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Notes Note: While Hunt's translation of the Grimms' Household Tales appears in many places on the web, SurLaLune is the first and only site to present the entire text from the 1884 edition, including Hunt's preface, Andrew Lang's introduction, and the extensive notes from the Grimms, translated by Hunt. Hunt has been one of the few translators to offer the notes in English in almost two centuries of English translations. The notes for each tale appear at the bottom of the individual tale's page. They also appear in this Notes section in their entirety. 1 The Frog King, or Iron Henry This comes from Hesse, where there is also another story. A King who had three daughters was ill, and asked for some water from the well in his court-yard. The eldest went down and drew a glassful, but when she held it up to the sun, she saw that it was not clear. She thought this very strange, and was about to empty it again, when a frog appeared in the well, stretched forth its head, and at last jumped on to the edge of it. It then said to her,
"Oh, indeed, who would be the sweetheart of a disgusting frog?" cried the King's daughter, and ran away. When she went back again she told her sisters about the wonderful frog which was in the well and made the water muddy. Then the second went down and drew a glassful, which was also so thick that no one could drink it. The frog again sat on the brink, and said,
"That would be a chance for me!" cried the King's daughter, and ran away. At last the third also went to draw water, but she did not succeed better, and the frog cried to her,
"Very well, then," she answered laughingly, "I will be your sweetheart; I will really; only draw me some pure water that is fit to drink." She thought to herself, "What can it signify, it is very easy to please him by saying that; after all, a stupid frog can never be my sweetheart." The frog had, however, leapt back into the well, and when the King's daughter again drew some water, it was so clear that the sun was actually sparkling in it for joy. So she took the glass upstairs and said to her sisters, "Why were you so stupid as to be afraid of the frog?" Then the King's daughter thought no more about it, and went to bed quite happy. And when she had lain there a while, but had not fallen asleep, she heard a noise outside the door, and some one sang,
"Why, if that is not my sweetheart the frog!" said the King's child. "Well, as I promised, I will open the door for him." So she got up, and opened the door for him a very little, and then lay down again. The frog hopped after her, and at last hopped on the bottom of the bed to her feet, and stayed lying there, and when the night was over and day dawning, it leapt down and went out by the door. The next night when the King's daughter was in bed, it again crawled to the door, and sang its little song, she again opened the door, and the frog lay for another night at her feet. On the third night it came once more; then she said, "Mind, this is the last time that I shall let thee in; in future it won't happen." Then the frog jumped under her pillow, and she fell asleep. And when she awoke next morning, and expected the frog to hop away again, a handsome young prince was standing before her, who said that he had been the bewitched frog, but was now set free, because she had promised to be his sweetheart. Then they both went to the King, who gave them his blessing; a magnificent wedding was celebrated, and the two other sisters were vexed that they had not taken the frog to be their sweetheart. In a third story from the district of Paderborn, the King's son, after he has been delivered from his frog's shape, gives his betrothed, when he takes leave of her, a handkerchief, on which his name is written in red, and tells her if that should become black it will betoken that he is either dead or unfaithful. One day the princess sees, to her sorrow, that the name really has become black. On this she and her two sisters disguise themselves as troopers, and hire themselves to him. Some people suspect them, and strew peas,(1) thinking that if they really are girls and fall, they will be afraid, but if they are men they will swear. They have, however, discovered the plot, and when they fall on the peas, they swear. After this when the King's son travels away with the false bride, the three have to ride behind the carriage. On the way, the King's son hears a loud crack, and cries, "Stop; the carriage is breaking!" on this, the true bride behind the carriage, cries, "Alas, no, it is one of my heart-strings which is breaking." Twice more there is a crack, and each time he receives the same answer. Then he remembers the true bride, recognizes her in the disguise of the trooper, and marries her. This story is one of the oldest in Germany. It was called by the name of Iron Henry, from the faithful servant who had caused his sorrowful heart to be bound with iron bands. Rollenhagen thus names it in the Old German Household Tales, and Philander von Sittewald refers to it (3. 42) when he says, "Then her heart would lie in my hand, more fast than in an iron band," which occurs in the same proverbial fashion in Froschmeuseler. The band of sorrow, the stone which lies on the heart, is spoken of elsewhere. An old Minnesinger says beautifully, "She is stamped on my heart as on steel;" and Heinrich von Sar (Man. p. 1. 36) has the expression, "My heart lies in bands." We find in the Lied von Heinrich dem Lowen, St. 59, "her heart lay in bands;" in Keller's Wurtemberger (p. 35), "tho body bound with iron bands." Wirnt says of the breaking heart,
In its main features the story is still current in Scotland. In the Complaynt of Scotland (written in 1548), the tale of the "wolf of the warldis end," which has unfortunately been entirely lost, is mentioned among other stories, perhaps the Saga of the Northern Fenrir. J. Leyden, in his edition of the Complaynt (Edinb. 1801, pp. 234, 235), believes that fragments of it are still existing in various songs and nursery tales, and says that he has heard fragments sung in which the "well of the warldis end "occurred, and was called the "well of Absolom" and "the cauld well sae weary." He connects our story with it, although the well of the world may very easily have worked its way into various traditions, and we perceive in the German no connection with the wolf (or should we in the original read wolf instead of well?) Leyden's words are these: "According to the popular tale, the lady is sent by her stepmother to draw water from the well of the world's end. She arrives at the well, after encountering many dangers, but soon perceives that her adventures have not come to a conclusion. A frog emerges from the well, and before it suffers her to draw water, obliges her to betroth herself to the monster, under penalty of being torn to pieces. The lady returns safe, but at midnight the frog-lover appears at the door and demands entrance, according to promise, to the great consternation of the lady and her nurse."
The frog is admitted, and addresses her:
The frog is finally disenchanted, and appears in his original form as a prince. It.is likewise deserving of notice that the name of Henry for a servant, has something about it that is popular, as is fully shown in our edition of Der arme Heinrich, 213-216. [This story bears some resemblance to the ballad of Earl Mar's daughter. She went out to play and saw a dove sitting in a tree, which she persuaded to come down by promising it a cage of gold and silver. The bird flew down and alighted on her head. She took it home and kept it daintily, but when night came a handsome youth stood by her side, who told her that he was the dove she had brought home, and that his mother was a queen skilled in witchcraft, who had turned him into a dove to charm such maidens as herself, and that he loved her and would live and die with her. She entreated him never to leave her. For six years he lived in her bower, and she bore him seven sons, but whenever one was born he instantly flew away with it, and gave it into his mother's care. After twenty-three years a great lord came to court the maiden, who refused him, and said she was content to dwell alone with her bird cow-me-doo. Hereupon the Earl swore he would kill the bird. The bird heard of this, and flew to his mother's castle beyond the sea, and told her that next day his wife, the mother of his seven sons, was to be married to another. The mother changed twenty-four stalwart men into storks, the seven sons into swans, and cow-me-doo into a hawk, and the birds flew over the sea to Earl Mar's castle, seized the men and bound them to trees, and then seized the maiden and carried her away with them.-TR.] 1: Die Zwolf Jager, No. 67, has many features in common with this story.-TR. 2: His death shocked her so much that her heart broke with a sound loud as that of a dry bough which is broken in two. 2 Cat and Mouse in Partnership From Hesse, where it is also told of the cock and hen. These found a precious stone in the dirt, sold it to a jeweller, and bought a pot of grease with the proceeds, which they put on a shelf for winter. The hen, however, by degrees emptied it secretly, and when that came to light, the cock was quite furious, and pecked his hen to death. Afterwards, in great repentance and sorrow, he buried her, as in the story of the Death of the Hen (No. 80). There is also a story about the cock and the hen in Pomerania, where the children are named, Top-off, Half-done, and Upside_down,(1) see Firmenich's Volkerstimmen, pp. 91, 92. It is also told of the fox and cock, who found a honey-pot. The children at their christening received the significant names, Top-off, Half-done, Quite-done. See Müllenhoff, No. 28, The Fox and the Bear. In Norwegian in Asbjörnsen, No. 17, there is also The Bear and the Fox. In it the names are, Just-begun, Half-eaten, and Cleaned-out. The negro story of the Hen and Cat, No. 2, has a similar incident. 1: It is a custom among village-folks when drinking tea together to turn their cups upside down when they are empty.-TR. From Hesse. According to another story, the poor man goes into a forest and is about to hang himself because he cannot support his children. Then comes a black carriage with four black horses; a beautiful maiden dressed in black, alights from it, and tells him that in a thicket in front of his house, he will find a bag of money, and, in return for that, he must give her what is concealed in his house. The man consents, and finds the money, but the thing which is concealed is his yet unborn child. When it is born, the maiden comes and wants to carry it away, but as the mother begs so hard, the maiden leaves it until its twelfth year. Then she takes it away to a black castle, which is furnished magnificently, and the child may go into every part of it except one chamber. For four years the girl is obedient, then she can no longer resist the torment of curiosity, and peeps into the chamber through a crack. She sees four black maidens, who absorbed in reading, appear alarmed at the instant, but her foster-mother comes out, and says, "I must drive thee away; what wilt thou lose most willingly?" "Speech," replies the girl. She gives her such a blow on the mouth that the blood streams out, and drives her forth. She has to pass the night under a tree, and next morning the King's son finds her there, takes her away with him, and against his mother's will, marries the dumb beauty. When the first child comes into the world, the wicked mother-in-law takes it and throws it into the water, sprinkles the sick Queen with blood, and gives out that she has devoured her own child. Thus it happens twice more, and then the innocent Queen, who cannot defend herself, is to be burnt. She is already standing in the fire when the black carriage comes; the maiden steps out of it, and goes through the flames, which instantly sink down and are extinguished; reaches the Queen, smites her on the month, and thus restores her speech; the other three maidens bring the three children whom they have rescued from the water, the treachery comes to light, and the wicked stepmother is put into a barrel filled with snakes and poisonous adders, and rolled down a bill. Allied to this are the Poor Man's Daughter, in Meier, No. 36, a Norwegian story in Asbjörnsen, No. 8, and Graamantel, a Swedish one (see further on). The legend of St. Ottilia has some resemblance to it, as told by Frau Naubert in her Volksmärchen, (Part I.) In the Pentamerone (1. 8) a goat's face is given as a punishment. In Wendish compare The Virgin Mary as Godmother, Haupt and Schmaler, No. 16, p. 179; in Wallachian, The Walled-up Mother, of Schott, No. 2. The root-idea of many doors which may be opened and one which may not, often re-appears and with various introductions, as in Fitcher's Vogel (No. 46). As regards each apostle being placed in a shining dwelling, compare the Hymn in praise of St. Anno, verse 720, where it is said that the bishops were sitting together in heaven like stars. It is an old incident that maidens who are robbed of their clothes should cover themselves with their long hair, it is related of St. Agnes in the Bibl. maxima 27, 82b of St. Magdalen, by Petrarch, in Latin verse, and there is a picture of the latter in the Magasin pittoresque, 1. 21. In an old Spanish romance a King's daughter sits in an oak, and her long hair covers the whole tree. (Diez's Ancient Spanish Romances, 177. Geibel's Volkslieder und Romanzen der Spanier, pp. 151, 152). 4 The Story of the Youth Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was This story is generally told in other places with new, or differently arranged, trials of courage, and is allied to the sagas Brother Lustig and Spielhansl, Nos. 81, 82. Parzival goes in an enchanted bed through the castle, 566, 567, in the same way as the youth who had no fear. The root of this is a Mecklenburgh story. The game of skittles played with dead men's bones, is inserted from a story from the district of Schwalm,(1) in Hesse. In another from Zwehrn it is related that ghosts come and invite the youth to play a game with nine bones and a dead man's head, which he fearlessly accepts, but in which he loses all his money. At midnight the spectres disappear of their own accord. From this also is taken the incident of the corpse being brought in, which he warms in bed. It contains, however, no further trials, and it lacks the jesting conclusion, which, on the other hand, appears in a third Hessian story, where the youth is a tailor, and his master's wife pours a bucket of cold water over him as he is lying in bed, in a fourth tale, this great bravery is ascribed to a youth from the Tyrol. He takes counsel with his father as to what trade will be most profitable for him, and at last resolves to learn how to fear. A new feature in this is, that a spirit comes in by night who is entirely covered with knives, and orders the Tyrolese youth to sit down and have his beard shaved by him, as in the story Stumme Liebe, by Musaus, 4. 65-82; and a similar incident is told by C Brentano in his notes on Die Grundung Prags. The youth does it without fear, but the ghost when he has shaved him wants to cut his throat as well, but at that very moment the clock strikes twelve, and the ghost disappears. In this part there is a connection with the story of the youth who kills the dragon and cuts out its tongue, by means of which he afterwards makes himself known to be the victor, and wins the King's daughter, as is fully detailed in the story of The Gold Children (No. 85). A fifth story from Zwehrn deserves to be given here at full length. A certain man once lived in the world whose father was a smith, who carried the youth to the grave-yard and to every place where it was terrible, but he never knew what fear was. Then his father said, "When once thou goest out into the world thou wilt soon learn it." He went out, and it chanced that he arrived in a village by night, and as all the houses were shut, he lay clown beneath the gallows. And as he saw a man hanging there, he spoke to him, and said, "Why art thou hanging there?" Then the man who was hanging, answered, "I am innocent. The schoolmaster stole the little bell of the alms-bag, and denounced me as the thief. If thou wilt help me to a decent burial, I will present thee with a staff, with which thou caust drive away all spirits. The schoolmaster has concealed the little bell under a great stone in his cellar." When the youth heard that, he got up, went into the village to the schoolmaster's house and knocked. The schoolmaster got up, but would not open his door, because he was afraid, but the other cried, "If thou dost not open the door, I will break it open." So the schoolmaster opened it, and the youth instantly seized him just as he was, in his shirt, took him on his back, and carried him to the judge's house. Then he cried aloud, "Open your door, I am bringing a thief." When the judge came out, the youth said, "Take down from the gallows the poor sinner outside; he is innocent, and hang up this one in his stead; he stole the little bell from the alms-bag, and it is lying in his cellar, under a great stone." The judge sent thither and the little bell was found, so the schoolmaster was forced to confess the theft. Then the judge pronounced the sentence, that the innocent man should be taken down from the gallows, and honourahly buried, and that the thief should be hanged in his place. The next night when the innocent man was already lying in a Christian grave, the young smith went out once more. Then the spirit came, and presented him with the staff which he had promised him. Said the smith, "Now I will go out into the world, and look for the "Scare-me-well." It so happened that he arrived in a town where there was a bewitched castle, which no one ever dared to enter. When the King heard that a man had arrived who was afraid of nothing, he caused him to be summoned, and said," If thou wilt deliver this castle for me, I will make thee so rich that thou shalt know no end to thy possessions." "Oh, yes," answered he, "I'll do it willingly, only some one must show me the way to the castle." Said the King, "I have no keys to it." "I don't want any," he replied, "I will contrive to get inside." Then was he taken thither, and when he reached the first gate, he struck it with his staff, and it sprang open instantly, and behind it lay the keys of the whole castle. He opened the first inside door, and as it opened, the spirits came against him. One of them had horns, another spat fire, and all were black as coal. Then he said, "What queer folks are these! They might be the devil himself! They may all go home with me, and mend my father's fire for him." And when they rushed forward against him, he took his staff, and smote them all together, six of them at a time, and seized them, and pushed them into a room where they could no longer stir. Then he took the keys in his hand again, and opened the second door. There stood a coffin, and a dead man lay in it, and on the ground beside it, was a great black poodle which had a burning chain round its neck. So he went up to it, and struck the coffin with his staff; and said, "Why art thou lying in there, old charcoal-burner?" The dead body rose up, and wanted to terrify him, but he cried, "Out with thee at once." And as the dead man did not come immediately, he seized him, and thrust him among the rest. Then he returned and caught hold of the burning chain, and wound it round himself, crying, "Away with thee!" But the black dog defended itself, and spat fire. Then said he, "If thou canst do that, there is all the more reason for taking thee with me. Thou also shalt help my father to light his fire." But before he was aware, the dog was gone, and he was most likely the devil. Now he had still one little key for the last door. As he opened that, twelve black spirits which had horns and breathed fire rushed on him, but he struck them with his staff, dragged them out, and threw them into a water-cistern, the cover of which he shut fast. "I have laid them to rest," said he, well pleased, "but it has made me warm; I should like a drink after it." So he went into the cellar, tapped some of the old wine which was there, and enjoyed himself. But the King said, "I should just like to know how he has got on," and sent his confessor thither, for no one else dared to trust himself in that bewitched castle. When the confessor, who was crooked and hump-backed, came to the castle and knocked the young smith opened the door for him, but when he saw him in all his deformity, and in his black gown, he cried, "After all, there is another of them left. What dost thou want, thou crooked old devil?" and he locked him up too. So the King waited one day longer, but as the confessor did not return at all, he sent a number of warriors who were to make their way into the castle by force. The smith said, "Here are some men coming, so I wilt gladly let them in." They asked him why he had shut up the King's confessor? "Eh! What!" said he. "But how could I know that he was the confessor? And why did he come here in his black gown?" Then the soldiers asked him what they were to say to the King. "That he may come here himself," he replied, "and that the castle is cleared." When the King heard that, he came full of joy, and found great possessions in jewels, silver-work, and old wine, all of which were once more in his power. Then he ordered a coat to be made for the young smith, which was entirely of gold. "No," said the smith, "I will not have that; it is the coat of a fool," and threw it away, and said, "But I will not leave the castle until the King has shown me the Scare-me-well; for that I must really get to know." Then the King had a white linen blouse made for him, and in order to do him some good in spite of himself he had a number of pieces of gold sewn inside it. But the young smith said, "That is too heavy for me!" and threw it away, put on his old blouse, and said, "But before I go home to my father I must just see the Scare-me-well." Then he took his staff, and went to the King, who led him up to a cannon. The young smith looked at it well and went round about it, and asked what kind of a thing that was? Said the King, "Stand a little aside," and ordered the cannon to be charged and fired off. When the young smith heard the violent report, he cried, "That was the Scare-me-well, now I have seen it!" and went home quite content. A sixth story is from the neighbourhood of Paderborn. Hans continually tells his father that he is afraid of nothing in the world. The father wishes to break him of this, and orders his two daughters to hide themselves at night in the charnel-house, and then he will send out Hans, and they, wrapped in white sheets, are to pelt him with bones, which will soon terrify him. At eleven o'clock the father says, "I have the tooth-ache so badly; Hans, go and fetch me a dead man's bone; but take care of thyself, the bone-house may be haunted." When he gets there, the sisters pelt him with dead men's bones. "Who is throwing things at me?" cries Hans. "If thou dost it again, thou shalt just see!" They pelt him again, and he seizes them, and wrings their necks. Then he takes a bone, and goes home with it. "How hast thou fared, Hans?" says the father. "Well: but there were two white things there, which threw things at me; however, I have wrung their necks." "Alack," cries the father, "they were thy two sisters; go away at once, or thou too, wilt have to die." Hans goes his way into the wide world, and says everywhere, "I am called Hans Fear-naught." He has to watch three nights in a castle, and thus free it from ghosts. The King gives him a soldier as a companion. Hans begs for two bottles of wine and a horsewhip. At night it becomes so cold that the two can bear it no longer. The soldier goes out and is about to light a fire in the stove, when the ghosts wring his neck. Hans stays in the room and warms himself with wine. Then there is a knock. Hans cries, "Come in, if thou hast a head." No one comes, but there is another knock, and then Hans cries, "Come in, even if thou hast no head." Then there is a crackling sound in the beam above, Hans looks up, and sees a mouse-hole; a pot full of tow falls down, and a poodle-dog is formed from this, which grows visibly, and at last hecomes a tall man, whose head, however, is not at the top of his body, but under his arm. Hans says to him, "Put thy head on, and we will have a game at cards." The monster obeys, and they play together. Hans loses a thousand thalers, which he promises to pay the next night. Then, however, all happens as on the previous night. A soldier who has once more been given to Hans as a companion is cold, and goes out to light a fire. As he is stooping, his head is cut off. Hans again hears the knocking, and cries, "Come in, either with or without thy head." The ghost comes in with his head under his arm, but has to put it on in order to be able to play again. Hans wins two thousand thalers from the ghost, which he promises to bring the following night. This last night begins in the same way, the soldier who leaves the room in order to light the fire, is thrust into the stove by the spirits, and is suffocated inside it; the powerful spirit goes to Hans, gives him the thousand thalers he owes him, and tells him he is to take himself off at once, or it will cost him his life, for all the spirits are coming to a great meeting. Bnt Hans will not go, and says, "I will soon show you all the door." The two struggle with each other to see which shall give way, until at last they agree to count three, and that the one who can then first thrust his finger into the key-hole shall stay. Hans counts, and the ghost gets his finger in first, on which Hans fetches a morsel of wood and a hammer, and wedges it tightly in, and then takes his horsewhip and beats him so violently, that the ghost promises never to let either himself or any of his spirits be seen in the castle again, if he may be allowed to remain in the little flower-garden behind the castle. Hans consents to that, and sets him free, on which the ghost and all the spirit-folk run instantly into the garden. The King causes a high wall to be built round it, the castle is delivered, and Hans receives the King's daughter to wife. This story appears again with characteristic variations in Wolf's Hausmärchen, p. 328-408; in Zingerle, p. 281-290; in Prohle's, Kinder und Volksmärchen, No. 33. In Netherlandish there is The Bold Soldier, in Wolf's Niederlandische Sagen, p. 517. In Swedish, there is Molbech's Graakappen No. 14. In Danish, Molbech's De Modige Svend, No. 29. Besides these, a similar character appears in an Icelandic story. Hreidmar is also apparently a stupid fellow of this kind, who wishes for once to know what rage is, and does get to know it. Goethe has written most thoughtfully about this story; see his Works, 1833, xlvi. 274. Works of the Scandinavian Literature Society, 1816-17, p. 208, and following. 1: This district took its name from the river Schwalm, which rises in the Vogelsberg, in the N.E. of the Grand Duchy of Hesse, and joins the Edder near Altenberg, after a northward course of 35 miles.-TR. 5 The Wolf and the Seven Young Kids From the Maine district, in Pomerania, it is said to be related of a child which, during its mother's absence, has been devoured by the children's ghost, which corresponds with Knecht Ruprecht. But the stones which he swallows with the child make the ghost so heavy that he falls down on the ground, and the child springs out again unhurt. It occurs in Alsace, see Stober's Volksbuchlein, p. 100. Boner (No. 33) tells the story quite simply. The mother warns her kid against the wolf, which it refuses to admit when it comes with its voice disguised. The story is still more abridged in an old poem (Reinhart Fuchs, 346), in which, however, the kid recognizes the wolf through a chink. So too in Burkard Waldis (Frankfurt, 1563, Fab. 24), and in Hulderich Wolgemuth's Erneuerter Aesopus (Frankf. 1623). A life-like story comes to us from Transylvania, see Haltrich, No. 33. In Lafontaine (IV. i. 15) the fable is as simple as in Corrozet, but the former mentions the incident of the white paw which, as in our story, the little kid asks to see; and we remember a fragment of a complete French story. The wolf goes to the miller, stretches out his grey paw, and says, "Meunier, meunier, trempe-moi ma patte dans ta farine blanche." "Non, non! Non, non!" "Alors je te mange." On this the miller does it from fear. The Nereid, Psamathe, sent the wolf to the flocks of Peleus and Telamon; the wolf devoured them one and all, and was then turned to stone, just as in our story, stones were sewn into him. But the saga of the wolf being turned to stone has a deeper foundation. From Zwehrn. There is another story from the Paderborn district. At the bidding of an old woman, a poor peasant invites the first person whom he meets on the road, who is a stranger to him, to stand as godfather. It so happens that this is the King, who therefore holds the child at the christening, and gives him the name of Roland. The Queen has been confined at the same time, and her child called Joseph. When a year has passed by, the King sends for the little Roland, and adopts him as his child. Roland and Joseph grow together, and look on each other as brothers. When they are twenty years of age, the King one day rides away and leaves them the keys of all the rooms, all of which they may open but one. Roland, however, is so curious that on the third day he persuades Joseph to go into the forbidden room with him. It is entirely hung with cloth, but when Roland lifts this up he beholds the portrait of a wonderfully beautiful maiden, and faints at the sight; Joseph carries him out. Roland is restored to consciousness, but from that hour is sick with love, and knows no rest until they both go to the kingdom where the King's daughter lives. She is shut up in a tower for seven years. In the evening she is taken in a closed carriage to her parents, and early in the morning before daybreak back again to the tower. Roland and Joseph cannot see her even once, and have to go home as they came. Then their father gives them four ships; three furnished with cannon, and one with the most beautiful wares. They sail thither, and give out that they are merchants, and Joseph begs the King to make a law that only one person at a time may go on board his ship, as it would otherwise be too much crowded. This is done, and now the King himself comes on board the ship, and after him the Queen, and they buy largely. And as all the things are so beautiful, their daughter is to see them too. But no sooner has she stepped on board than the anchor is raised, and the lovely bride carried away. The King sends a ship to bring her back again, but that is sunk by the cannon. During the voyage Joseph is one night on the watch, and hears a murmuring, and a voice which cries, "Do you know any news?" "News enough," answers another, "the King's beautiful daughter is stolen away, and is here in this ship; but whosoever intends to have her for his wife must first find some one who will cut the black horse's head off." This alarms Joseph, and the next night, when Roland is going to keep watch, Joseph begs him to sleep instead, and give up the watch to him. Then he again hears the voices. "Do you know any news?" "News enough; the King's daughter is stolen away, and is shut up here in the ship; but whosoever intends to have her to wife, can only succeed if any one can be found who, when the bridegroom is drinking the bride's health, will strike away the glass from his lips so that the fragments fly round about. He, however, who speaks of this will be turned into stone to the height of his heart." Joseph is on the watch on the third night also, and then he hears, "The bridegroom cannot obtain the bride unless some one can be found to cut off the seven heads of the dragon which will be thrust in through the window on the night of the marriage. He, however, who speaks of this will be stone to his head." On the following day they arrive; the King comes to meet them with his people, and brings with him a white horse for Joseph, and a black one for Roland. Joseph mounts his, and cuts the black one's head off. All are astonished and excited, and ask the cause, but he replies, "I may and dare not tell you." In the same way also at the wedding-feast, when Roland is about to drink his bride's health, Joseph strikes the glass away from his lips so that the fragments fly about. At last at night when Roland and his bride are already asleep, Joseph walks with his drawn sword backwards and forwards in the room before the window. Suddenly something begins to roar and bellow, and a dragon thrusts in his seven heads. He cuts them off at one blow, and the blood spirts into the room and fills his boots. The watch hearing the noise, summon the King, who comes, and when he opens the door the blood streams out to meet him, and he sees Joseph with drawn sword. "Alas, what hast thou done, my son?" he cries. Then Joseph cannot do otherwise than tell him all, and is immediately encased in stone, so that no one can see anything of him but his head, which seems to be asleep. In the course of a year the young Queen brings a son into the world, and then she dreams on three successive nights that if Joseph is smeared with the blood of the child he will be set