93–99), but omits ‘The Two Brothers’ in F. A. Steel’s Wide-awake
Stories, pp. 138–152, and ‘Saiyid and Said’ in Knowles’s Folk-tales
of Kashmir, pp. 74–97. The last offers wonderfully close analogies
to the Gypsy story. Cf. also Krauss, i. 187; and Vuk’s Servian
story, No. 26.
NO. 26.—THE WINGED HERO
There was a certain great craftsman, and he was rich. He took to
drinking and gambling, and drank away all his wealth, and grew poor, so
that he had nothing to eat. He saw a dream, that he should make himself
wings; and he made himself wings, and screwed them on, and flew to the
Ninth Region, to the emperor’s castle, and lighted down. And the
emperor’s son went forth to meet him, and asked him, ‘Where do you come
from, my man?’
‘I come from afar.’
‘Sell me your wings.’
‘I will.’
‘What do you want for them?’
‘A thousand gold pieces.’
And he gave him them, and said to him, ‘Go home with the wings, and
come back in a month’s time.’
He flew home, and came back in a month; and the prince said to him,
‘Screw the wings on to me.’
And he screwed them on, and wrote down for the prince which peg he was
to turn to fly, and which peg he was to turn to alight. The prince flew
a little, and let himself down on the ground, and gave him another
thousand florins more, and gave him also a horse, that he might ride
home. The prince screwed on the wings, and flew to the south. A wind
arose from the south, and tossed the trees, and drove him to the north.
In the north dwelt the wind, drove him to the Ninth Region. And a fire
was shining in the city. And he lighted down on the earth, and
unscrewed his wings, and folded them by his side, and came into the
house. There was an old woman, and he asked for food. She gave him a
dry crust, and he ate it not. He lay down and slept. And in the morning
he wrote a letter for her, and gave her money, and sent her to a
cookshop with a letter to the cookshop to give him good food. And the
old woman came home, and gave him to eat, and he also gave to the old
woman. He went outside, and saw the emperor’s palace with three stories
of stone and the fourth of glass. And he asked the old woman, ‘Who
lives in the palace? and who lives in the fourth story?’
‘The emperor’s daughter lives there. He won’t let her go out. He gives
her her food there by a rope.’
And the maid-servant lowered the rope, and they fastened the victuals
to it, and she drew them up by the rope. And the maid-servant had a
bedchamber apart, where she slept only of a night, and the day she
passed with the princess.
And that emperor’s son screwed on his wings and flew up, flew to the
glass house, and he looked to see how the bars opened, and opened them,
and let himself in. And she was lying lifeless on the bed. And he
shakes her, and she never speaks. And he took the candle from her head;
and she arose, and embraced him, and said to him, ‘Since you are come
to me, you are mine, and I am yours.’ They loved one another till
daybreak; then he went out, placed the candle at her head, and she was
dead. And he closed the bars again, and flew back to the old woman.
Half a year he visited the princess. She fell with child. The
maid-servant noticed that she was growing big, and her clothes did not
fit her. She wrote a letter to the emperor: ‘What will this be, that
your daughter is big?’ The emperor wrote back a letter to her: ‘Smear
the floor at night with dough, and whoever comes will leave his mark on
the floor.’ She placed the candle at her head, and the girl lay dead.
And she smeared the floor with dough, and went to her chamber. The
emperor’s son came again to her, and let himself in to her, and never
noticed they had smeared the floor, and made footprints with his shoes,
and the dough stuck to his shoes, but he never noticed it, and went
home to the old woman, and lay down and slept. The servant-maid went to
the emperor’s daughter, and saw the footprints, and wrote a letter to
the emperor, and took the measure of the footprints, and sent it to the
emperor. The emperor summoned two servants, and gave them a letter, and
gave them the measure of the footprints. ‘Whose shoes the measure shall
fit, bring him to me.’ They traversed the whole city, and found
nothing.
And one said, ‘Let’s try the old woman’s.’
And another said, ‘No, there’s nobody there.’
‘Stay here. I’ll go.’
And he saw him sleeping, and applied the measure to his shoes. They
summoned him. ‘Come to the emperor.’
‘All right.’
He bought himself a great cloak, and put it on, so that his wings might
not be noticed, and went to the emperor. The emperor asked him, ‘Have
you been going to my daughter?’
‘I have.’
‘With what purpose have you done so?’
‘I want to marry her.’
The emperor said, ‘Bah! you’ll not marry her, for I’ll burn you both
with thorns.’
The emperor commanded his servants, and they gathered three loads of
thorns, and set them on fire, and lowered her down, to put them both on
the fire. The emperor’s son asked, ‘Allow us to say a pater noster.’ He
said to the girl, ‘When I fall on my knees, do you creep under the
cloak and clasp me round the neck, for I’ll fly upwards with you.’
She clasped him round the neck, and quickly he screwed the wings, and
flew upwards. The cloak flew off, the soldiers fired their guns at it;
on he flew. She cried, ‘Let yourself down, for I shall bear a child.’
He said, ‘Hold out.’
He flew further, and alighted on a rock on a mountain, and she brought
forth a child there. She said, ‘Make a fire.’ He saw a fire in a field
afar off. He screwed his wings, and flew to the fire, and took a brand
of it, and returned. And a spark fell on one wing, and the wing caught
fire. Just as he was under the mountain the wing fell off, and he flung
away the other one as well. And he walked round the mountain, and could
not ascend it.
And God came to him and said, ‘Why weepest thou?’
‘Ah! how should I not weep? for I cannot ascend the mountain, and my
wife has brought forth a child.’
‘What will you give me if I carry you up to the top?’
‘I will give you whatever you want.’
‘Will you give me what is dearest to you?’
‘I will.’
‘Let us make an agreement.’
They made one. God cast him into a deep sleep, and her as well, and God
bore them home to his father’s, to his own bed, and left them there,
and departed. And the child cried. The warders heard a child crying in
the bedchamber. They went and opened the door, and recognised him, the
emperor’s son. And they went to the emperor and told him, ‘Your son has
come, O emperor.’
‘Call him to me.’
They came to the emperor; they bowed themselves before him; they
tarried there a year. The boy grew big, and was playing one day. The
emperor and the empress went to church, and his nurse too went to the
church. God came, disguised like a beggar. The emperor’s son said to
the little lad, ‘Take a handful of money, and give it to the beggar.’
The beggar said, ‘I don’t want this money; it’s bad. Tell your father
to give me what he vowed he would.’
The emperor’s son was angry, and he took his sword in his hand, and
went to the old man to kill him. The old man took the sword into his
own hand and said, ‘Give me what you swore to me—the child, you
know—when you were weeping under the mountain.’
‘I will give you money, I will not give you the child.’
God took the child by the head, and the father took him by the feet,
and they tugged, and God cut the child in half.
‘One half for you, and one half for me.’
‘Now you’ve killed him, I don’t want him. Take him and be hanged to
you.’
God took him, and went outside, and put him together; and he was
healed, and lived again.
‘Do you take him now.’
For God cut off his sins.
Of this story, widely familiar through H. C. Andersen’s ‘Flying
Trunk,’ Wlislocki furnishes a Transylvanian-Gypsy variant, ‘The
Wooden Bird,’ in his ‘Beiträge zu Benfey’s Pantschatantra’
(Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenl. Gesellschaft, vol. xxxii. 1888,
part i. p. 119). For that variant and many others—Persian, Hindu,
Modern Greek, etc., including ‘Der Weber als Wischnu’ from Benfey,
i. 159–163, ii. 48–56, see W. A. Clouston’s Notes on the Magical
Elements in Chaucer’s ‘Squire’s Tale,’ and Analogues (Chaucer Soc.
