In “Melusine,” for 1878, col. 206 ff., M. Luzel gives a Breton version,
under the title of “Les Trois Filles du Boulanger; ou, L’Eau qui danse,
la Pomme qui chante, et l’Oiseau de Vérité,” which does not appear to
have been derived from Galland’s story, although it corresponds with it
closely in the first part. A prince overhears the conversation of three
daughters of an old baker, who is a widower. The eldest says that she
loves the king’s gardener; the second, that she loves the king’s valet;
and the youngest says the prince is her love, to whom she would bear two
boys, each with a star of gold on his brow, and a girl, with a star of
silver. The father chides them for talking nonsense and sends them to
bed. The following day the prince sends for the girls to come to the
palace one after the other, and having questioned them, tells the
youngest that he desires to see her father. When she delivers the royal
message the old baker begins to shake in his shoes, and exclaims, “I
told you that your frivolous remarks would come to the ears of the
prince, and now he sends for me to have me punished, without a doubt.”
“No, no, dear father; go to the palace and fear nothing.” He goes, and,
to be brief, the three marriages duly take place. The sisters married to
the royal gardener and valet soon become jealous of the young queen, and
when they find she is about to become a mother they consult a fairy, who
advises them to gain over the midwife and get her to substitute a little
dog and throw the child into the river, which is done accordingly, when
the first son with the gold star is born. For the second son, a dog is
also substituted, and the king, as on the former occasion, says, “God’s
will be done: take care of the poor creature.” But when the little girl
with the silver star is smuggled away and the king is shown a third
puppy as the queen’s offspring, he is enraged. “They’ll call me the
father of dogs!” he exclaims, “and not without cause.” He orders the
queen to be shut up in a tower and fed on bread and water. The children
are picked up by a gardener, who has a garden close to the river, and
brought up by his wife as their own. In course of time the worthy couple
die, and the king causes the children to be brought to the palace (how
he came to know of them the story-teller does not inform us), and as
they were very pretty and had been well brought up, he was greatly
pleased with them. Every Sunday they went to grand mass in the church,
each having a ribbon on the brow to conceal the stars. All the folk were
astonished at their beauty.
One day, when the king was out hunting, an old woman came into the
kitchen of the palace, where the sister happened to be, and exclaimed,
“O how cold I am,” and she trembled and her teeth chattered. “Come near
the fire, my good mother,” said the little girl. “Blessings on you, my
child! How beautiful you are! If you had but the Water that dances, the
Apple that sings, and the Bird of Truth, you’d not have your equal on
the earth.” “Yes, but how to obtain these wonders?” “You have two
brothers who can procure them for you,” and so saying, the old woman
went away. When she told her brothers what the old woman had said, the
eldest before setting out in quest of the three treasures leaves a
poignard which as long as it can be drawn out of its sheath would
betoken his welfare. One day it can’t be drawn out, so the second
brother goes off, leaving with his sister a rosary, as in Galland. When
she finds the beads won’t run on the string, she goes herself, on
horseback, as a cavalier. She comes to a large plain, and in a hollow
tree sees a little old man with a beard of great length, which she trims
for him. The old man tells her that 60 leagues distant is an inn by the
roadside, she may enter it, and having refreshed herself with food and
drink, leave her horse there, and promise to pay on her return. After
quitting the inn she will see a very high mountain, to climb which will
require hands and feet, and she’ll have to encounter a furious storm of
hail and snow; it will be bitterly cold: take care and not lose courage,
but mount on. She’ll see on either side a number of stone
pillars—persons like herself who have been thus transformed because they
lost heart. On the summit is a plain, bordered with flowers, blooming as
in May. She will see a gold seat under an apple-tree and should sit down
and make it appear as if asleep; presently the bird will descend from
branch to branch and enter the cage; quickly close it on the bird, for
it is the Bird of Truth. Cut a branch of the tree, with an apple on it,
for it is the Apple that sings. Lastly, there is also the fountain of
Water which dances: fill a flask from the fountain and in descending the
hill sprinkle a few drops of the water on the stone pillars and the
enchanted young princes and knights will come to life again. Such were
the instructions of the little old man, for which the princess thanked
him and went on her way. Arriving at the summit of the mountain, she
discovered the cage and sitting down under the tree feigned to be
asleep, when presently the merle entered and she at once rose up and
closed it. The merle, seeing that he was a prisoner, said, “You have
captured me, daughter of the King of France. Many others have tried to
seize me, but none has been able till now, and you must have been
counselled by some one.” The princess then cut a branch of the tree with
an apple on it, filled her flask with water from the fountain that