free. She relates her dream to Roland, who summons together all the counsellors of the kingdom, who say that indeed he must sacrifice his child for the sake of his friend. So the child is christened, and then its head is cut off. Joseph is smeared with the blood of the child, the stone disappears forthwith, and he stands up and says, "Alas, dear brother, why hast thou awakened me? I have slept so sweetly." They tell him all that has passed, and then Joseph says, "Now I must help thee once more," and ties up the dead child in a linen cloth, and goes away with him. When he has already wandered about for three-quarters of a year, and troubled at heart that he can find no help, seats himself beneath a tree, an aged man comes and gives him two small bottles wherein are the water of life, and the water of beauty. Joseph now carries the child home, but is forced to beg, as he has nothing left. After a quarter of a year, he reaches his father's castle, and then he sits down on the bridge and rubs the child first with the water of life, which restores it to life, and then with the water of beauty, which makes it more fresh and beautiful than all others. Thereupon he takes it to its parents, who rejoice over it with all their hearts. There is a third variant in Wolf's Hausmarchen, p. 383. It is evidently the saga of the faithful friends, Amicus and Amelius. The one while appearing to wrong the other, in reality gives his life for him; on the other hand, the latter sacrifices his own children in order to bring his friend back to existence, though, by a miracle, these are preserved. The counterpart of the voluntary sacrifice of a pure virgin's life (in Der arme Heinrich) is to be found in the story of Hildebrand, the faithful master of Dieterich; and the story of the Child Oney may be said to form a connecting link between them. Compare The Two Brothers (No. 60), Der arme Heinrich, p. 187, and following, and further indications in Athis, p. 46. The fate which in Hartmann's poem is announced by the physician, is here declared by the ravens-birds of destiny. The bridal-shirt (1) (a woven one, as it is called, in the language of the people, in contradistinction to one which is cut out) which consumes with fire whosoever puts it on, resembles the garment which Dejanira sends to Hercules, and Medea to Glauce. In our story it has apparently so happened that a witch for some reason or other desires to destroy the young King. In the corresponding, but still very individual Italian story (Pentam. iv. 9), it is probably the father of the stolen bride who sends misfortune after them by his curses. A Russian story in Dieterich, p. 38, should be compared, and the Negro story in Kölle (see further on). A ship is similarly equipped, in the poem of Gudrun (1060 and following) on the voyage when Horand has to fetch Hilda. 1: A shirt without seams is probably what is meant. Such garments play a large part for good or for evil, in mythology. When Ragnar Lodbrog went on his last expedition to England, Aslanga his wife, who foreboded evil, gave him a shirt she had woven of fine grey silk in which no stitch had been put. He wore it instead of armour, and none could wound him, though at length he was captured. Finally, he was thrown into a pit full of snakes, none of which would touch him till the shirt was removed. See Ragnar Lodbrog's Saga, 16th chapter.-TR. From the neighbourhood of Paderborn. The amusing trick by which the peasant transfers the beating to the sentinel and the Jew, is similarly related of Tamerlane's fool Nasureddin (Flogel's Geschichte der Hofnarren, p. 178), and likewise of the Pfaffe von Kalenberg, see the preface to Hagen's Narrenbuch, pp. 272-277, and in Flogel, p. 255. It is also told in Sacchetti's 195th story of a countryman who brings back to a King of France his lost hawk. Bertoldo amplifies something of the same kind. The peasant in his story is to have a beating, but he entreats that the head shall be spared. He therefore does not receive the beating, but those who follow him, for he is the head or leader. Bertoldino also appeases the frogs by throwing gold pieces at them. See Hagen's preface to Morolf, pp. 18, 19. From Lorsch near Worms. It seems as if the story were not quite perfect; a reason ought to be given why the musician, who, like Orpheus, can entice animals to follow him, treats them so deceitfully. There is a similar story in Transylvania, as Haltrich remarks (No. 50). From Zwehrn, but there the incident of the maiden noticing the twelve children's shirts and inquiring about her brothers, is wanting. We find it in another, otherwise meagre story, likewise from Hesse. There is a similar incident in The Six Swans (No. 49), from German Bohemia. In Wigalois a red standard denotes a combat for life and death (6153). Compare in the Pentamerone, The Seven Doves (iv. 8). In Norwegian, Asbjörnsen, p. 209. Also the Lithuanian story in the report of the meetings of the Viennese Academie der Wissenschaften, xi. 209-212. From Paderborn. It resembles Herr Korbes (No. 41) and the Town Musicians of Bremen (No. 27). In Pomerania it is united with the story of The Cat and the Mouse in Firmenich's Deutsche Mundarten, 91, 92. 11 Little Brother and Little Sister From two stories from the Maine district which complete each other; in one of them the incident is wanting of the little stag springing into the midst of the chase, and enticing the King by its beauty. According to another version which H. R. von Schröter has communicated to us, the little brother is changed by the stepmother into a fawn, and is hunted by her hounds. It stands by the river, and calls across to the little sister's window,
But the little sister had already been thrown out of the window by the stepmother and changed into a duck, and from the water a voice came to him, saying,
Afterwards when the little sister goes into the kitchen to the cook, and makes herself known to him, she asks
He replies,
Here, as in the story of The Three Little Men in the Forest (No. 13), the mother comes out of her grave to suckle and attend to her child, so likewise in the old Danish Volkslied (Danske viser, 1.206-208. Altd. Blatter, 1. 186.) The Swedish story, which is otherwise identical, lacks this feature. (See further on.) Melusina, after her disappearance, comes to her little sons Dietrich and Raimund, warms them at the fire, and suckles them; the nurses watch her, but dare not speak (Volksbuch). The Servian song of the walled-up mother who hushes her child, may be compared with this, and also a story in Le Foyer Breton, of Souvestre, pp. 3, 4, where a mother comes from her grave at night to take care of her children, which are neglected by their stepmother. Although again very different, La biche au bois, D'Aulnoy, No. 18, has some affinity to this. Fr. Schulz tells this story in his Kleine Romanen (Leipzig, 1790), 5, 269-88, only too diffusely, though undoubtedly from oral tradition. It begins in the following manner: A witch has a young girl with her, to whom she entrusts all her keys, but forbids her to enter one room. When, however, impelled by curiosity, she does enter it, she sees the witch sitting in it with two great horns. The girl is now placed, as a punishment, in a high tower which has no door. When the witch brings her food, the girl has to let down from the window her hair, which is twenty yards in length, and by this, the witch ascends. In these stories it frequently occurs that the father, or more usually the mother, in order to gratify a momentary desire, pledges away her coming child. It is often asked for and given, in veiled or mysterious terms; for instance, the mother is to give what she carries beneath her girdle. In the old Norse Alfskongssage a similar incident is to be found, (chap. i). Othin grants Signy's wish that she may brew the best beer, in return for which she promises him what is between her and the beer-barrel, namely, the child which she is about to bear. Compare the Sagabibliothek of P. B. Muller, ii. 449. In the Danish Volkeslieder, for instance, that of the Wilder Nachtraben, there are promises of the same kind. Salebad, Firdusi (Schack, p. 191) mounts up by the braids of the maiden's hair which she lets down. In Busching's Volkssagen, p. 287, a story begins with some incidents in common with ours. In the Pentamerone it is Petrosinella, ii. 1. 13 The Three Little Men in the Forest From two tales, both from Hesse, which complete each other. In the one from Zwehrn, the beginning with the boot being used as a test is wanting. The name of Haulemannerchen by which, in Lower Hesse, the little folks who dwell in caves in the forest (Waldhöhlen), and steal away people's unchristened children, are known; comes from Hohlen-Waldmännlein. In Denmark the common people call them by the very similar name Hyldemand (Thorlacius, spec. 7. 161). The curse on the wicked daughter, that a toad shall spring out of her mouth with each word that she utters, appears in a third story, which we likewise heard in Hesse, and for that reason have inserted. There is a story with some affinity to this from Austria, .Reward and Punishment which is allied to Frau Holle (No. 24), and is to be found in Ziska, p. 47, and another in Pröhle's Marchen für die Jugend No. 5. Compare Perrault's Les Fees No. 1, and in the Pentamerone (3. 10), The three Fairies. The punishment of being rolled in a barrel stuck full of nails is an old custom. According to the Dutch Chronicle, Gerhard van Velzen, because he had murdered Count Florens, V. of Holland (1296), was rolled in a barrel of the like kind for the space of three days. The old song says,
When he was taken out of it, and asked how he felt, he answered,
