face of Corvetto, and immediately began to shout out, "The Monaciello, the Monaciello, hola! candles! run, run!" Corvetto, meanwhile, got off with his prize through the window *.

The belief in Mermaids also prevailed in modern Italy. In the reign of Roger, king of Sicily, a young man happening to be bathing in the sea late in the evening, perceived that something was following him. Supposing it to be one of his companions, he caught it by the hair, and dragged it on shore. But finding it to be a maiden of great beauty and of most perfect form, he threw his cloak about her, and took her home, where she continued with him till they had a son. There was one thing however which greatly grieved him, which was the reflection that so beautiful a form should be dumb, for he had never heard her speak.

One day he was reproached by one of his companions, who said that it was a spectre, and not a real woman, that he had at home: being both angry and terrified, he laid his hand on the hilt of his sword, and urged her with vehemence to tell him who or what she was, threatening if she did not do so, to kill the child before her eyes. The

♦ In another of these tales, it is said of a young man, who, on breaking open a cask, found a beautiful maiden in it, that he stood for a while comme a chillo che ha visto lo Monaciello.

spirit only saying, that he had lost a good wife by forcing her to speak, instantly vanished, leaving her son behind. A few years after, as the boy was playing on the sea-shore with his companions, the spirit his mother dragged him into the sea, where he was drowned *.

We come now to the Fatè of romance and tale, and are more convinced than ever of the truth of an opinion that we hazarded in the beginning of this work, of Fata being the contraction of Fatata, Enchanted †, and that the Italian Fata, like the French Fée, merely signifies a woman endowed with superior power.

The earliest notice we recollect seeing of the

* Vincentius apud Kornmann de Miraculis vivorum.

See vol. i. p. 12. note. At the time that note was written we had not seen the Pentamerone, which has furnished us with strong confirmation of our opinion. In the tale of the Dragon which we shall presently give, Fata and Maga are used as synonymous.-It is, by the way, not easy to distinguish in Ariosto between La Maga Melissa, and La Fata Alcina. Their powers seem to be at least equal.In the introduction, Zoza arrives at the castle of a Fata, and next morning she sends her to a sister of hers, puro fatata (also enchanted). We also meet in the Pentamerone what we were long in search of, the contraction of fatato. In the tale of Lo Serpe, it is said, of the king's son, Lo quale essenno bello comme a no Fato (who being as handsome as a Fay).

Fate is in the Orlando Innamorato, where we meet the celebrated Fata Morgana, who would at first appear to be, as a personification of Fortune, a being of a higher order.

Ivi una Fata è chiamata Morgana,
Che fatta ha Dio dispensiere dell' oro;
Quanto per tutto il mondo se ne spende
E s'adopra, da lei tutto si prende.

L. i. c. 2. st. 11.

But we afterwards find her in her proper station, subject, with the Fatè and Witches, to the redoubtable Demogorgon. When Orlando, on delivering Ziliante from her, makes her swear by that awful power, the poet says:

Sopra ogni Fata è quel Demogorgone
(Non so se mai l'odiste raccontare)
E giudeca fra loro e fa ragione,

E quel che piace a lui può di lor fare;

La notte se cavalca ad un montone,
Traversa le montagne, passa

mare,

E streghe, e fate, e fantasime vane

Batte con serpe, viene d'ogni dimane †.

* Neither Lucan nor Statius, who describe this awful being, ventures to name him. It was, probably, from Lactantius that Bojardo learned his name. Tasso (Ger. Lib. c. xiii. st. x.) imitates the reticence of the Latin poets.

† Fa che diventan gatte, says Berni, witchifying the matter completely.