The Portland daily press., 1880-01-07
Was It a Glass Slipper?

As to the material of Cinderellas slipper
there has been much dispute In the greater
part Of what are apparently the older forms of
the story, it is made of gold. This may per-
haps be merely figure of speech, but there
are instances on record of shoes, or at least
sandals, being made of precious metals, Even
in our own times, as we'll as in the days of the
Caesars, horse is said to have been shod with
gold. And an Arab geographer, quoted by
Mr.. Lane, vouches for the fact that the islands
of Wak-Wak are ruled by queen who "has
shoes of gold.' Moreover. "no one walks in
all these islands with any other kind of shoe;
if he wear any other kind his feet are cut"
1t is true that his authority is little weak
ened by his subsequent statement that these
isles have trees which bear fruits like
women" These strange beings have beauti-
fnl faces, and are suspended by their hair.
"They come forth from integuments like large
leathern bags. And when they feel the air
and sun they cry 'Wak-Wak!' until their hair
Is cut; and when it is cut they die" Glass is
an all but unknown material for shoe-making
in the genuine folk tales Of any country except
France. The heroine of one of Mr.. J. F.
Campbell's Gaelic tales wore glass shoes"
but this exception to the rule may be due to a
French influence, transmitted through an
English or Lowland Scotch channel. Even in
France itself the slipper is not always of glass.
Nine. D'Aulnoy's "Finette Cendron,'' for in
stance, wore one of "red velvet embroidered
with pearls" The use Of the word verre by
Perrault has been accounted for in two ways
Some think that the material in question was
tisSu en- Uerre, fashionable in Perrault's time.
But the more generally received idea is that
the substance was originally kind of fur
called vair-a word now obsolete in France,
except in heraldry, but locally preserved in
England as the name of the weasel-and that
some reciter or transcriber to whom the mean
ing of Udir was unknown, substituted the more
familiar but less probable 0efre, thereby DOOM
ing Cinderella to wear glass slipper long
before the discovery was made that glass may
be rendered tough. In favor of the correct
ness of this superstition, we have the great au-
thority of M. Littre, whose dictionary affirms
positively that in the description of Cinder-
elias slipper, Ue,re is mistake for Udir. In
this decision some scholars, especially those
who detect in every feature of fairy tale
''solar myth refuse to acquiesce. Thus M.
Andre Lefevre, the accomplished editor of
recent edition of Perrault's "Contes,' abso-
lutely refuses to give up the UeTre which
cOItUteUt puJJutGeUtoNt u UIt UtyttG tttUItjeUL.
But the fact that Cinderella is not shod with
glass in the vast majority of the lands she in
habits, outweighs any amount OF NEUROLOGICAL
probabilities. Besides, a golden shoe is admir-
ably adapted to a luminous myth. 1t was
golden sandal which Rhodopis lost while bath
ing, and understanding to the evidently ORR
entail tale preserved for us by Strabo and Elian
was borne by an eagle to the Egyptian King,
who Immediately resolved to make that SAN
dals owner his royal spouse. In the veneer
able Egyptian tale of the 1.-TWO Brothers,"
another monarch is equally affected by the
sight of lock of the heroine's golden hair,
that is borne to him by the river into which it
had fallen, and he makes a similar resolve.
In Lesghian storyfrom the Caucasus super
natural being drops golden shoe, and the
hero is sent in search of its fellow, becoming
thereby exposed to many dangers. We may
fairly be allowed, without any slur being cast
upon NEUROLOGICAL Interpretation, to give up
the glassiness of Cinderella's slipper. If the
substitution of 0efre for Udir be admitted, it
supplies us with one of the few verbal tests
which exists whereby to track story's wan
behring's. For in that case we may always trace
home to France, or at least detect French
element in any form of the Cinderella story in
which the heroine wears glass slipper. A
somewhat similar mistake to that which vitre-
fed Cinderella's slipper caused a celebrated
picture by Rubens to be long known by an in
appropriate title. Many visitor to the Ma
tional Gallery must have wondered why por-
trait of lady in hat manifestly made not of
straw, but of beaver or kind of felt should
be designated the cbdpedu de pdilLe, before it
was pointed out by Mr. Wornum in the cata-
logue that paiHe was probably mistake for
poll, word meaning among other things wool
and the nap of hat, and akin to the Latin
pileus, felt cap or hat, and indeed, to the
word felt itsef-Nineteenth Century,