See Casp. Commelin's, Beschryving van Amsterdam, 1. 86-88. This punishment occurs in a Swedish, and also in a Danish Volkslied (Geyer and Afzerius 1, No. 3, and Danske viser No. 165). 1: A tun they hammered full of spikes, 2: I am still the self-same man From a story from the Principality of Corvei, but it is from Hesse that we have the version with the three women, all of whom are afflicted with some peculiar defect caused by spinning. In the former there are only two extremely aged women, who have become so broad from sitting that they can hardly get into the room. They have thick lips from wetting and licking the thread; and from drawing and pulling it they have ugly fingers, and broad thumbs. The story from Hesse begins differently; for instance, that there was a King who liked nothing so much as spinning, and for that reason, on taking leave before going a journey, he left behind him for his daughters, a great chest full of flax which was to be spun by his return. In order to release them from this, the Queen invited these three misshapen women, and on the King's arrival set them before his eyes. Pratorius, in the Glückstopf, pp. 404-406, relates the story in the following way: a mother cannot induce her daughter to spin, and for this reason often beats her. A man who on one occasion sees this, asks what is the meaning of it. The mother answers, "I cannot keep her from spinning; she spins away more flax than I can procure." The man says, "Then give her to me to wife; I shall be quite satisfied with her indefatigable industry, even if she bring me nothing else." The mother is heartily delighted, and the man at once gives his betrothed a great provision of flax. At this she is secretly terrified, but she takes it and puts it in her room, and considers what she is to do. Then three women come in front of her window, one so broad with sitting that she cannot get through the door of the room, the second has an enormous nose, the third a broad thumb. They offer their services to her, and promise the bride to spin what has been given to her if, on her wedding-day, she will not be ashamed of them, but will declare that they are her aunts, and place them at her table. She agrees to this, and they spin the flax, for which the bridegroom praises the bride. So when the wedding-day comes, the three horrible women appear also, and the bride pays them great honour, and says they are her aunts. The bridegroom is astonished, and asks how she comes by such repulsive relatives. "Ah," says the bride, "they have all been made like that by spinning. One of them is so broad with sitting, the other has quite licked away her mouth, and that makes her nose stand out so, and the third has twisted the thread so much with her thumb." Thereupon the bridegroom is much troubled, and tells the bride that she shall not spin another thread so long as she lives that she may not become a monster like them. A third story from Upper Lusatia, by Th. Pesheck, is in Busching's Wochentliche Nachrichten i. 355-360; on the whole it corresponds with that of Pratorius. One of the three old women has blear-eyes because the flue of the flax has gone into them, the second has a great mouth reaching from ear to ear from wetting her thread, the third is fat and unshapely with sitting so much at the spinning-wheel. A portion of the story is to be found in Müllenhoff, No 8. In Norwegian, see Asbjörnsen, p. 69. In Swedish, Cavallius, p. 214. The beginning of Ricdin-Ricdon, by Mlle. I'Heritier, resembles it, and Le sette cotenelle, in the Pentamerone, bears some affinity (iv. 4).(1) 1: See also Schlejcher's Lithuanian Tales, and the story of Habetrot and atl Mab, in Henderson's Folil-L ore of the Northern Counties.-TR. From different stories current in Hesse. In Swabia it is a wolf which is in the sugar-house. See in Caroline Stahl's Stories, p. 92. The house of sweetmeats (see further on). Also Pröhle's Kinder-und Volksmarchen, No 40. Bechstein, vii. 55. The Eierkuchauschen, in Stöber's elsass. Volksbuch, p. 102. In Danish the Pandekagehuset (see further on). In Swedish, Cavallius, pp. 14, 26. In Hungarian, Stier, p. 43. In Albanian, Hahn, 164, 165. In Servian, Wuk, No 35. The story of Der Fanggen, from the Oberinnthal in Zingerle's Kinder und Hausmarchen p. 51. Oberlin gives a piece, in the dialect of the district of Luneville, in his Essai sur le patois. Clearly allied too, especially in the beginning, is Nennillo and Nennilla in the Pentamerone (5-8), and so is the first part of Finette Cendron in D'Aulnoy, No. 11. In this there are three King's children who are twice brought home by the cleverness of the youngest; the first time by a thread which had been given to her by a fairy, the second by strewn ashes; the third time, the two elder provide an expedient and scatter peas, but the pigeons eat them, and the children cannot find the way back. In a Tyrolese story, Zingerle, p. 138, as here, the boy who is imprisoned reaches out a bit of stick to the man-eater, instead of his finger; but in a Swedish story his captor is a giant (Cavallius, 31). Hansel is connected with Thumbling (No. 37 and 45), and thus appears in the German stories. There are six children; he is the seventh. When they are in the forest with the man-eater, they have to comb his hair, but Thumbling springs in among it, pulls it, and always comes back again. Afterwards there is the changing the seven crowns during the night for the seven red caps. Thumbling puts all the purses of money and valuables into the seven-league boots. To this group also belongs a Tyrolese story in Zingerle, p. 235, of the Thumbling Hansel. The old German fable (Altd. Wälder iii. 178, 179) of the twelve who go to the giant (Turse), and who are previously warned by his wife, and told to go into the bedroom, is only altered so far as concerns the moral. From two stories which only differ from each other in trifling matters, the one from Hof am Habichtswald, a village in Lower Hesse, the other from a village near Paderborn. A Greek saga may be traced in it. Polyidus is to restore life to Glaukos, but is unable. The enraged father therefore has him shut up in the tomb with the corpse. Polyidus sees a snake creeping up to the dead body, and kills it. Soon afterwards a second snake comes carrying a herb in its mouth, which it lays on the dead one, by means of which it at once comes to life again. Polyidus quickly snatches the herb, lays it on Glaukos, and he returns to life. See Apollodorus, iii. 3, 1. Compare with this a Hun story, in Stier, p. 107, and also a poem by Marie de France Lai d'Eliduc (1. 401), where the part of the snakes is played by two weasels (474). The woman's desire that the survivor shall allow himself to be buried with her, recalls the Norse saga of Asmund and Aswit, who, when they adopted each other as brothers, exchanged a similar promise. Asmund afterwards caused himself to be taken into the barrow with the dead Aswit, but took with him a store of provisions which was sufficient to support him for a time; he was afterwards drawn up by a lucky accident (Suhm's Fabelzeit, ii. 178). A similar custom between man and wife is found in Sindbad'e voyages (1001 Nights, ii. 137). The unfaithfulness of the woman after coming to life again, seems originally only to have been intended to express that she had begun a new life and forgotten the old one. [It is however commonly believed among the dwellers in the North of Scotland that if you save a man's life he will repay you by doing you some great injury. Sir Walter Scott, as usual, seized on this superstition and used it in one of his stories. Mordaunt is trying to save Cleveland, and Bryce remonstrates with him thus, "Are you mad?" said he, "You that have lived so long in Zetland to risk the saving of a drowning man? Wot ye not, if ye bring him to life again, he will be sure to do you some capital injury?" Pirate, vol. i. chap. 7.-TR.] From Hanau. The story of the Queen of the Bees (No. 62) has some similarity to this. So has another in the Ammenmärchen of Vulpius; see also Soldat Lorenz, No. 7, in Pröhle's Kindermärchen. By eating a white snake, one learns to understand the speech of animals, as in the Sagas of the Seeburg (Deutsche Sagen, i. 131). The same result is produced by eating the heart of a dragon or of a bird. See Donkey Cabbages, No. 122. According to a Scotch saga, the middle piece of a white snake roasted by the fire gives a knowledge of supernatural things to any one who shall put his finger into the fat which drops from it. See Grant Stewart, pp. 82, 83. Compare with this The Magic Horse, in Straparola, iii. 2. 18 The Straw, the Coal, and the Bean From Cassel, the best and earliest version is to be found in Burkard Waldis, Book 3, Fab. 97 (1542). The Nugoe venales (1648, S. 1. l2mo.) contain also Crepundia poetica, and pp. 32, 33, an abridgement of our story.
In a Latin poem of the Middle Ages (MS. Strasburg), the fable of the mouse and the coal travelling occurs with the variation that both make a pilgrimage to church to confess their sins, and, in crossing a little brook, the coal falls in, hisses, and is extinguished. The cat and mouse travel, the straw breaks, and the cat falls into the water, at which the mouse laughs so that she bursts. See Stöber's elsass: Volksbuch, 95. In a Wendish story, see Haupt and Schmaler, p. 160, a coal, a pair of bellows, and a straw, travel together. Compare Neue Preuss. Provinzialblätter, i. 226. In Transylvania a duck, a frog, a mill-stone and a red-hot coal travel together, and the two last are drowned. (Haltrich, No 46). The AEsopian fable of the thorn-bush, the diver, and the bat (Furia, 124, Coray 42) ought to be mentioned. This story has been excellently well taken down by Runge of Hamburg, in the Pomeranian dialect, and it was kindly communicated to us by Arnim, as early as in the year 1809. It was afterwards printed in Runge's works also. It is often told in Hesse, but imperfectly and with variations. It is called The History of little Husband Domine (sometimes also of Hans Dudeldee), and little Wife Dinderlinde (Dinderl, Dirne?) Domine complains of his ill luck and goes out to the sea. There a little fish stretches forth its head and says,
He goes home to his wife and asks what he is to wish for. "Wish for a better house for us," says Dinderlinde. He goes to the sea and cries,
And now the wishes begin: first a house, then a garden, then oxen and cows, then lands and kingdoms, and so on to all the treasures of the world. When they have wished for everything they can wish for, the man, says, "Now I should like to be God, and my wife to be the mother of God." Then the little fish stretches out its head again and cries,
In Justus Kerner's Poetical Almanack for 1812, pp. 50-54, the story is told in a similar way, apparently from a South German version, but the doggrel rhymes are wanting. The fisherman is called Hans Entender. In Albert Ludwig Grimm's Kindermärchen (2nd edit. Heidelberg, 1817) it appears also, but in prose. The fisherman Hans Dudeldee lives with his wife in a hut, and is so poor that they have no window, but are forced to look through a hole, where there has been a knot in the wood. He first begs the fish to give him a house, and so on until he is emperor; at last he desires to be able to make sunshine and rain as God does, where upon they find themselves sitting in the hut again, looking through the hole in the planks. It is much more meagre as a whole. See De Kossät und siine Fruu, in Kuhn, No 6. The Golden Fish in Firminich's Völkerstimmen, p. 377. The beginning of the story strikingly reminds us of a story in the 1001 Nights (1. 107, Histoire du Pêcheur), as well as of the Welsh saga of Taliesin (compare Altd. Wälder, 1. 70). A story from Finland also, given in the Freimüthiger, 1834, No. 253-256, has a similar opening, but the development is different. The feature of the wife inciting her husband to seek high dignities is ancient in itself, from Eve and, the Etruscan Tanaquil (Livy, 1. 47), down to Lady Macbeth. The first half is taken from two stories from Hesse, which compliment each other. The second from the place where the Tailor leaves th giants, and betakes himself to the King's court, is from a somewhat rare little book, Wegkürzer, a very amusing and unusually diverting little book by Martinus Montanus of Strasburg (1557, in l2mo. p. 18-25). This part can stand alone, but as it fits naturally to what has gone before, it is here joined to it, and therefore re-written. In the first edition may be seen the unaltered copy. Allusion is made to the story by Fischart, in Gargantua (254b), "I will kill you like the midges, nine at one blow, as the tailor did," and in Flohhatz (Dornavius), 39b.