1890, pp. 413–471). Cf. also Grimm’s ‘Blue Light,’ No. 116; Hahn,
No. 15, and ii. 269, for tower of glass or crystal; Cosquin, No.
31; and Hahn, ii. 186, for a king who governs nine kingdoms. With
the princess lying lifeless on the bed compare the lady sleeping on
a golden bedstead in Lal Behari Day’s Folk-tales of Bengal, p. 251.
In ‘The Demon and the King’s Son’ (Maive Stokes’s Indian Fairy
Tales, p. 186), the demon every day makes his daughter lie on her
bed, and covers her with a sheet, and places a thick stick at her
head, and another at her feet. Then she dies till he comes home in
the evening and changes the sticks. This brings her to life again.
Cf. also notes to our Welsh-Gypsy story of ‘An Old King and his
three Sons’ (No. 55).
NO. 27.—TROPSYN
There was a poor man, and he had four sons. And they went out to
service, and went to a gentleman to thrash wheat. And they received so
much wheat for a wage, and brought it to their father. ‘Here, father,
eat; we will go out to service again.’ And they went again to a
gentleman, who was to give them each a horse at the year’s end. And the
youngest was called Tropsyn; and the gentleman made him his groom. And
a mare brought forth a colt; and that colt said, ‘Tropsyn, take me. The
year is up now.’
The gentleman said, ‘Choose your horses.’
So the three elder brothers chose good horses; but Tropsyn said, ‘Give
me this horse, master.’
‘What will you do with it? it’s so little.’
‘So it may be.’
Tropsyn took it and departed; and the colt said, ‘Let me go, Tropsyn,
to my dam to suck.’
And he let it go, and it went to its dam, and came back a horse to
terrify the world.
‘Now mount me.’
He mounted, and the horse flew. He caught up his brothers, and his
brothers asked him, ‘Where did you get that horse from?’
‘I killed a gentleman, and took his horse.’
‘Let’s push on, and escape.’
Night fell upon them as they were passing a meadow, and in that meadow
they saw the light of a fire. They made for the light. It was an old
woman’s, and she was a witch, and had four daughters. And they went
there, and went into the house; and Tropsyn said, ‘Good-night.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Can you give us a night’s lodging?’
‘I’m not sure; my mother is not at home. When she comes you had better
ask her.’
The mother came home. ‘What are you wanting, young fellows?’
‘We’ve come to demand your daughters in marriage.’
‘Good.’
She made them a bed on the ground with its head to the threshold, and
her daughters’ with its head to the wall. And the old woman sharpened
her sword to cut off their heads. And Tropsyn took his brothers’ caps,
and put them on the girls’ heads. And the old woman arose, and kept
feeling the caps, and keeps cutting off the heads, and killed her
daughters.
Tropsyn arose, and led his brothers outside. ‘Come, be off.’ And he
arose, Tropsyn; and the old woman had a golden bird in a cage; and
Tropsyn said to the horse, ‘I will take a feather of the bird.’
And the horse said, ‘Don’t.’
‘Bah! I will.’ And he took a feather, and put it in his pocket.
And they mounted their horses and rode away, and went to a city. There
was a great lord, a count; and he asked them, ‘Where are you going?’
‘We are going to service.’
‘Take service with me, then.’
And that lord was still unmarried. And they went to him, and he gave
them each a place. One he set over the horses, and one he set over the
oxen, and one he set over the swine; and Tropsyn he made coachman. Of a
night Tropsyn stuck the feather in the wall, and it shone like a
candle. And his brothers were angry, and went to their master. ‘Master,
Tropsyn has a feather, such that one needs no candle—of gold.’
The master called: ‘Tropsyn, come here, bring me the feather.’
Tropsyn brought it, and gave it to his master. The master liked him
better than ever, and the brothers went to the master, and said to him,
‘Master, Tropsyn has said that he’ll bring the bird alive.’
The master called Tropsyn. ‘Tropsyn, bring me the bird. If you don’t, I
shall cut off your head.’
He went to his horse. ‘What am I to do, horse, for the master has told
me to bring the bird?’
‘Fear not, Tropsyn; jump on my back.’
So he mounted the horse, and rode to the old woman’s. And the horse
said to him, ‘Turn a somersault, [84] and you’ll become a flea, and
creep into her breast and bite her. And she’ll fling off her smock, and
do you go and take the bird.’
And he took the bird, and departed to his master; the master made him a
lackey.
And there was in the Danube a lady, a virgin; and of a Sunday she would
go out on the water in a boat. And his brothers came to their master
and said, ‘Master, Tropsyn boasts that he’ll bring the lady from the
bottom of the Danube.’
‘Tropsyn, come here. What is this you’ve been boasting, that you’ll
bring me the lady?’
‘I didn’t.’
‘You’ve got to, else I shall cut off your head.’
He went to his horse. ‘What am I to do, horse, for how shall I bring
her?’
And the horse said, ‘Fear not, let him give you twelve hides and a jar
of pitch, [85] and put them on me, and let him make you a small ship,
not big, and let him put various drinks in the ship. And do you hide
yourself behind the door. And she will come, and drink brandy, and get
drunk, and sleep. And do you seize her, and jump on my back with her,
and I will run off home.’
The horse ran home to the master, and Tropsyn gave her to his master in
the castle. The count shut the doors, and set a watch at the window to
prevent her escape, for she was wild. The count wanted to marry her;
she will not.
‘Let them bring my herd of horses, then I will marry you. He who
brought me, let him bring also my horses.’
The count said, ‘Tropsyn, bring the horses.’
Tropsyn went to his horse. ‘What am I to do, horse? How shall I bring
the horses from the Danube?’
‘Come with me, fear not.’
When he came to the Danube, the horse leapt into the Danube, and caught
the mother of the horses by the mane, and led her out. And Tropsyn
caught her, and mounted her, and galloped off. And the whole herd came
forth, and ran after their dam home to the count’s palace. The lady
cried ‘Halt!’ to the horses.
The count wants to marry her. She says, ‘Let him milk my mares, and
when you have bathed in their milk, then I will marry you.’
The count cried, ‘Tropsyn, milk the mares.’
And Tropsyn went to his horse. ‘What shall I do, horse? How shall I
milk the mares?’
‘Fear not, for I will catch her by the mane, and do you milk, and fear
not.’
And he milked a whole caldron full.
And the lady said, ‘Make a fire, and boil the milk.’
And they made a fire, and the milk boils.
‘Now,’ said the lady, ‘let him who milked the mares bathe in the milk.’
And the count said, ‘Tropsyn, go and bathe in the milk.’
He went to the horse. ‘What shall I do, horse? for if I bathe, then I
shall die.’
The horse said, ‘Fear not, lead me to the caldron; I will snort through
my nostrils, and breathe out frost.’
He led the horse; the horse snorted through his nostrils; then the milk
became lukewarm. Then he leapt into the caldron, and fair as he was
before, he came out fairer still. When he came out, the horse snorted
through his nostrils, and breathed fire into the caldron, and the milk
boiled again.
And the lady said to the count, ‘Go thou too and bathe in the milk,
then will I live with thee.’
The count went to the caldron and said, ‘Tropsyn, bring me my horse.’
Tropsyn brought him his horse; the horse trembled from afar. The count
leapt into the caldron; only bones were to be seen at the bottom of the
caldron.
Then cried the lady, ‘Come hither, Tropsyn; thou art my lord, and I am
thy lady.’
Of this Bukowina-Gypsy story we have a very interesting Welsh-Gypsy
version, taken down in Rómani from Matthew Wood’s recitation by Mr.
