To collect popular stories is either a most difficult or a most easy task. Everybody who finds nothing better to do thinks he is able at least to write down the stories which his nurse has told him. But this, you know, is a great mistake. First of all, not every story that an old woman may tell deserves to be written down and printed. There is a particular earthy flavour about the genuine home-grown, or, if I may say so, autochthonic Marchen - something like the flavour of the dark-red wild strawberry - which we must learn to appreciate before we can tell whether a story is old or new, genuine or made-up; whether it comes, in fact, from the forest or from the hothouse. This is a matter of taste; but, as tasters of wine or tea will tell you, even taste can be acquired. - F Max Muller