The story of the Envious Sisters as told by Galland was known in Italy (as Dr. W. Grimm points out in the valuable notes to his K. u.  H.M.) many generations before the learned Frenchman was born, through the “Pleasant Nights” of Straparola.  That Galland took his story from the Italian novelist it is impossible to believe, since, as Mr. Coote has observed, Straparola’s work “was already known in France for a couple of centuries through a popular French translation,” and Galland would at once have been an easily convicted copyist.  Moreover the story, imitated from Straparola, by Madame d’Aulnois, under the title of “La Belie Etoile et Le Prince Cheri,” had been published before Galland’s last two volumes appeared, and both those writers had the same publisher.  It is clear, therefore, that Galland neither invented the story nor borrowed it from Straparola or Madame d’Aulnois.  Whence, then, did he obtain it?—­that is the question.  His Arabic source has not yet been discovered, but a variant of the world-wide story is at the present day orally current in Egypt and forms No. xi. of “Comes Arabes Modernes.  Recueillis et Traduits par Guillaume Spitta Bey” (Paris, 1883), of which the following is a translation: 

Modern Arabic version.

There was once a King who said to his vazir, “Let us take a walk through the town during the night.”  In walking about they came to a house where they heard people talking, and stopping before it they heard a girl say, “If the King would marry me, I would make him a tart (or pie) so large that it would serve for him and his army.”  And another said, “If the King would marry me, I would make him a tent that would shelter him and his whole army.”  Then a third said, “If the King would marry me, I would present him with a daughter and a son, with golden hair, and hair of hyacinth colour alternately; if they should weep, it would thunder, and if they should laugh, the sun and moon would appear.”  The King on hearing these words went away, and on the following day he sent for the three girls and made the contract of marriage with them.  He passed the first night with the one who had spoken first, and said to her, “Where is the tart that would be sufficient for me and my army?” She answered him, “The words of the night are greased with butter:  when day appears they melt away.”  The next night he slept with the second, saying to her, “Where is the tent which would be large enough for me and my army?” She answered him, “It was an idea that came into my mind.”  So the King ordered them to go down into the kitchen among the slaves.  He passed the third night with the tattle one, saying, “Where are the boy and girl whose hair is to be like gold and hyacinth?” She replied, “Tarry with me nine months and nine minutes.”  In due time she became pregnant, and on the night of her confinement the midwife was sent for.  Then the other wife of the King went and met her in the street and said to her, “When