Also in Simplicissimus (chap. ii. 28), "and has surpassed the tailor's title, 'seven at one blow.'" And in Fabelhans (16, 3) "five at one blow." The number naturally changes; we likewise hear of "nine-and-twenty at one blow." If the giant here squeezes water out of a stone, it perhaps has some reference to a passage in Bruder Wernher (M.S. 2. 164b):
And a passage in Freiberg's Tristan alludes to the tailor's cunning when he takes a cheese instead of a stone,
A part of this story is from a Lower Austrian story in Ziska, p. 9. The little tailor begins his journey, and enters the service of the giant, whom in the distance he had taken for a mountain. "What wages am I to have?" he asks. "Three hundred and sixty-five days every year, and, when it is leap-year, one day more," answers the giant, "does that satisfy thee?" "Yes, all right, one must cut one's coat according to one's cloth." The giant orders him to fetch a pitcher of water. "What! a jug of water! why not bring the well itself, and the spring too;" says the boastful little tailor. "What!" growls the giant "the fellow can do more than roast apples!-he has a mandrake in his body." After this he tells the tailor to cut some logs of wood in the forest, and to bring them home. "Hey day, and why not bring the whole forest?" When he has brought the wood, the giant desires him to shoot a couple of wild boars. "And why not rather shoot a thousand of them at once with one shot, and thyself as well?" "What," says the giant in a fright, "that is enough for to-day; go to bed and sleep." The next morning the giant goes with the tailor to a marsh which is thickly overgrown with willows. "Now my man, seat thyself on a branch like this, and let me see if thy weight will bend it down." The tailor seats himself, holds his breath, and makes himself heavy in order to bend the branch; but as he is obliged to breathe again, and as he unfortunately has not got his goose with him, to the giant's delight it springs up with him so high in the air that he is never seen again. The story is spread over the whole of Germany. It is found in the Büchlein für die Jugend, p 171-180. In Kuhn, No. 11. In Stober's elsass: Volksbuch, p. 109; in Bechstein, p. 5; in Ernst Meyer, No. 37; Vonbun, p. 9; Zingerle, p. 12; Pröhle's Kindermärchen, No. 47; in Swedish in Cavallius, pp. 1-8; in Norwegian in Asbjörnsen, p. 40; in Danish in Etlar, p. 29, in the tale of a valiant young shoe maker's apprentice. Nyerup describes the rhymed treatment of this version in his work on the Danish Volkbücher (Almindelig Morskabsläsning i Dannemark og Norge. Kiobenhavn, 1816), pp. 241, 242. The hero strikes fifteen flies dead at one blow with his garter, the renown of which great deed is so spread abroad, that a prince takes him into his service, that he may deliver his country from a wild boar. The animal devours a fruit which causes sleep, and is easily killed by the shoemaker. He then overcomes the unicorn, and lastly a bear, which he shuts up in a brickmaker's oven. There is likewise the following characteristic story in Dutch, from a book on folk-lore published in Amsterdam. Van Kleyn Kobisje, alias Koningh sonder Onderzaten, p. 7. 14. (King without subjects). It is to be found also as a supplement, in an almost identical form in another Dutch book on folk-lore; Clement Marot, pp. 132-133, under the title of Hans Onversagt. "Little Kobisje was sitting by his cutting-board peeling an apple, and left the parings lying on it. He made a fly-killer, and when the flies settled on the apple-parings to eat them; he killed seven at one stroke. He leapt up from the table, imagining that he had performed a valiant deed, and had thus become a great man; sold all he had, and caused a pretty shield to be made for himself on which he had inscribed, "My name is young Kobis the dauntless, I slew seven at one stroke." Then he went to a far-off country where a King ruled; placed his shield on his breast, went behind the King's palace, and lay down on a high hill, where he knew he was accustomed to pass. At length the sun began to shine brightly, and the King could not imagine what it was that was glittering so, and immediately sent a nobleman thither. When the nobleman came up, he was alarmed when he read, "My name is young Kobis, the Dauntless; I slew seven at one blow." He went back and told the King what he had seen, who instantly sent two or three companies of soldiers thither with the nobleman, to give him courage, and conduct the stranger to court with the respect and honour due to such a knight. They went thither as the King had ordered, and approached and examined him, but none of them would be the first to speak to him. At last one of the crowd was bold enough to take a spear and touch the sole of his shoe with it. Up he sprang with great vigour, and they fell on their knees, and entreated him to be pleased to go to the King, which he did. When he came to the King, he was treated with great respect. Meanwhile he was informed that he might become the King's son-in-law, but that there were three difficult things which he must first do for him. In the first place there was a wild boar which did a great deal of mischief, and no one could capture it. Secondly, there were three giants, who had made the King's forest so dangerous that any one who traversed it was a dead man. Thirdly, several thousand foreigners had invaded the land, and the realm appeared to be in great peril. He accepted these conditions, and they told him the way to the place where the wild boar lurked. Full of courage he left the court. He was, however, so terrified when he heard the wild boar that he wished himself back again by his cutting-board. The wild boar came rushing on him with such fury that he looked for a safe place to escape to, espied a ruined chapel, and took refuge in it. The wild boar followed him, but with all speed he sprang through the window over the wall, and shut the door of the chapel. No sooner was the wild boar secured, than Kobisje went to the King, who said to him, "How didst thou catch the wild boar?" The other replied, "I seized it with great force by its bristles and flung it into the chapel, but I would not kill it, for I wanted to present it to you." Then there were great rejoicings at court, and he went in search of the giants, and had the good fortune to find them asleep. He took his bag and filled it with stones, climbed up a high tree, and threw a stone at one of them, who thought one of the others had done it, and began to scold, and tell him to leave off throwing stones, or he would box his ears soundly. He threw stones at the second, who likewise began to swear. The third was treated in the same way. He got up, drew his sword, flew at the other, and stabbed him and he fell down on the ground. Then he attacked the other and after a long struggle both fell to the earth exhausted. Kobisje seized the opportunity, came down and took the sword of the dead one and stabbed the two others, cut off their heads, and went back to court again. The King asked him if he had performed the task? He answered, "Yes." On this the King enquired how he had done it. He answered thus, "I took one giaut by his legs and belaboured the other with him till he dropped down dead, and I paid off the other in the same coin. And as the one I was holding by the legs was half dead, I struck him with such force against a tree that it flew up six feet high into the air.' Again there was great joy at court, and he was held to be the greatest man there. Then he once more made ready, and the nobles of the court with him, and he had an army of brave men of whom he was the general. Having taken leave, he began his third task. He bade the troops march onwards, and followed on horse back. But as he had never cidden on horseback he had great difficulty in keeping his seat. When they had arrived at the place where the enemy was, he ordered his troops to draw up in order of battle, and was soon told that all was ready. He did not know how to turn his horse round, drew the wrong side of the bridle, spurred his horse, and it went off with him full gallop towards the enemy. As he could not hold the bridle fast, he clutched at a wooden cross by the wayside, which broke off and he held it tightly in his arms. When the enemy perceived him, they thought that he was the Devil, and began to fly, and those who could not escape were drowned. The others unloosed their ships from their moorings and sailed away. After this victory, he returned to his noblemen, and the whole army, and told them of his conquest, and how he had completely routed the enemy. He went to the King, and informed him of the victory, and the King thanked him. Moreover he had him proclaimed his suc cessor to the throne. The wedding-day was fixed, and great preparations were made for it. When the wedding had taken place, he was held in high esteem, and always placed next the King. It hap pened however that nearly every night Kobisje dr that he was sitting by his cutting-board once more, and his mind was always filled with this or that thought about his work, and he cried aloud, "Courage, courage, bestir yourselves, in six or seven hours you will leave off work," for he was fancying that he was giving his apprentices something to cut or sew. The princess was alarmed, for she thought that he must be possessed by the Devil, as he was always babbling, "Courage! Courage!" She accused her father of having given her to a book-binder, and not a great lord. The father resolved to place a company of soldiers by his bed-side who were to take him prisoner or kill him if they heard him say this. He however, was warned, and when he was in bed he thus exclaimed, "I have overcome a wild boar, I have killed three giants; I have slain an army of a hundred thousand men, and shall I be afraid of two or three companies of soldiers to-night?" and he jumped out of bed and went fiercely towards them. On hearing him, they fell head over heels from the top of the stairs to the bottom. Those who lay dead, or had lost legs and arms, were very numerous, and those who ran away, took such news to the King, that he said, "My daughter ought to be wiser than to affront such a great knight!" Soon after this, the King became ill and died, leaving the throne to Kobisje, which he accepted, and ruled over the kingdom in peace. The English story of Jack the Giant Killer is allied (Tabart Collection, 3. 1-37); and No. 17 in Müllenhoff. Also some incidents in a Tyrolese story, Zingerle, p. 108. The Persian story, Amint the wise (Kletke's Märchensaal, 3. 54) likewise belongs to this group. It is even known among Laplanders (see Nilsson' Ureinwohner des skand: Nordens (Stockh. 1843), p. 31. In a Russian ballad in Wladimir's Tafelrunde (see further on), Tugarin performs in earnest what the little tailor only pretends to do, and throws a stone so far that it never comes back at all. The saga of the conquered wild-boar is also to be found in the Buch von den sieben weisen Meistern, p. 36, 37. [A very good story, The Giant and his Boy, which is told in Rae's White Sea Peninsula, ought to be given here. "A boy once served a giant who, wanting to try his strength, took him into the forest. The giant proposed that they should strike their heads against the fir-trees. The boy anticipating this, had made a hole in a tree and covered it with bark. They both ran, the boy burying his head in the tree while the giant only split the bark. 