Introduction
to Little Russian Stories
(from South Russia)

HERE again Mr. Ralston informs us in his preface that he 'has been able to use but little the South Russian collections of Kulish and Rudchenko, there being no complete dictionary available of the dialect, or rather language, in which they are written.' He has, however, given a long and interesting story from the Ukraine, which I find also in Erben, the 'Norka.' One of Erben's South Russian stories is too closely identical with a pretty tale from the government of Voronezh, given by Ralston (p. 63), for me to give it a place here. All the other South Russian stories in Erben's collection I have translated, and only wish they had been more numerous.

The tales of Snake Husbands always appear to have an evil end, though the two that I have translated do not conclude so touchingly as the beautiful Great Russian story, 'The Watersnake' (Ralston, p. 116). Certainly the science of comparative mythology cannot be considered as having its data complete, until Slavonic folklore has been thoroughly investigated and analyzed.

In No. 28 an old friend will be discovered in a very rustic dress.

The text came from:

Wratislaw, A. H. Sixty Folk-Tales From Exclusively Slavonic Sources. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Company, 1890.

©Heidi Anne Heiner, SurLaLune Fairy Tales
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