The legends of the Panjâb

XX
PREFACE.
actors simply fly through the air, as in the case of GurA
G-orakhnath going to help his friends in the story of Sila Dai.
Metamorphosis plays a large and important part in Indian
story, as it inevitably must where half the population believe
that the proper and natural course for the human soul to take
after death is to go into some other animal, and that this
process with regard to their own individual souls has been
going on for an indefinite period. Accordingly we find in the
folktales metamorphosis of the most startling kind constantly
called into requisition. There is metamorphosis of the dead
into the living; metamorphosis of the dead into inanimate
objects ; of the deities into animate objects {avatara or incarnation)
and into inanimate objects ;
so also of superhuman personages,
as ogres, angels, jinns, vampires, mannikins, fairies
and ghosts ; of living things one into another and into inanimate
things with the most wonderful results ; and of inanimate
things into each other. Lastly, we have a variant of the
temporary death notion in the temporary form of metamorphosis
or change of skin. Metamorphosis is very common in the
Panjah Lngends, especially in the stories of Gurd Gugg^ and
Niwal Dai, and its general prevalence in Indian folklore, even
in the most grotesque shapes, has been noticed by Mr. Ralston
in his introduction to Indian Fairy Tales. Disguise for
folktale
purposes may be described as metamorphosis with the
marvellous left out, and though a careful survey of disguises
shows that they are apt to run in grooves as it were, the
same disguise constantly occurring in different tales, yet they
are not of sufficient importance to deserve more than a passing
mention here. They are constantly employed. Enchanted
beings and things are a very useful ingredient in the composition
of a folktale, and occur in every collection, but,
owing to the great diversity of these and of their qualities,
I cannot do more now than notice that the invariable
object of their introduction is to help on the hero or the
tale. There is one other essential to the progress of a stoiy
which is found in the Panjah Legends, the identification of
the hero. It is clear that, after having been killed and