'Well,' said the giant, 'now I have found a boy who is strong.' "Then the giant wished to try who could shout the loudest. The giant roared till the mountains trembled, and great rocks tumbled down. The boy cut a branch from a tree, saying he would bind it round the giant's head for fear it should burst when he shouted. The giant prayed him not to shout, and said they would try instead who could throw the farthest. He produced a great hammer which he threw so high in the air, that it appeared no larger than a fly. The boy said he was considering which sky to throw the hammer into, and the giant, fearing to lose his hammer, asked the boy not to throw at all. "In the evening the giant asked him when he slept the soundest, and he answered, at midnight. At midnight the giant came and aimed heavy blows at the bed. In the morning when the boy, in reply to the giant's enquiries, said he had felt some chips falling on his face during the night, the giant thought he had better send him away. This he did, giving him as much money as he could carry."-TR.] 1: Hast thou not heard of the bold tailor's apprentice who killed three at one blow? 2: And know that rather than vent my fierce anger on a person of generous temper, I would crush a stone with my girdle, so that (one) could draw blood from its veins. 3: And the willing fool Tristran took the cheese in his hands and pressed it so fiercely, that the whey ran through his fingers. From three stories current in Hesse. One of them from Zwehrn is without the introduction, where the dying mother promises her help to her child, but begins at once with the unhappy life of the step-child-the end also is different. After Cinderella has lived happily with the King for one year, he travels away and leaves all his keys with her, with the order not to open a certain room. When he is gone however, she is persuaded by the false sister to open the forbidden room, wherein they find a well of blood. Into this the wicked sister afterwards throws her, when she is lying ill after the birth of a son. The sister lies down in the bed in her place, but the sentries hear the cry of lamentation, and save the real Queen and the false one is punished. This termination resembles that in the story of The little Brother and Sister (No. 11). A fourth from Mecklenburg has an ending which reminds us of the well-known saga of St. Genoveva. Aschenputtel has become Queen, and has taken her step-mother, who is a witch, and her wicked step-sister to live with her. When she gives birth to a son these two lay a dog beside her, and give the child to a gardener who is to kill it; and they do the same thing a second time, but the King loves her so much that he again says nothing about it. The third time they give the Queen and the child to the gardener who is to kill them, but he takes them into a cave in the forest. As the Queen from grief has no milk, she puts the child to a hind which is in the cave. The child grows, but he becomes wild, and has long hair, and seeks herbs in the forest for his mother. One day he goes to the palace and tells the King about his beautiful mother [1]. Being asked, "Where is thy beautiful mother, then?" he answers, "In a cave in the forest." "Then I will go there." "Yes, but take a mantle with thee, so that she may be able to dress herself." The King goes there, recognizes her though she is wasted away, and takes her home with him. On the way, two boys with golden hair meet him. "To whom do ye belong?" he asks. "To the gardener." The gardener comes and reveals that they are the King's children whom he had not killed but brought up in his house. The truth comes to light, and the witch and her daughter are punished. A fifth story from the Paderborn district begins thus: A beautiful Countess had a rose in one hand and a snowball in the other, and wished for a child as red as the rose, and as white as the snow. God grants her wish. Once, when she is standing by the window looking out, she is pushed out of it by the nurse. The godless woman, however, screams loudly, and pretends that the Countess has thrown herself out. Then she ensnares the Count by her beauty, and he marries her. She bears him two daughters, and the beautiful red and white step-child has to serve as scullion. She is not allowed to go to church because she has no clothes; then she weeps on her mother's grave, and her mother gives her a key, and bids her open a hollow tree; it opens like a wardrobe and she finds in it clothes, soap with which to wash herself, and a prayer-book. A Count sees her, and in order to catch her, smears the threshold of the church with pitch. After this all developes itself as in the other stories. A sixth from the neighbourhood of Zittau is given in Büsching's Wochentliche Nachrichten, i. 139. Aschenputtel is a miller's daughter, and is likewise not allowed to go to church. There is nothing new in it, except that instead of a dove, a dog betrays the false bride, and barks,
A seventh is found in Hagen's Erzählungen und Märchen, ii. 339. The rhymes run thus,
The dog barks,
There is an eighth in Colshorn, No. 44. A ninth in Meier, No. 4. This story is one of the best known, and is told in all parts [2]. Murner says, "es soil ein gouch sein wib regieren lassen und meister sin. Nit dass du si alwegen für ein Fusstuch woltest halten, denn si ist dem man uss der siten genummen und nit uss den Füssen, dass si soll ein äschengriddel sin." Geuchmat Strassb. 1519 (first 1515), 4 folio eb. In Low German we find Askenpüster, Askenböel, and Askenbüel (Bremer Wörterb. i. 29, 30). In Holstein, according to Schütze, Aschenpöselken is derived from pöseln, to seek laboriously (as, for instance, the peas among the ashes). Sudelsödelken, from sölen, sudeln, because it must be destroyed in the dirt. In Pomerania, Aschpuk, signifies a dirty kitchen-maid (Dähnert). The Hessian dialect corroborates this (see Estor's Upper Hessian Dictionary): "Aschenpuddel, an insignificant, dirty girl." What is more the High German is Aschenbrödel (Deutsches Wörterbuch, 581), and Ascherling. In Swabia we find Aschengrittel, Aschengruttel, Aeschengrusel. (Schmid's, Schwäb. Wörterb. 29. Deutsches Wörterbuch i. 582). in Danish and Swedish it is Askesis, from blowing the ashes (at fise i Asken). In Jamieson, see Assiepet, Ashypet, Ashiepattle, a neglected child employed in the lowest kitchen work [3]. In Polish Kopciuszek, from Kopec, soot, smoke. There was also a story in which Aschenprödel was a boy despised by his proud brothers; a similar incident occurs in the story of The Man with the iron hand [4] (No. 136) and in Aschentagger, see Zingerle, p. 395. Rollenhagen mentions it in the preface to Froschmeuseler, as the wonderful domestic tale "of the despised and pious Aschenpössel and his proud and scornful brethren." Oberlin also gives one passage from Aschenprödel, in which a servant bears this name; and Geiler von Keisersberg calls a despised kitchen-boy an Eschengrüdel and says, "how an Eschengrüdel has everything to do," Brosamen, folio 79 a., compare the seventh stave of the fifteen verses. Tauler, in the Medulla animoe says, "I thy stable-boy, and poor Aschenbaltz." Luther, in the Table-talk, 1. 16, says "Cain, the godless reprobate, is one of the powerful ones of earth, but the pious and Godfearing Abel has to be the submissive Asehenbrödel-nay, even his servant and be oppressed." In Agricola, No. 515, occurs "Does there remain anywhere an Aschenbrödel of whom no one has thought?" No. 594, "Jacob the Aschenbrödel, the spoiled boy." In Eyering, 2. 342, is "poor Aschenwedel" Verelius, in the notes to the Gothreks Sage, p. 70, speaks of the Volks Saga, "huru Askesisen sick Konungsdottren til hustru," which also treats of a youth who was kitchen-boy, and won the king's daughter. The proverbs also, sitia hema i asku, liggia som kattur i hreise und liggia vid arnen, apply for the most part to King's sons, in the Wilkinasage, cap. 91, of Thetleifr, and in the Refssage (cap. 9 of the Gothreks Sage) from which Verelius wishes to derive all the others. In Asbjörnsen's Norwegian stories an Askepot frequently occurs. In Finnish he is called Tukhame or Tuhkimo, from tukka, ashes-vide Schiefner, 617, We are likewise reminded of Ulrich von Thürheim's Starker Rennewart, who must also have first been a scullion; likewise of Alexius, who lived under the stairs in his father's royal house like a drudge. Vide Görres' Meisterlieder, p. 302. It was a very ancient custom that those who were unhappy should seat themselves amongst the ashes. Odysseus, who, as a stranger entreating help, had spoken with Alkinous, thus seated himself humbly down in the ashes on the hearth, and was then brought forth and set in a high place. 7. 153, 169; compare 11. 191. It is frequently mentioned that pigeons pick all clean. They are pure, holy creatures, and good spirits. In Meister Sigeher (MS. 2, 221b) we find,
In Geiler von Keisersberg, "thus the pigeons pick up the very cleanest corn," and therefore when any one has good corn, the saying is, "It is just as if it had been got together by pigeons." Brosamen, folio 88b. In Pauli's Schimpf und Ernst (1535), chap. 315, folio 60a, there is a story of a woman who knelt down quite far back in the church and wept from devotion, and the bishop saw how a dove came and picked up these tears, and then flew away. In the incident of Aschenputtel being sought for and found by means of the lost shoe, we are reminded of the saga of Rhodope, whose shoe having being carried away by an eagle, Psammetichus, into whose breast it had fallen, sent over the whole of Egypt in order to make the owner of it his wife. (AElian, Var. lib. 13). Gudrun in her misfortunes has to become an Aschenbrödel; she herself although a queen, has to clean the hearth and wipe up the dust with her hair, or else she is beaten. Compare 3986, 3991, 4021, 4077, 4079. In the Pentamerone (1. 6) is Cenerentola, in Perrault Cendrillon, ou la petite pantoufle de verre (No. 6.) In D'Aulnoy, Finette Cendron (No. 10). In Norwegian, see Asbjörnsen, p. 110. In Hungarian, see the second part of The Three Kings' Daughters, in Stier, p. 34, and following. In Servian, with special and beautiful variations, see Wuk, No. 32. Schottky expressly says (in Büsching's Wöchentl. Nachrichten, 4. 61) that the Servians have a story of Aschenbrödel, which is like the German one. The story of Allerleirauh (No. 65) is related to this, and so is that of Einäuglein, No. 130. 1: See "Valentine and Orson."-TR. 2: A foolish man shall let his wife rule and be master. Not that thou wouldst altogether look on her as a door-mat, for she was taken out of the side of man, and not out of his feet, to be an äschengriddel. 3: Jamieson observes that Ashiepattle is used in this sense in Shetland, and is perhaps derived from Isi askas patti, a little child employed in the lowest kitchen-work.-TR. 4: Qu. Der Eisenhans.-TR. 5: I am softly singing to the generous man, sweet and gentle words lovelier than a turtle-dove could gather together. From Zwehrn in Lower Hesse. The story of Turandot: she wants to have her riddle guessed, and seeks what she fears, and what will destroy her pride and power. Another story differs in some respects. A King's son sees a maiden whose beauty so attracts him that he follows her, and gets into the house of a witch, whose daughter she is. The maiden herself is well-disposed, and warns him against her mother's magical and poisonous drinks. He rides away, but the mother hurries after him, and wants to give him something to drink. As she cannot get up to him, she gives the glass to the servant, who is to take it to him, but it flies in pieces (compare Deutsche Sagen, 2. 319), and the horse, which is sprinkled with poison, falls down dead. The servant runs to his master and tells him what has happened, they go back to fetch the saddle, and a raven is sitting on the horse eating it. The King's son kills the raven, and they take it with them; when they enter the inn, they give it to the innkeeper, who is to roast it. They have however stumbled on a den of murderers, and are shut in. By night the murderers come to take the lives of the strangers, but before doing so, they eat the raven which was roasted for the prince and his servant and all die of it; and now the innkeeper's daughter who means well by them, goes and opens the doors for the strangers, and shows them the abundance of gold and treasure. The King's son says, she shall keep that as a reward, and rides on farther with his servants, and comes to the town where the King's daughter is to guess the riddle. He gives her this riddle to guess, "One struck none and yet struck twelve." All the other stories are like this. One in Lassberg's Liedersaal, 1. 537, should be compared with it. 23 The Mouse, the Bird, and the Sausage From Philander von Sittewald's Gesichten, part 2, at the end of the seventh "Vision." The story however still survives by word of mouth, but it is told in many different ways, for instance, it is related of a mouse and sausage without the little bird. One has to cook one week, the other the week after. There is a story from Alsace in Stöber's Volksbüchlein, p. 99. See Gossip Mysel, and Gossip Läverwürstel, in the Neue Preuss. Provinzialblatter, 1. 226. From Hesse and Westphalia. A third story from the Schwalm district connects this story with that of Hansel and Grethel. Two girls were sitting together by a well, spinning'; one of them was pretty, the other hideous. The pretty one said, "The one who lets her distaff fall into the water shall go in after it." Then her distaff fell down, and she was forced to go in after it. When she was below she was however not drowned in the water, but came out in a meadow wherein stood a little pear-tree, to which she said, "Shake thyself, stir thyself," and then the little pear-tree shook and tossed itself about. Then she came to a little calf, and said, "Moo-calf, stoop down." Then the little calf stooped down. Then she came to an oven, and said, "Oven, bake me a roll." Theii the oven baked her a roll [1]. At length she came to a little house made of pancakes, nd as she was hungry she ate some of it, and when she had eaten a hole in it, she looked in and saw a little red woman, who cried, "The wind, the heavenly child! come in and comb my hair." Then she went in and combed the old woman's hair until she fell asleep. Thereupon the girl went into a room full of things made of gold, and put on a golden dress, and went away again. When however she came to the oven again, she said, "Oven, please do not betray me." "No, I will not betray thee." Then she came to the little calf, and at last to the little pear-tree, and to each of them she said, "Betray me not," and each answered, "No, I will not betray thee." Then she came out of the well again, and day was just dawning, and the cock cried, "Our golden girl is coming." Soon afterwards the dirty ugly girl's distaff also falls into the well, and she has to go after it. She comes to the pear-tree, the calf, and the oven. She speaks to them as the pretty one had done, hut they do not obey her. Then she, too, combs the red old woman's hair until she has fallen asleep, goes into the room and dresses herself all in gold, and is about to go home. She entreats the oven, the calf and the pear-tree not to betray her, but they answer, "Yes, indeed, we will betray thee." So when the old woman awakes, she hastens after the girl, and they say to her, "If thou runuest, thou wilt yet overtake her." She overtakes the girl and dirties htr golden dress for her. When she comes out of the well again day is just dawning and the cock cries, "Our dirty girl is coming." A fourth story from the Paderborn district is most like this, especially in the sympathy which the things the girl has spoken to on her way show her afterwards. She has shaken a little tree, milked a cow which has had its calf stolen from it, and has taken the bread out of the oven. Then in the house she is forced every afternoon to pick the lice off a witch, an ape, and a bear, and for that she receives the most beautiful clothes and a quantity of gold and silver. When she has got all these things, she says, "I will go out and fetch some water." She goes and again finds the door of the well by which she had come down. She opens it and sees the bucket just being let down. She seats herself in it, and is drawn up. As she stays away, the witch, the ape, and the bear send a great black dog after her, which asks everywhere if no one has seen a girl quite covered with silver and gold. But the tree which she shook points with its leaves to another road, the cow which she milked goes another way and nods her head as if she were showing him the right one, and the oven shoots out its flames and points in quite a wrong direction. The dog therefore cannot find the girl. All fares on the contrary very ill with the wicked girl, when she runs away and comes under the tree which she refused to shake: it shakes itself, and throws down a great many dry branches which strike her, the cow she would not milk kicks her, so that at last she arrives above again, bruised and covered with blue marks. A fifth story, also from Hesse, is different. There was once a woman who had a great affection for her own daughter, and did not at all love her step-daughter, who was a good and pious girl, but treated her very cruelly, and tried to get rid of her. One day she places both of them by a well, and says that they are to spin there, but adds, "If either of you lets her distaff fall down the well, I will throw her in after it." Having said this, she fastens her own daughter's distaff tightly, but her step-daughter's quite loosely. The latter has only spun very short time, when her distaff falls into the well, and the step-mother is hard-hearted enough to throw her in after it. She falls deep down, but comes into a magnificent garden and to a house in which there is no one. In the kitchen, the soup is just boiling over, the roast meat just going to burn, and the cakes in the oven are just going to turn black. She quickly takes the soup off the fire, pours water on the roast meat, draws the cakes out of the oven, and puts everything right, and though very hungry, takes nothing but a few crumbs which have fallen off while she was trimming the cakes. But now comes a water-nixie with frightful hair which has certainly not been combed out for a year, and desires the girl to comb it without twitching it, or pulling a single hair out, which at length, with much dexterity, she accomplishes. The nixie now says that she would much like to keep the girl with her, but can not do so because she ate the two or three crumbs, but she gives her a ring and other things, and says if at night she turns the ring round she will come to her. The other daughter likewise has now to go to the nixie, and is thrown into the well, but she does every thing wrong, does not restrain her hunger, and therefore comes back with evil gifts. W. Reynitzsch gives a sixth story from Thuringia in his book, Ueber Truhten und Truhtensteine [2] (Gotha, 1802), pp. 128-131. The pretty sister, whose distaff has fallen into the well, is pushed down by the wicked ugly one (aischliche). She comes into a wide open country. A little white man goes with her into a green meadow in which a minstrel with his fiddle meets her, receives her singing, and accompanies her. A red cow begs to be milked in order that her udder may not burst; the girl does it. At last they reach a magnificent town; the little man asks by which gate she will enter-the golden gate, or the pitch gate? She chooses the latter out of humility, but is led through the first, where everything is dropping with gold, and her face and clothes become gilded. A maiden asks her where she will live; in the white house, or in the black one? She again says, "In the black one," but is conducted to the white one. Another asks her whether she would prefer to spin gold flax with pretty spinning-girls and have her meals with them, or with cats and snakes. The girl is terrified, but is taken to the golden spinners and eats roast meat with them, and drinks beer and mead. After she has led a delightful life there for some time she is taken back through a golden gate by another little man, and reaches home covered with golden garlands. On her arrival the yellow cock crows "Cock a doodle doo! Cock a doodle doo!" and every one cries, "Here comes Golden Mary." The ugly sister now also lets herself be pushed into the well. Everything happens quite contrariwise with her. A little black man guides her, she passes by a gate of pitch into a misty abode of snakes and toads, where she is not allowed to eat so much as she wants, and has no rest day or night. In the Naubert collection (1. 136-179) the story is on the whole treated in the same way as in the fourth tale from Hesse, and in the same manner as the rest, but it is very pleasantly amplified. There is another method of treatment in Mad. Villeneuve's stories, of which in 1765 a translation appeared in Ulm, under the title, Die junge Amerikanerin. The Marmot (Liron), so the step-child is called, has to perform the coarsest work, keep the sheep, and at the same time bring back home with her an appointed quantity of spun thread. The maiden frequently seats herself on the edge of a well, and one day when she is about to wash her face, she falls in. When she comes to herself again, she finds herself in a crystal globe in the hands of a beautiful nixie, whose hair she is obliged to comb, for which she receives a magnificent dress, and whenever she lets down her hair and combs it, bright flowers are to fall from it, and whenever she is in trouble she is to plunge into the well and seek help from the nixie. The nixie likewise gives her a shepherd's crook which will keep off wolves and robbers; a spinning-wheel and distaff, which spin of their own accord, and lastly, a tame beaver able to perform many services. When Marmot comes home one evening with these things, the other daughter also is to get some like them for herself, and sh |