Sampson, and thus epitomised by him in English:—
NO. 28.—THE BEAUTIFUL MOUNTAIN
Somewhere far off were a quarryman and his wife. They had a son in
their old age. They died. An old man comes to beg, and asks boy will he
come with him to seek fortune. They go. ‘Wish me into a horse.’ Boy
does so. ‘Jump on my back.’ He does so. They take the road. Horse warns
boy to help anything in distress. Boy finds a little fish cast up by
the tide, and puts it back in the water. Fish promises gratitude. They
cross the Beautiful Mountain. Horse warns boy to touch nothing. A
feather blows in his mouth. He spits it out again and again, but it
returns. He looks at it, thinks it pretty, puts it in his pocket. They
descend other side of the mountain. Boy hears noise of bellowing in a
castle. Finds sick giant in bed, without servant-maid. Boy gets him
food. Giant promises gratitude. Horse asks boy if he touched anything
on mountain. ‘Nothing but this feather.’ ‘That feather will bring you
sorrow, but keep it now you have it.’ They come to a castle. Boy asks
for work. Master tests his handwriting. Engages him. Wants him to sleep
indoors; he prefers stable beside his old horse (cf. Grimm, No. 126,
ii. 155, also for pen). They marvel at his penmanship, done with this
feather. One day the master’s man steals the pen by a ruse, and brings
it to master: ‘Master, the man that got the feather can get the bird.’
Boy tells horse what they want him to do. Horse tells him to ask for
three days’ leave and three sacks of gold. Horse and boy go off. They
go and get the bird, choosing the dirtiest and ugliest bird (cf.
Polish-Gypsy story, No. 49, for choosing bird in common cage). The
master’s man says, ‘Master, the bird is fair, but fairer still the
lady’ (that owned it). Boy told to fetch lady; he tells horse. Horse
reminds him that he said the feather would bring him trouble. Three
more days and three purses of gold. Horse says, ‘Wish me into a boat on
the sea.’ The boat is full of the finest silk. They sail under the
castle. Lure lady on board to see silk. She goes into cabin. Boy weighs
anchor and off. Lady comes up, and drops her keys into sea. They
return. Man says to master, ‘Master, the man that got the lady can get
the castle.’ Boy tells horse. Horse reminds him of unlucky feather.
Three more days and bags of gold. They go. Horse reminds boy of giant’s
promise. Giant puts chain round castle and drags it along. The castle
is walled round and locked. Lady demands her keys. Boy and horse go
off, call the little fish. He fails to find keys. Tries again and
brings them up. Keys given to lady. Lady says, ‘Which would you prefer,
Jack, to have your head cut off or your master’s head cut off?’ Boy
says, ‘Cut off mine, not his.’ Lady says, ‘You have spoken well. Had
you not spoken thus, your own head would have been cut off. Now the
master’s head will fall, not yours.’ Boy and lady wed, and live in the
castle still. ‘Now you’ve got it.’
It must at least be nearly five hundred years since the ancestors
of our Welsh Gypsies parted from those of their kinsfolk in
Bukowina; yet the resemblance between these two versions still is
marvellous. The talking horse, the entering into service at the
castle, the feather, the fetching the bird, the fetching a lady (in
the Bukowina version not the lady), the cabin even, the fetching
the lady’s belongings, and the doom of the master—these eight
details are common to both: the very order of them is identical.
Non-Gypsy variants are Grimm’s ‘Ferdinand the Faithful’ (No. 126;
ii. 153, 425), Cosquin’s ‘Le Roi d’Angleterre et son Filleul’ (No.
3, i. 32), his ‘La Belle aux Cheveux d’Or’ (No. 72, ii. 290), the
Donegal story of ‘The Red Pony’ in W. Larmenie’s West Irish
Folk-tales (1893, pp. 211–218), a Russian story summarised by
Ralston (p. 287), and Laura Gonzenbach’s long Sicilian story, ‘Die
Geschichte von Caruseddu’ (No. 83, ii. 143–155, 257–9). All six
deserve careful study, but specially the last, which links these
stories to the heroic version of ‘The Master Thief’ (supra, p. 51).
For its plot, told briefly, is this:—Caruseddu and his two elder
brothers go as gardeners to a dragu (rendered ‘Menschenfresser’ or
‘ogre,’ but query rather ‘dragon’). By the Hop-o’-my-thumb device
of changing caps, as in ‘Tropsyn’ (cf. also Hahn, ii. 179–180),
Caruseddu deludes him into devouring his own three daughters. The
brothers then take service with a king—Caruseddu as trusted
servant, the others as gardeners. They are jealous of Caruseddu,
and get the king to send him to steal first the dragu’s talking
horse, next his bed-cover with golden balls, and lastly the dragu
himself. This last task he achieves by the trick of getting the
dragu to try if a new coffin for (the supposed dead) Caruseddu is
big enough. [86] Still at his brothers’ suggestion, Caruseddu is
now sent to fetch the daughter of the queen with the seven veils;
he achieves this, like his former feats, with the help of the
talking horse. The princess refuses to wed the king unless he
recovers for her the veil and the ring she had lost on the way to
him; Caruseddu recovers them by the aid of a grateful bird and a
grateful fish (cf. the Welsh version). He also sifts a barnful of
wheat, oats, and barley with the aid of grateful ants. Lastly, he
has to plunge into a fiery furnace, but, smeared with foam snorted
by the talking horse, he emerges uninjured, far fairer than before.
The old and ugly king has to essay the same ordeal, and asks
Caruseddu what he smeared himself with. Who, sickened at last by
his master’s ingratitude, answers, ‘With fat.’ So the king is burnt
to ashes, and Caruseddu marries the princess. Reinhold Köhler, the
learned annotator of Gonzenbach, compares Straparola, iii. 2
(Grimm, ii. 478) and a Wallachian story, where the hero bathes in
boiling milk, which his magic horse blows cold, but in which the
king himself perishes. Wratislaw gives a curious Servian story from
Bosnia, ‘The Bird-catcher’ (No. 42, pp. 239–245). Here the hero, a
bird-catcher, is advised by a grateful crow, but the horse comes in
very mal-à-propos at the finish. Cf. also Hahn, ii. 180, 186; and
Clouston’s Eastern Romances, p. 499, 570.
NO. 29.—PRETTY-FACE
There was a widow lady, and she had an only son. And he stuck his ring
in the wall, and said, ‘Mother, when blood flows from the ring, then I
am dead.’
And he was called Peter Pretty-face.
He took the road, and the dragon with six heads came, and he drew his
sword and killed him, and made three heaps of him, and planted a red
flag, and went further. And a dragon with twelve heads came, and he
drew his sword, and killed him also, and made twelve heaps, and planted
a black flag, and went further. And there came one with twenty-four
heads, and he killed him also, and made twenty-four heaps, and planted
a white flag.
Behold! the dragons carried off an emperor’s daughter—there were twelve
dragons—and shut her up in their castle. And they went and fought from
morning even till noon; he who shall prove himself strongest, he shall
marry the maiden.
And his mother had said to him, ‘If you will go, your death will not be
by a hero, but your death will be by a cripple.’
So he went to that castle, and saw the maiden at the window, and he
asked her, ‘What are you doing there?’
‘The dragons carried me off, and shut me up here.’
‘And where are they gone to?’
‘They are gone to fight for me.’
‘And when will they come home?’
‘They will come at noon to dine. And they will hurl their club, and it
will strike the door, that I may have the food ready.’
He opened the door and went in to her. The dragons hurled the club, and
struck the door; and he took the club, and hurled it back, and killed
them all.
‘Now have no fear; they are dead.’
He married the emperor’s daughter.
And the emperor heard that the dragons had carried off his daughter;
and the emperor said, ‘He who shall free her from the dragons, he shall
marry her.’ The emperor knew not that Peter Pretty-face had married
her. He thought that the dragons had carried her off.
And there was one Chutilla the Handless, and he went to the emperor.
‘I, O emperor, will rescue your daughter from the dragons.’
‘Well, if you do, she shall be yours.’
So he, Chutilla, went to Peter Pretty-face. And night came upon him,
and he had nowhere to sleep, and he crept into the hen-house. In the
morning Peter Pretty-face arose, and washed his face, and looked out of
the window, and Chutilla came forth from the hen-house.
And Peter Pretty-face saw him. ‘By him is my death.’
Chutilla came indoors and said, ‘Good-morning, Peter Pretty-face.’
‘Thanks, Chutilla.’
‘Come, Peter Pretty-face, give me the emperor’s daughter.’
He said, ‘I will not.’
Chutilla caught him by the throat, and placed his head on the
threshold. [87] ‘Give me, Peter Pretty-face, the maiden, else I will
cut off your head.’
‘Cut it off; I will not give her.’
Chutilla cut off his head, and took the girl and departed.
Blood began to flow from the ring. His mother saw it. ‘Now my son is
dead.’ She went after him, to seek for him, and came to the red flag.
His mother said, ‘My son went this way.’ She went further, and came to
the black flag. ‘My son went this way.’ She went further, and came to
the white flag. ‘My son went this way.’ She came to the castle, found
her son dead; and two serpents were licking the blood. And she struck
one serpent, and it died. And the other serpent brought a leaf in its
mouth, and went to the first serpent, and it also arose. And the lady
saw, and killed it also, and took the leaf, and placed her son’s head
again on the trunk, and touched it with the leaf, and he arose.
‘Mother, I was sleeping soundly.’
‘You would have slept for ever if I had not come.’
‘Mother, I will go to my lady.’
‘Go not, mother’s darling.’
‘Bah! I will go, mother.’
‘If go you will, God aid you.’
He went, and went straight to Chutilla, and seized Chutilla, and cut
him all in little pieces, till he had cut him up, and cast him to the
dogs, and they devoured him. And he took the emperor’s daughter, and
went with her to the emperor.
And the maiden said, ‘Father, this is he that saved me from the
dragons.’
The emperor joined them in marriage, and made him king. And they lived,
perhaps they are living even now.
I know no variant, Gypsy or Gentile, of this story, though Chutilla
recalls the ‘Halber Mensch’ of Hahn, ii. 274. The three flags, red,
black, and white, are seemingly unique. For casting the club to
announce one’s coming, cf. supra, pp. 37, 40; and Denton’s Serbian
Folklore, p. 124. For snake-leaf in Hungarian-Gypsy tale, cf.
supra, p. 99. And for ‘Mother, I was sleeping soundly,’ cf. supra,
p. 33. If the story of ‘Peter Pretty-face’ is complete, his easy
victory at the end may be due to God’s help, invoked by the mother.
NO. 30.—THE RICH AND THE POOR BROTHER
There were two brothers, one poor and one rich. And the rich one said
to him, ‘Come with me, brother, to our father.’ And the rich one took
bread for himself, and the poor one had none.
And the rich one kept eating bread, and the poor one said, ‘Give me,
too, a bit of bread.’
‘If you will give me an eye, I will give you a bit of bread.’
‘I will give it you, brother.’
And he took out an eye, and gave him a bit of bread.
And he went further, and he hungered. ‘Give me a bit more bread.’
‘Give me one more eye.’
‘I will give it you, brother.’
Behold, he was blind now, and his brother took him by the hand and led
him under the gallows, and left him there; and his brother departed. At
nightfall came the devils, and perched on the gallows.
And the biggest devil asked, ‘What hast done in the world? where wert
walking?’
‘I did—I stopped the water.’
‘And thou, what hast thou done?’
‘The emperor’s daughter neither dies nor lives; she is just in
torment.’
‘And thou, what hast thou done?’
‘I did—that a brother dug out a brother’s eyes.’
‘If he knew, there’s a brook here, and if he washed himself, he would
see.’
‘If the townsfolk knew to go to the mountain and remove the stone, the
water would flow again.’
And the third said, ‘But if the emperor’s daughter knew, under her bed
there is a toad, and if she takes it out, and gets ready a bath, and
puts the toad in the bath, and if they wash her, she would grow
strong.’
Then the cocks crowed, and the devils departed.
So the man dragged himself to the brook, and kept feeling with his hand
till he found the water. And he washed his face, and his eyes were
restored to him. And he went into the city where they had stopped the
water. ‘What will you give me if I release the water?’
‘What you want, we will give you.’
‘Well, come with me to the mountain, take to you iron crowbars.’
So they went to the mountain, and raised the stone; and the water
flowed plentifully.
‘Well, now, what do you want, man, for releasing the water?’
‘Give me a carriage and two horses and a carriageful of money.’
They gave them to him. He went to the emperor’s daughter. ‘What will
you give me if I make her strong?’
‘What you want, I will give you.’
‘Set water on the fire to boil.’
And he went and took out the toad, and threw it into the bath; and they
washed the emperor’s daughter, and she grew stronger and fairer than
ever.
‘What do you want for making her strong and fair?’
‘Give me two horses and a carriageful of money, and give me a driver
home.’
So he went home, and sent the servant to his brother, to borrow a
bushel. And his brother asked, ‘What to do with the bushel?’
‘To measure money with.’
His brother gave him the bushel, and went himself and asked his
brother, ‘Where did you get it, the money, from, and the horses?’
‘From there where you left me.’
‘Lead me, too, thither to that place. I am sorry, brother.’
‘Don’t be sorry; you’ve just got to go. Well, come, brother.’
So they both went to the place where he dug out his eyes.
‘Give me, brother, a bit of bread.’
‘Give me an eye.’
He gave him an eye, and he gave him a bit of bread.
And they went further. ‘Give me, brother, a bit more bread.’
‘Give me one more eye.’
‘I will, brother.’
So he gave him a bit more bread, and took him by the hand, and led him
under the gallows, and left him there, and departed. At nightfall came
the devils, and perched on the gallows. And the biggest devil asked,
‘What have you done? where have you been to in the world?’
One said, ‘Don’t tell, for there was lately a blind man under the
gallows, and he heard what we said. And he made himself eyes, and made
the water run, and raised up the emperor’s daughter. Stay, while I look
under the gallows.’
And they found the blind man. ‘There’s a blind man here.’ And they rent
him all in pieces. Then the devils departed; the man was dead.
This story is told as well as story may be. There is a Gypsy
variant, longer but not half so good, from the Hungarian
Carpathians, in Miklosich’s Beiträge, p. 3:—
NO. 31.—THE THREE BROTHERS
There was, there was not, a lord; and he had three sons. And one was
the eldest son, and he said to his father, ‘We will go somewhere to
seek a livelihood.’
‘Well, go, my sons,’ said their father.
When they went, he baked loaves for each one to put in his wallet. Then
they went a long way, and the youngest had most bread. And that
youngest brother said, ‘Brothers mine, I cannot carry this wallet, so
first we will eat from my wallet, brothers mine.’
When they had eaten, they then went a long way further, and then those
two brothers ate, and gave not to the third. He now had nothing, and
says, ‘Brothers mine, why don’t you give me to eat? You ate up mine,
and now you don’t give me to eat.’
‘If you’ll let one of your eyes be taken out, then we will give you to
eat,’ said the two elder brothers. And then they took out his eye, and
then gave him to eat. When they had eaten, they went a long way
further. And there again those two brothers eat, and the third one
says, ‘Why don’t you give me to eat? Now you’ve taken my eye out, and
yet give me nothing to eat.’
‘If you’ll let your other eye be taken out, then we will give you to
eat.’
And he, the youngest, says, ‘Just do with me what you will.’
Then they took out his eye; then they gave him to eat; then that
eyeless one said, ‘Lead me under the cross; maybe some one will give me
something.’
They led him not under the cross, but under a gallows, and there hung a
dead man. And then thither came three crows, and thus talked one with
another:
‘What’s the news in your country?’ thus they asked one of them. ‘What’s
the news?’
‘In my country there is no water.’
‘And in your country what’s the news?’
‘There’s a dew there, if a blind man rubs his eyes with it, he
forthwith sees.’
‘And in your third country what’s the news?’
‘In my country there is a princess sick.’
And then those three crows went to the lad, and then they asked him
what he was doing under the gallows.
And he said, ‘My brothers brought me here.’
And then those three crows flew away. And that lad feels in the grass
with his hands, then he put it on his eyes, then he moistened his eyes;
forthwith he saw. And then that lad departed to the king. That lad was
then the king’s servant, and went then to a city, and went up above the
city, and saw there such a great rock, and struck that rock as with a
rod; forthwith the water came from the rock. And then that water flowed
into the city, where there was no water, there flowed that water, and
the people were greatly rejoiced. And then he, that lad, cried that the
water will always flow; then were the people greatly rejoiced that that
water was flowing.
And then that boy went to another city, and there was a sick princess.
He went to that king, and asked him, ‘What’s this princess got?’
‘What’s she got! she’s sick.’
‘If you will give me her to wife, then I will help her,’ said that lad
to the king.
‘Do but help her, then we will give you her to wife.’
When he had healed her, then he took her to wife; and then they held
the bridal seven whole years. And then he became young king.
That young king said to his soldiers, ‘Hark ye, soldiers, go after my
two brothers.’
Then those soldiers went after those two brothers, and then they
brought the brothers. Then that young king asks them, ‘How many
brothers had you?’
And they said, ‘We are only two.’
The king says, ‘Hah! were there ever more of you?’
Then those two brothers say, ‘We were three.’
Then, ‘What have you done with the third one?’
‘Done with him! He demanded of us to eat, then we took out his eyes.’
Then, ‘I am he,’ thus did that young king say. ‘Now, what am I to do
with you?’
Those two brothers say, ‘Lead us under that cross.’
He led them under that very cross. When he had led them, there came
again those same three crows. When they had come, again they asked one
another, ‘What is the news in your country?’
‘In my country now is the princess well.’
‘And in your second country what is the news?’
‘In my country now is much water.’
‘And in your third country what is the news?’
‘There now is no such dew as they rubbed the eyes with.’
Then those three crows came to those two lads, and then there those
crows say, ‘We will tear these two lads.’ And they tore and devoured
them. And then those three crows flew away, and flew into the sky.
With its then’s and its that’s, a very imperfect, schoolboyish
version. It does not tell how the hero cured the princess, or that
his two brothers were blinded. Non-Gypsy variants of this
widespread story are Grimm’s ‘The Two Travellers’ (No. 107, ii.
81), Cosquin’s ‘Les Deux Soldats de 1689’ (No. 7, i. 84), Denton’s
Servian story of ‘Justice or Injustice’ (p. 83), Wratislaw’s ‘Right
always remains Right’ (Lusatian, No. 14, p. 92), Hahn’s ‘Gilt Recht
oder Unrecht’ (No. 30, i. 209), and others cited by Clouston (i.
249–261) from Norway, Portugal, the Kabyles, the Kirghiz, Arabia,
Persia, and India. The borrowing the bushel occurs in the ‘Big
Peter and Little Peter’ group of stories (cf. Clouston, i. 120, ii.
241–278; and Campbell’s Santal Folk-tales, pp. 30, 100), of which
we have a Welsh-Gypsy version (No. 68), and which have a certain
affinity with ‘The Rich and the Poor Brother.’ ‘Prince Half-a-Son’
in F. A. Steel’s Indian Wide-awake Stories, p. 290, is plainly
analogous. On p. 277 we have ‘a great rich wedding that lasted
seven years and seven days.’
NO. 32.—THE ENCHANTED CITY
There was a poor lad, and he served seven years, and could not earn
anything. And he went into the world, and went into a city, and spent
the night there, and lay down under a wall, and slept. In that wall
there was a hole, and he awoke, and looked through the hole, and saw a
candle. And he crept through the hole, and went into a palace. There
was a great city, and there was an emperor in the city; and the emperor
was dead, and also the empress was dead. And the emperor had a
daughter, and she commanded the army. And that city was excommunicated,
and the people were turned into stone. So the lad went into the palace
of the emperor, and there in the palace all were turned into stone. And
he marvelled what this might be, that the men were like men, but yet
were all turned into stone.
A cat came, and set food on the table. He sat down to table, and ate.
At night came the cat, and brought him food, and brought him cards, and
said to him, ‘There will come a lord, and will say, “Play at cards,”
and do you play; and he will spit on you, and do you bear it, but look
at the clock. When it strikes ten, then give him a slap.’
Then there came devils as many as the blades of grass; and they beat
him and tormented him till twelve o’clock; and the cocks crowed, and
they fled. He lay down in the bed and slept. In the morning the cat
brought him food, and he ate. At nightfall she again brought him food,
said to him, ‘He will come again for you to play with him, and do you
play till ten o’clock, and give him a slap; and they will come to you
as many as all the blades of grass, and will beat you and torment you,
and do you bear it till twelve o’clock.’
The lord came to him. ‘Hah! let us play cards.’
And they played till ten o’clock. He gave him, the devil, a slap. They
came as many as all the blades of grass, and they beat him and
tormented him till twelve o’clock, and they fled. He lay down in the
bed and slept. In the morning he heard the folks talking in the city.
In the morning the cat brought him food, and brought him royal clothes.
He ate, and put on the clothes, and went into twelve chambers. There
was the emperor’s daughter in her bed. One half was alive, and she
said, ‘You are my emperor, and I am your empress, but come no more to
me.’
Again at night the cat brought him food, and said to him, ‘He will come
again to-night to play cards till ten o’clock. At ten o’clock give him
a slap again, and they will come to you as many as all the blades of
grass, and they will beat you and torment you, but bear it.’
That lord came to him. ‘Hah! let us play cards.’
And they played till ten o’clock. He gave him a slap, and they came as
many as all the blades of grass, and they beat him and tormented him,
and he bore it till twelve o’clock. At twelve o’clock they fled. He lay
down on the bed and slept. In the morning the band began to play, they
held a review. [88] ‘For we have a new emperor.’ The ministers came to
him, and raised him shoulder-high. ‘We have a new emperor.’
And he is in a hurry to go to his empress, and said, ‘Stay here, I will
be back immediately.’
And he went to her. There she stood with her head to the roof, and a
vapour went forth from her mouth; and he opened the door, and she just
made a sign to him with her hand, and fell back on the bed, and became
stone up to the waist. And she called him to her. ‘Leave me; I want you
not. Why did you not wait to come to me, till I should obtain remission
of my sins? Take you my father’s horse and his sword, and take a purse;
as much money as you want, it shall not fail.’
He set out, and journeyed, and departed into another kingdom. There two
emperors were fighting, because one would not give his daughter to the
other’s son. ‘Set yourself to battle with me, since you refuse your
daughter.’ They fought seven years. So he [89] came into that city, and
came to an inn, to a certain Armenian. And there was a great famine;
the soldiers were dying of hunger. So he asked the Armenian, ‘What’s
the news here?’
‘No good. They have been waging a great war seven years here for a
girl, and the soldiers are dying of hunger.’
And he said, ‘Go and call them to me.’
The soldiers came, and he bought bread and brandy, and they drank and
ate; and he said to the Armenian, ‘I, if I choose, I will cut that army
to pieces.’
The Armenian went to the emperor. ‘Emperor, a king’s son is come, and
has boasted that he by himself will cut that army to pieces.’
‘Call him to me.’
‘What is this you’ve been boasting? will you cut that army to pieces?’
‘I will.’
‘If you do, I will give you my daughter, and give you one half of my
kingdom.’
And he, when he went to battle, waved to the right hand, and slew one
half of the army, and he waved to the left hand, and slew the other
half. And he came home, and the emperor gave him his daughter, and made
a marriage.
‘Ask him what strength is his, that he slew so great an army.’ [90]
And he said, ‘My sword slays.’
And she sent back a letter, ‘The sword alone slays; send me another
sword, and I will send this one to you.’
She sent him the sword, and he then said, ‘Set yourself now to battle
with me.’
And he went in hope. But the emperor slew him, and cut him all in
pieces, and put him in the saddle-bags, and placed him on his horse,
and said, ‘Whence thou didst bear him living, bear him dead.’ [91]
The horse carried him home, thither to that lady who was of stone. She
cried, ‘Bring him to me.’ She laid him on a table, and put him all
together; and she sprinkled him with dead water, and he became whole;
and she sprinkled him with living water, and he arose. [92]
‘Go back; take you this purse, you have but to wish and you will find
it full of money. And go to that Armenian, and give him whatever he
wants, and tell him you will turn yourself into a horse. Take a hair
from my tail, [93] and bind it round you like a girdle, and fling a
somersault.’ [94]
So he turned himself into a horse; and the Armenian took him, and led
him into the city. The emperor bought him, and mounted him. He dashed
him to the earth, and he died. The horse took the sword in his mouth,
and went to the Armenian. The Armenian loosened the hair, and he became
a man again. He made the Armenian king; and he departed home to his
mistress, the first one, and wedded her. And he became emperor.
A mere ruin of a folk-tale, but what a fine ruin. The cat reminds
one of Grimm’s No. 106, ‘The Poor Miller’s Boy and the Cat’ (ii.
78, 406), where the cat takes the hero into an enchanted castle,
and gives him to eat and to drink. But Grimm’s No. 92, ‘The King of
the Golden Mountain’ (ii. 28, 390), comes much closer to our Gypsy
story. There the hero has three nights running to let himself be
tortured in a bewitched castle by twelve black men till twelve
o’clock, so to set free an enchanted maiden. Grimm’s No. 121, ‘The
King’s Son who feared Nothing’ (ii. 134, 419), should also be
compared, and our Welsh-Gypsy story, ‘Ashypelt’ (No. 57). The
latter half of ‘The Enchanted City’ is identical with Krauss’s No.
47 (i. 224), a Slovenian story. For the magic sword cf. infra, p.
160; Clouston’s notes to Lane’s Continuation of Chaucer’s ‘Squire’s
Tale’ (Chaucer Soc. 1888, pp. 372–381); Wratislaw’s Polish story,
‘The Spirit of a buried Man,’ No. 18, p. 122; and F. A. Steel’s
Wide-awake Stories, p. 62. Playing cards with the devil or a
monster occurs also in our No. 63 (p. 256), and in folk-tales from
Russia, Germany, French Flanders, Lorraine, and Brittany (cf.
Ralston, p. 375; Grimm, No. 4, i. 16, 346; and Cosquin, i. 28; ii.
254, 259, 260).
NO. 33.—THE JEALOUS HUSBAND
There was a merchant, great and wealthy, and he had a beautiful wife;
he did not let her go out. And he went in a ship on the Danube after
merchandise with another merchant. And they were coming home. They
hauled their ships to the bank, and moored them to the bank, to pass
the night. They fell into discourse. Said one, ‘Has your wife got a
lover at home?’
And he said, ‘My wife has not got a lover.’
‘Come, what will you give me if I become her lover?’
‘If you do, I will give you my estate, and my merchandise too, ship and
all.’
‘How will you know that I am her lover?’
‘If you tell me her birth-mark, and if you take the gold ring from her
finger. But my wife will be like to thrash you, if you but hint such a
thing to her. I left a maid with her, to see that my wife does not go
out of doors.’
‘I shall succeed, though.’
‘Go home and try; I’ll bring your ship.’
Home he went. What will he do? for he cannot come near her. He found an
old wife. ‘Old wife, what am I to do to get the ring from the lady?’
‘What will you give me if I contrive that you get it?’
‘I will give you a hundred florins.’
‘Get a big chest made, and a window in it, and get into it, and make a
bolt inside, and I will carry you to her.’
She carried him in the chest under the wall of her house, and went to
the lady. ‘I beg you, lady, to take in my box of clothes, so that they
may not be stolen.’
‘Carry it into the hall.’
She called the maid, and the maid helped her to carry him into the
hall.
‘I beg you, lady, to let me take it right into your house. I will come
in the morning to fetch it.’
‘Well, put it in a corner.’
The old woman went off home. The lady at night took a bath, and laid
the ring on the table, and washed herself. And through the little
window he perceived a mole under her right breast. The lady slept all
night in her bed, and forgot the ring on the table, and put out the
candle. And he let himself out, took the ring off the table, and got
back into the chest, shut himself in. The old woman came next morning
at daybreak, and carried her chest outside. He opened it, and came out,
and took the chest, and departed. He went to meet the husband, and
found him on the way.
‘Hast thou lain with my lady?’
‘I have.’
‘What is her birth-mark?’
‘She has a mole under her right breast. If you do not believe me, here
is the ring as well.’
‘It’s all right; take the ship and everything in it, and come home, and
I will give you also the estate.’
He went home, and said never a word to the lady; and he made a little
boat, and put her in it, and let it go on the Danube. ‘Since you have
done this, away you go on the Danube.’ He gave his whole estate, and
became poor, and carried water for the Jews.
A whole year she floated on the Danube; the year went like a day. An
old man caught her, and drew her to shore, and opened the boat, and
took her out, and brought her to his house. She abode with him three
years, and spun with her spindle, and made some money. And she bought
herself splendid man’s clothes, and dressed herself, and cut her hair
short, and went back to her husband. She went and passed the night
beneath a lime-tree, and slept under the lime-tree. In that city the
emperor was blind. She saw a dream: in the lime-tree was a hole, and in
the hole was water; and if the emperor will anoint himself with that
water he will see. She arose in the morning, and searched around, and
found the hole. And she had a little pail, and she drew water in the
pail, and put it in her pocket, and went into that city to an inn, and
drank three kreutzers’ worth of brandy. And she asked the Jew, ‘What’s
the news with you?’
‘Our emperor is blind, and he will give his kingdom to him who shall
make him see.’
‘I will do so.’
The Jew went to the emperor, and the emperor said to him, ‘Hah! go and
bring him to me.’
They brought him to the emperor. ‘Will you make me see? then I will
give you my daughter.’
She took water, and anointed his eyes, and he saw. The emperor set his
crown on her head. ‘Do you be emperor. I want nothing but to stay
beside you.’ The emperor clad her royally, called his army, beat the
drum. ‘For there’s a new emperor.’
And she saw her husband carrying water for the Jews. ‘Come hither. Have
you always been poor?’
‘No, I once was not poor, I was rich. I had an estate, and I was a
great merchant.’
‘Then how did you lose your estate?’
‘I lost it over a wager. My wife played the wanton with another, and I
gave up the estate, and sent her adrift on the Danube.’