danced, and as she went down the hill sprinkled a few drops on the stone
pillars, which were instantly turned into princes, dukes, barons, and
knights, and last of all her two brothers came to life, but they did not
know her. All pressed about the princess, some saying, “Give me the
Water which dances,” others, “Give me the Apple which sings,” and
others, “Give me the Bird of Truth.” But she departed quickly, carrying
with her the three treasures, and passing the inn where she had left her
horse she paid her bill and returned home, where she arrived long before
her brothers. When at length they came home she embraced them, saying,
“Ah, my poor brothers! How much anxiety you have caused me! How long
your journey has lasted! But God be praised that you are back here
again.” “Alas, my poor sister, we have indeed remained a long time away,
and after all have not succeeded in our quest. But we may consider
ourselves fortunate in having been able to return.” “How!” said the
princess, “do you not bring me the Water which dances, the Apple which
sings, and the Bird of Truth?” “Alas! my poor sister, a young knight who
was a stranger to us carried them all away—curse the rascal.” The old
king who had no children (or rather, who believed he had none) loved the
two brothers and the sister very much and was highly delighted to see
them back again. He caused a grand feast to be prepared, to which he
invited princes, dukes, marquises, barons, and generals. Towards the end
of the banquet the young girl placed on the table the Water, the Apple,
and the Bird, and bade each do its duty, whereupon the Water began to
dance, and the Apple began to sing, and the bird began to hop about the
table, and all present, in ecstasy, mouth and eyes wide open, looked and
listened to these wonders. Never before had they seen such a sight. “To
whom belong these marvels?” said the king when at length he was able to
speak. “To me, sire,” replied the young girl. “Is that so?” said the
King. “And from whom did you get them?” “I myself procured them with
much trouble,” answered she. Then the two brothers knew that it was
their sister who had delivered them. As to the king, he nearly lost his
head in his joy and admiration. “My crown and my kingdom for your
wonders, and you yourself, my young girl, shall be my queen,” he
exclaimed. “Patience for a little, sire,” said she, “until you have
heard my bird speak—the Bird of Truth, for he has important things to
reveal to you. My little bird, now speak the truth.” “I consent,”
replied the bird; “but let no one go out of this room,” and all the
doors were closed. The old sorceress of a midwife and one of the king’s
sisters-in-law were present, and became very uneasy at hearing these
words. “Come now, my bird,” then said the girl, “speak the truth,” and
this is what the bird said: “Twenty years ago, sire, your wife was shut
up in a tower, abandoned by everybody, and you have long believed her to
be dead. She has been accused unjustly.” The old midwife and the king’s
sister-in law now felt indisposed and wished to leave the room. “Let no
one depart hence,” said the king. “Continue to speak the truth, my
little bird.” “You have had two sons and a daughter, sire,” the bird
went on to say—“all three born of your lady, and here they are! Remove
their bandages and you will see that each of them has a star on the
forehead.” They removed the bandages and saw a gold star on the brow of
each of the boys and a silver star on the girl’s brow. “The authors of
all the evil,” continued the bird, “are your two sisters-in-law and this
midwife—this sorceress of the devil. They have made you believe that
your wife only gave birth to little dogs, and your poor children were
exposed on the Seine as soon as they were born. When the midwife—that
sorceress of hell—learned that the children had been saved and
afterwards brought to the palace, she sought again to destroy them.
Penetrating one day into the palace, disguised as a beggar, and
affecting to be perishing from cold and hunger, she incited in the mind
of the princess the desire to possess the Dancing-Water, the
Singing-Apple, and the Bird of Truth—myself. Her two brothers went, one
after the other, in quest of these things, and the sorceress took very
good care that they should never return. Nor would they have returned,
if their sister had not succeeded in delivering them after great toil
and trouble.” As the bird ended his story, the king became unconscious,
and when he revived he went himself to fetch the queen from the tower.
He soon returned with her to the festive chamber, holding her by the
hand. She was beautiful and gracious as ever, and having ate and drank a
little, she died on the spot. The king, distraught with grief and anger,
ordered a furnace to be heated, and threw into it his sister-in-law and
the midwife—“ce tison de l’enfer!” As to the princess and her two
brothers, I think they made good marriages all three, and as to the
bird, they do not say if it continues still to speak the truth;—“mais je
présume que oui, puisque ce n’était pas un homme!”
It would indeed be surprising did we not find our story popularly known
throughout Germany in various forms. Under the title of “The Three
Little Birds” a version is given in Grimm’s _K. u. H. M._ (No. 96, vol.
i. of Mrs. Hunt’s English translation), which reproduces the chief
particulars of Galland’s tale with at least one characteristic German
addition: