louisville Courier-Journal, February 18, 

 1886, and is somewhat as follows : 



A little boy lives with his mother in a hut beside a road. He 

 is her only child; but Uncle Remus, who tells the story, in- 

 forms us that the boy once had a little sister, who had been stolen 

 away how, it is not related and whom her brother searches the 

 woods in vain to find. One day, while engaged in this pursuit, 

 he meets two ladies wearing long veils, who come to his mother's 



VOL. XLI. 5 