Straightway she sent for the other, and they brought him. ‘How did you
come by this man’s estate?’
‘Over a wager.’
‘What was your wager?’
‘That I would lie with her.’
‘Then you did so?’
‘I did.’
‘And, pray, what were her birth-marks?’
‘Under her right breast she had a mole.’
‘Would you know that mole again?’
‘I would.’
Then she drew out her breast. ‘Did you lie with me?’
‘I did not.’
‘Then why those falsehoods? Here, take him, and cut him all to pieces.’
And she looked earnestly on her husband. ‘You, why did you not ask me
at the time?’
‘I was a fool, and I was angry.’
‘Here, take him outside, and give him five-and-twenty, to teach him
wisdom.’
She threw the robes off her, and put them on him. ‘Do you be emperor,
and I empress.’
Were I a painter, I would paint a picture—the Forest of Arden, a
Gypsy encampment, with tents, dogs, donkeys, and children, a Gypsy
story-teller, and Shakespeare. But one knows, of course, that
Shakespeare derived the material of his Cymbeline from the novel of
Boccaccio (Dec. ii. 9), immediately in all likelihood, and not
through the second story in Westward for Smelts. Granted he did,
the question arises next, whence did Boccaccio get his material?
Did he invent it, and, if so, is this Gypsy story derived from
Boccaccio, and not it only, but Campbell’s West Highland tale of
‘The Chest’ (No. 18), Larminie’s ‘Servant of Poverty’ (West Irish
Folk-tales, pp. 115–129), and at least two other folk-tales cited
by Köhler—one in Wolf’s German Hausmärchen, p. 355, and one from
Roumania in Ausland, 1856, p. 1053? Campbell’s story at any rate
cannot have come from Boccaccio, containing, as it does, the
essence, not merely of Cymbeline, but also of The Merchant of
Venice. For its hero borrows £50 on condition that if he does not
repay it within a year and a day he is to lose a strip of skin cut
from his head to his foot; [95] ‘Yes,’ says the heroine, ‘but in
cutting it, not one drop of blood must be shed.’ To go fully into
this question would occupy pages and pages; I must content myself
with referring to The Remarks of M. Karl Simrock on the Plots of
Shakespeare’s Plays, with notes by J. O. Halliwell (Shakespeare
Soc. 1850), pp. 64–75 and 45–63, and to Reinhold Köhler on
Campbell’s tale in Orient und Occident, ii. 1864, pp. 313–316. But
it is just worth pointing out that Gypsies may have had a
considerable influence on the European drama. The Scottish Gypsies
who, as recorded in the Introduction, used yearly to gather in the
stanks of Roslin during the last half of the sixteenth century,
acted there ‘severall plays.’ We have not the dimmest notion what
those plays may have been; still, this would be quite an early item
in any history of the stage in Scotland. Sir William Ouseley in his
Travels in Persia (1823), iii. 400–405, gives a long description of
a Persian puppet-play, curiously like our own Punch and Judy: ‘the
managers of these shows, and the musicians who attended them, were
said to be of the Karachi or Gypsy tribe.’ I myself at Göttingen,
in 1873, several times came across a family of German Gypsies, very
full-blooded ones, who were marionette-showers; like a dull dog, I
never went to see their shows. Gorger (Rómani gaújo, Gentile or
man) is current theatrical slang for a manager; and Mayhew’s London
Labour and the London Poor (1851) shows that the slang of our
English show-folk contains a good many Rómani words. The very
Pandean pipes are suggestive of importation from South-east Europe.
Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister offers something to the purpose, so also
do the Bunjara players in Mrs. F. A. Steel’s On the Face of the
Waters (1896); and my own In Gypsy Tents, pp. 295–6, gives a glance
at an English travelling theatre whose performers spoke fluent
Rómani.
NO. 34.—MADE OVER TO THE DEVIL
There was a rich man, and he went into the forest, and fell into a bog
with his carriage. And his wife brought forth a son, and he knew it
not. And the Devil came forth, and said, ‘What will you give me if I
pull you out?’
‘I will give you what you want.’
‘Give me what you have at home.’
‘I have horses, oxen.’
‘Give me that which you have not seen.’
‘I will.’
‘Make a covenant with me.’
He made a covenant with him, and the Devil pulled him out of the mud,
and the man went home. By the time he got home he had forgotten the
covenant.
The boy was twenty years old. ‘Make me a cake, mother, for I’m off to
the place my father pledged me to.’ And he went far over the mountains,
and came to the Devil’s house. There was an old woman in the house, and
a daughter of the Devil’s, and she asked him, ‘Whither art going, lad?’
‘I have come to the lord here, to serve.’
And the girl saw him, and he pleased her. ‘I may tell you that he is my
father. My father will turn himself into a horse, and will tell you to
mount him and traverse the world. And do you make yourself an iron club
and an iron curry-comb, and hit him with the club, for he will not
stoop, and get on his back, and as you go keep hitting him on the
head.’
He traversed the world, and came home, put him in the stable, and went
to the maiden.
‘My father didn’t fling you?’
‘No, for I kept hitting him on the head.’
The Devil called him, and took a jar of poppy-seed, and poured it out
on the grass, and told him to gather it all up, and fill the jar, for,
‘If you don’t, I will cut off your head.’
He went to the maiden, and wept.
‘What are you weeping for?’
‘Your father has told me to fill the jar with poppy-seed; and if I
don’t, he will cut off my head.’
She said, ‘Fear not.’ She went outside and gave a whistle, and the mice
came as many as all the blades of grass and the leaves.
And they asked, ‘What do you want, mistress?’
‘Gather the poppy-seed and fill the jar.’
And the mice came and picked up the grains of poppy-seed one by one,
and filled the jar.
The Devil saw it. ‘You’re a clever chap. Here is one more task for you:
drain the marsh, and plough it, and sow it, and to-morrow bring me
roasted maize. And if you do not, I shall cut your head off.’
He went to the maiden and wept. ‘Your father has told me to drain the
marsh, and give him roasted maize to-morrow.’
‘Fear not.’
She went outside, and took the fiery whip. And she struck the marsh
once, and it was dried up; a second time she struck, and it was
ploughed; the third time she struck, it was sowed; the fourth time she
struck, and the maize was roasted; and in the morning he gave him
roasted maize.
She said to him, ‘We are three maidens. He will make us all alike, will
call you to guess which is the eldest, which is the middle one, and
which the youngest; and you will not be able to guess, for we shall be
all just alike. I shall be at the top, and notice my feet, for I shall
keep tapping one foot on the other; the middle one will be in the
middle, and the eldest fronting you, and so you will know.’
The Devil said to him, ‘One more task I will give you. Fell the whole
forest, and stack it by to-morrow.’
He went to the maiden, and the maiden asked him, ‘Have you a father and
mother?’
‘I have.’
‘Ah! let us fly, for my father will kill you. Take the whetstone, and
take a comb; I have a towel.’
They set out and fled. The Devil arose, saw that the forest is not
felled. ‘Go and call him to me.’
Ho, ho! there is neither the lad nor the maiden.
‘Hah! go after them.’
They went, and the two saw them coming after them. And she said to him,
‘I will make myself a field of wheat, and do you make yourself to be
looking at the wheat, and they will ask you, “Didn’t a maiden and a lad
pass by?” “Bah! they passed when I was sowing the wheat.”’
‘Go back, for we shall not catch them.’
They went back. ‘We did not catch them.’
‘On the road did not you find anything?’
‘We found a field of wheat and a peasant.’
‘Go back, for the field of wheat was she, and he was the peasant.’
They saw them again. She said to the lad, ‘I will turn a somersault and
make myself an old church, and do you turn a somersault and make
yourself an old monk, and they will ask you, “Didn’t a maiden and a lad
pass by?” “They passed just as I began the church.”’
