IN NORTH GERMAN LEGENDS.

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dienstigen Kabouter manneken:" which, though not so direct in their tendency as the two first, sufficiently show the individuality and spread of these spirits, with all the customs and manners attributed to our English Puck, and consequently identical with him.

As this will be for the present the latest opportunity of referring to the connexion of Shakespeare's elves with their original derivation from the Continent, and the immense development in Continental nomenclature from them, in everything relating to sacredness of mountains, lakes, rivers, plains, or buildings, or of veneration for sites of ancient worship and prayer, it might worthily be introduced by the awful invocation which Shakespeare puts into the mouth of Prospero, the magician of the "Tempest" (act v. sc. 1), beginning—

"Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves;'

but why quote more of a piece of lyric poetry which every one with a due appreciation of the pact, or of the beauties of the English language, must be able to repeat by heart, whilst they almost exhaust the list of localities on which the elves could have impressed their names, if themselves are not only a derivation from the Archaic Ell-also a most widely-diffused synonym for holy, and so found in nearly every language? Eli, Elias, and Elijah, are some of the most prominent scriptural proofs. Bel, Baal, Belinus, and numerous others, lead us to the East. Bellerophon, Bellona, and Belisma, are classic instances in which personal appellatives are resorted to from this favourite root; but, as it is

the names of places that we mean more particularly to illustrate, we shall proceed to them, and confine ourselves to the regions of Germany, since it is to that country we believe our poet principally owes his mythology of the "Tempest," as we shall show more particularly in the following chapter. Besides, however, the Ells and compounds and variants that may be found in most foreign gazetteers-(Alsace, Elbe, Illmenau, Oldenburg, Ullaborg, in Finland, may serve as guides to search with the different Vowels)—we have very prominently their religious pagan localities still named Ellguth, generally now sunk to small villages or private estates. Kruse ("Budorgis on Silesian Antiquities," p. 93) says: "the denomination Ellgut seems to me significant, as it appears at nearly every place where pagan burial-places are found;" and he enumerates forty-nine such-Elgothe or Ellgute in the Province of Silesia and Prussian Glatz. Speaking of the Principality of Ratibor, he first enumerates a silly popular derivation of Ellguth-because the fertility there might be measured by ells-and then continues: "but I believe that it rather comes from Hel (holy), and signifies a sacred glebe appropriated to the priests. My opinion is supported by the translation of the name of a small place in Switzerland called Ellgow or Ellkow in old diplomas rendered as Augia sacra, or by sacer Pagus." Zedler's Lexicon adds that it was formerly called "die heilige Aue," or "Heiligow;" as in Scotland we have the tribe of the Elgovi, to which a prefixed sibilant for Selgovii is added improperly by some. Elgin, an old metropolitan See in Scotland, may be added as

IN SILESIA AND AT POTSDAM.

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an ancient name; and Ulster, in Ireland, would answer with a proper explanation for the Emerald Isle; Aliso, the famous German fortress taken by the legionaries of Augustus, and the numen Alces of Tacitus (An. cap. xliii.), furnish the oldest examples.

The forty-nine Silesian localities of Kruse are all given in "Meyer's Grosses Lexicon," s. v. Ellguth, with the equivalent Polish Ligota (possibly, by the inversion of the vowel, rectius Ilgota). There is another Ellguth, however, which fell under my own observation in a pedestrian excursion from Berlin to Potsdam, along the Havel, in which Englishmen will feel almost a dear and domestic interest, as it immediately adjoins the castle and domain of Babensberg, where the eldest-born of her present Majesty and the Prince Consort has found a home, and which the Princess Royal of England and Prussia may render as sacred by her virtues as it was in the opinions of the nation when dedicated to an earlier creed and worship. It is a tract immediately opposite Babensberg and the Pfauen Insel (Peacock's Island), with local designations that point unmistakeably to early sanctity. One of its boundaries is "der Heiliger See," the holy lake, called Weisser See, or White Sea-another synonym for holy; nor would the Zackerau, another variation stretched also to the adjoining woods and district, be but a popular corruption of Sacra au, or Augia, thus confirming the other interpretations.

As the next chapter will be devoted to proofs from Shakespeare's own works that he must have

226 THIS ATTEMPT ORIGINAL AND UNAIDED.

been well acquainted with Germany, its language and legends, we shall now close our specific Excursus on the most original of his creations-the noisy, mischievous, merry Puck, which he alone revived in his true name and character, superseding any previous views of the little imp as a Pouke or Devil, and possibly introducing him in a more friendly and beneficent character, as a real Robin Goodfellowa name, I believe, not found before as an English characteristic, and which is so truly expressive of his exploits as could only be found out of England.

The attempt is new and carried on without any aid, either literary or pecuniary, from other resources than my own. The above pages are the result of twenty years' continued reading and research; and they may, therefore, lay claim to favourable consideration should any errors or defects appear which better opportunities or friendly assist ance in its progress might have corrected. The success of the first volume was not such as to offer much temptation to proceed; but, having promised my subscribers a second, I hereby offer it as a redemption of that promise, with all the additional experience which its delay has afforded.

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CHAPTER XII.

"We are not at the end of our discoveries relative to the original of our author's (Shakespeare) dramatic pieces."Steevens' Notes on Romeo and Juliet.

"Many years ago I had made a note of the dates in which these performances (of the English actors) were given before the Court at Dresden, but have mislaid it. There may yet be found in the Treasury Accounts of our Electoral Courts, or of the Imperial Municipalities, information regarding them."— Tieck's Preface to Deutsches Theater.

IF Shakespeare has been thus far found cognisant of so much of the mythology and customs of the Continent, the question naturally arises, How and where did he gain all this? At p. 9 of the present volume we have stated our belief that it could only have happened from close personal observation and acquaintance. The present chapter will be devoted to a more full development of this view, which we have already given succinctly in a German paper contributed to the Morgenblatt, published at Stuttgart in December 1853, and in the Literary Gazette, Oct. 22nd, 1859.

It will first be shown that Shakespeare was com