I. ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE EFFIGIES OF THE MADONNA. Through all the most beautiful and precious productions of human genius and human skill which the middle ages and the renaissance have bequeathed to us, we trace, more or less developed, more or less apparent, present in shape before us, or suggested through inevitable associations, one prevailing idea: it is that of an impersonation in the feminine... more...

PREFACE The welcome which has been accorded to the volumes of this Series, and the fact that some of them have passed into second and third editions, suggest that these little books have been found useful by beginners in Egyptology and others. Hitherto the object of them has been to supply information about the Religion, Magic, Language, and History of the ancient Egyptians, and to provide editions of... more...

PREFACE Maui is a demi god whose name should probably be pronounced Ma-u-i, i. e., Ma-oo-e. The meaning of the word is by no means clear. It may mean "to live," "to subsist." It may refer to beauty and strength, or it may have the idea of "the left hand" or "turning aside." The word is recognized as belonging to remote Polynesian antiquity. MacDonald, a writer of the New... more...

PREFACE This book consists almost entirely of legends or traditions of a varied character, referring to places and buildings in Florence, such as the Cathedral and Campanile, the Signoria, the Bargello, the different city gates, ancient towers and bridges, palaces, crosses, and fountains, noted corners, odd by-ways, and many churches.  To all of these there are tales, or at least anecdotes attached,... more...

No new edition of Bulfinch's classic work can be considered complete without some notice of the American scholar to whose wide erudition and painstaking care it stands as a perpetual monument. "The Age of Fable" has come to be ranked with older books like "Pilgrim's Progress," "Gulliver's Travels," "The Arabian Nights," "Robinson Crusoe," and five... more...

PREFACE In these lectures an attempt is made, not so much to restate familiar facts, as to accommodate them to new and supplementary evidence which has been published in America since the outbreak of the war. But even without the excuse of recent discovery, no apology would be needed for any comparison or contrast of Hebrew tradition with the mythological and legendary beliefs of Babylon and Egypt.... more...

THE LEGEND OF MONTE DEL DIABLO. The cautious reader will detect a lack of authenticity in the following pages. I am not a cautious reader myself, yet I confess with some concern to the absence of much documentary evidence in support of the singular incident I am about to relate. Disjointed memoranda, the proceedings of ayuntamientos and early departmental juntas, with other records of a primitive and... more...

VERSE: A LEGEND OF PROVENCE The lights extinguished, by the hearth I leant,Half weary with a listless discontent.The flickering giant-shadows, gathering near,Closed round me with a dim and silent fear.All dull, all dark; save when the leaping flame,Glancing, lit up a Picture’s ancient frame.Above the hearth it hung.  Perhaps the night,My foolish tremors, or the gleaming light,Lent power to that... more...

AN INTRODUCTION BY CHARLES DICKENS In the spring of the year 1853, I observed, as conductor of the weekly journal Household Words, a short poem among the proffered contributions, very different, as I thought, from the shoal of verses perpetually setting through the office of such a periodical, and possessing much more merit.  Its authoress was quite unknown to me.  She was one Miss Mary Berwick, whom... more...

PREFACE Although the folk-tales and legends of Brittany have received ample attention from native scholars and collectors, they have not as yet been presented in a popular manner to English-speaking readers. The probable reasons for what would appear to be an otherwise incomprehensible omission on the part of those British writers who make a popular use of legendary material are that many Breton... more...