‘Ah! go back, for we shall never catch them. When he was beginning the
church! It is old now.’
‘Did you not find anything on the road?’
‘We found a church and a monk.’
‘The church was she, and he was the monk. I will go myself.’
They saw him. ‘Now my father is coming; we shall not escape. Fling the
comb.’
He flung the comb, and it became a forest from earth to sky. Whilst he
was gnawing away the forest, they got a long way ahead. He was catching
them up; she cried, ‘Fling the whetstone.’
He flung the whetstone, and it became a rock of stone from earth even
to heaven. Whilst he, the Devil, was making a hole in the rock, they
got a long way ahead. Again he is catching them up. ‘Father is catching
us up.’ She flung the towel, and it became a great water and a mill.
They halted on the bank.
And he cried, ‘Harlot, how did you cross the water?’
‘Fasten the millstone to your neck, and jump into the water.’
He fastened the millstone to his neck, and jumped into the water, and
was choked.
She said, ‘Fear not, for my father is choked.’
He went to his father with the maiden. His father rejoiced; but the
maiden said to the lad, ‘I will go to expiate my father’s sins, for I
choked him. I go for three years.’
She took her ring, and broke it in half, and gave one half to him.
‘Keep that, and do not lose it.’ She departed for three years.
He forgot her, and made preparations to marry. He was holding his
wedding. She came, and he knew her not.
‘Drink a glass of brandy.’
She drank out of his glass, and flung the half of the ring into the
glass, and gave it to him. When he drank, he got it into his mouth, and
he took it in his hand and looked at it, and he took his half and
fitted the two together. ‘Hah! this is my wife; this one saved me from
death.’
And he quashed that marriage, and took his first wife and lived with
her.
There are several obvious lacunæ in this story, one that the
poppy-seed must have been mixed with some other seed, else the task
would have been far too easy. The Polish-Gypsy story of ‘The Witch’
(No. 50), corresponds pretty closely; and for the roasted maize
task compare the Roumanian-Gypsy story of ‘The Snake who became the
King’s Son-in-law’ (No. 7). For a multitude of non-Gypsy variants
see Ralston’s ‘The Water-King and Vasilissa the Wise’ (pp.
120–133), especially the Indian story at the end. Cf. also Cosquin,
ii. 9, and i. 103, 106, 139, 141. The ring episode recurs in the
Bohemian-Gypsy story, ‘The Three Dragons’ (No. 44, p. 154). The
fiery whip in the Gypsy story is, to the best of my knowledge,
unique.
NO. 35.—THE LYING STORY
Before I was born, my mother had a fancy for roast starlings. And there
was no one to go, so I went alone to the forest. And I found roast
starlings in the hollow of a tree. I put in my hand, and could not draw
it out. I took and got right in, and the hole closed up. I set out and
went to my godfather to borrow the axe.
My godfather said, ‘The servant with the axe is not at home, but,’ said
my godfather, ‘I will give you the hatchet, and the hatchet is
expecting little hatchets.’
‘Never fear, godfather.’
And he gave me the hatchet, and I went and cut my way out of the tree,
and I flung down the hatchet. Whilst it was falling a bird built its
nest in the handle, and laid eggs, and hatched them, and brought forth
young ones; and when the hatchet had fallen down, it gave birth to
twelve little hatchets. And I put them in my wallet, and carried them
to my godfather. My godfather rejoiced. He gave me one of the hatchets,
and I stuck it in my belt at my back, and went home. I was thirsty and
went to the well. The well was deep. I cut off my brainpan, and drank
water out of it. I laid my brainpan by the well, and went home. And I
felt something biting me on the head; and when I put up my hand to my
head there came forth worms. I returned to my brainpan, and a wild-duck
had laid eggs in my brainpan, and hatched them, and brought forth
ducklings. And I took the hatchet, and flung it, and killed the
wild-duck, but the ducklings flew away. Behind the well was a fire, and
the hatchet fell into the fire. I hunted for the hatchet, and found the
handle, but the blade of the hatchet was burnt. And I took the handle,
and stuck it in my belt at my back, and went home, and found our mare,
and got up on her. And the handle cut the mare in half, and I went
riding on two of her legs, and the two hind ones were eating grass. And
I went back, and cut a willow withy, and trimmed it, and sewed the mare
together. Out of her grew a willow-tree up to heaven. And I remembered
that God is owing me a treeful of eggs and a pailful of sour milk. And
I climbed up the willow, and went to God, and went to God’s
thrashing-floor. There twelve men were thrashing oats.
‘Where are you going to, man?’
‘I am going to God.’
‘Don’t go; God isn’t at home.’
And the smiths felled the willow, and I took an oat-straw and made a
rope, and let myself down. And the rope was too short, and I kept
cutting off above, and tying on below; then I jumped down, and came to
the other world. I went home, and got a spade, and dug myself out [of
the other, or nether world], and went home, and gave the starlings to
my mother, and she ate, and was safely delivered of me, and I am living
in the world.
One is reminded of Münchausen and of several lying tales in Grimm,
e.g. Nos. 112, 138, 158, and 159. Cf. especially his notes at ii.
413. The very first Gypsy folk-tale I ever took down, twenty years
ago now, from one of the Boswells, was the following lying tale:—
NO. 36.—HAPPY BOZ’LL
Wonst upon a time there was a Romano, and his name was Happy Boz’ll,
and he had a German-silver grinding-barrow, and he used to put his wife
and his child on the top, and he used to go that quick along the road
he’d beat all the coaches. Then he thought this grinding-barrow was too
heavy and clumsy to take about, and he cut it up and made tent-rods of
it. And then his donkey got away, and he didn’t know where it was gone
to; and one day he was going by the tent, and he said to himself,
‘Bless my soul, wherever’s that donkey got to?’ And there was a tree
close by, and the donkey shouted out and said, ‘I’m here, my Happy,
getting you a bit o’ stick to make a fire.’ Well, the donkey came down
with a lot of sticks, and he had been up the tree a week, getting
firewood. Well then, Happy had a dog, and he went out one day, the dog
one side the hedge, and him the other. And then he saw two hares. The
dog ran after the two; and as he was going across the field, he cut
himself right through with a scythe; and then one half ran after one
hare, and the other after the other. Then the two halves of the dog
catched the two hares; and then the dog smacked together again; and he
said, ‘Well, I’ve got ’em, my Happy’; and then the dog died. And Happy
had a hole in the knee of his breeches, and he cut a piece of the dog’s
skin, after it was dead, and sewed it in the knee of his breeches. And
that day twelve months his breeches-knee burst open, and barked at him.
And so that’s the end of Happy Boz’ll.
Also Münchausen-like; but I believe it was largely this story,
which I printed on p. 160 of my In Gypsy Tents, that led the great
Lazarus Petulengro to remark once to Mr. Sampson, ‘Isn’t it
wonderful, sir, that a real gentleman could have wrote such a
thing—nothing but low language and povertiness, and not a word of
grammar or high-learned talk in it from beginning to end.’
We have a third Gypsy lying story, a Welsh-Gypsy one. Matthew
Wood’s father had, like a good many Gypsies, a contempt for
folk-tales, and, when called on for his turn, he always gave this,
the very shortest one:—‘There were a naked man and a blind man and
a lame man. The blind man saw a hare, and the lame man ran and
caught it, and the naked man put it in his pocket.’ Cf. Grimm’s No.
159, ‘The Ditmarsch Tale of Wonders’ (ii. 230, 452). Indian lying
stories occur in Maive Stokes’s Indian Fairy Tales, Nos. 4, 8, 17.