60 ASHIEPATTLE: OR HANS SEEKS HIS LUCK 



brew poison, befriend and enchant, 1 as the case may be, 

 or as she wishes to favour the old or oppose the new 

 civilisation. Occasionally, instead of a hut in the forest, 

 the witch has a well or spring. At first sight, it might 

 appear as if the witch were thus confused with the 

 spring goddess herself, but the discovery of more than 

 one cave-dwelling or habitation down a well in Bavaria 2 

 is not without its weight in reckoning the probability 

 of actual well-dwelling witches. We may note also Das 

 blaue Licht, where the witch hides her treasures in a 

 subterranean chamber leading off a well. In the very 

 first tale of our Grimm, the German Froschkonig, the 

 Scottish Frog-Lover, we find that near the king's house 

 is a vast, dense wood, and in the wood an old lime tree, 

 at the foot of which is a spring or well. The witch 

 associated with this spot is spoken of as evil, for she 

 has enchanted a prince or king's son. Her hostility, 

 however, to this particular king's son may possibly be 

 accounted for by the fact that when he is disenchanted 

 he carries his bride off to his own kingdom. He is one 

 of the "modern" young men, with a patriarchal view 

 of life, removed far indeed from that of the witch- 

 priestess. Quite in keeping with this witch is the witch 

 in Rapunzel. Frau Gothel is a great hand at the 

 cultivation of vegetables, and her neighbour steals, as 

 folk -custom justified him in doing, corn -salad for his 



1 It is conceivable, although of course it cannot be proven, that the primitive 

 witch-priestesses had learnt the secret of hypnotising those who could be useful 

 or were hostile to them. Many of the features of enchantment would thus 

 become intelligible. For example, the evil eye of the witch, or a common method 

 of overcoming her, namely, to go and do precisely what you need in her presence 

 but without paying the least regard to her. 



2 See Panzer, Bayerische Gebrduche, Bd. ii. pp. 277, 302. 



