Publisher's Synopsis
From the Preface.
The revival of interest in folk-lore and fairy tales is one of the most marked and, at the same time, encouraging incidents in modern literature.
Some few years ago these works were only known to the few-were hardly classed as books by the critics or by the public; now they are valued by the one, and eagerly looked for by the other. The remote by-ways of tradition are being examined for examples of these tales, and every land and every language brought under tribute to supply the new demand.
Hitherto, however, no systematic attempt seems to have been made to gather together into one series a representative selection of Fairy Tales of other lands. The European Folk-Tale Series is an attempt to do this, and, while avoiding the knownor hackneyed, to give characteristic examples of each land, racy of the soil, and peculiar to the people.
The tales are, for the most part, now first presented to the world in an English garb. When complete, the publisher believes that a representative and catholic collection of little known and yet valuable legends will be within the reach of the reader. The series will be complete in about twelve volumes, representing, amongst others, the Esthonian, Russian, Mongolian, Slavonic, Polish, Bohemian, Servian, Magyar, and Scandinavian races.
The present volume deals with Esthonian, perhaps one of the least known branches of the great Folklore family. Up to a few years ago very little was known of Esthonian tales. One or two might be met with here and there in large collections, but it was not until Dr. Kreutzwald edited them that any real attempt was made to collect them in any number. Speaking of the characteristics of these stories it has been well said: 'Many signs show unmistakably a Lithuanian source, or, at least, contact; others, more recent, indicate Russian origin. As the coast of Esthonia and the adjacent islands had a Swedish population, there are borrowed from them many stories as well as many myths springing from the earliest times. Others, more modern, show German traces and characteristics of dwellers in towns as well as the country.' Over sixty examples of Esthonian folk-lore have been collected, edited, and published under the auspices of the Finnish Literary Society. These are, of course, of varying merit. The present volume presents to the English reader what the translator believes to be the best and most marked of the collection. No attempt has been made to alter the styles of these tales; on the contrary, the aim has been to present them to the reader as closely in their native garb as the exigencies of our language will permit. Artistic feeling and no small amount of poetry will be found in most of these stories, and while there is no lack of magic and witchcraft, dragons, serpents, and other monsters, still it appears to the translator that the construction of the stories shows a skill that interests the reader apart from these attractions, and will, it is hoped, make the first volume, 'The Secrets of the Night, and other Esthonian Tales, ' acceptable to the public in general, and to the folk-lore student in particular.
