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=THE LAUGHING
PRINCE=
A book of Jugoslav Fairy Tales
and Folk Tales.
RETOLD BY
PARKER FILLMORE
With illustrations and decorations by Jay Van Everen.
When Mr. Fillmore started his study of the folk lore of Eastern Europe,
he tapped a mine of treasure for children. The gorgeousness of the
imagery in the stories, their rollicking humor, the adventures, were
entirely new to child and adult readers. The stories in this third
volume reflect the folk lore of many races, for the country now known as
Jugoslavia has been one of the great highways and battlefields of the
world where Orient and Occident, Greek and Roman, Turk and Slav have
fought out their national aspirations. Basically, it has the Slavic
exuberance of imagination and humor, but it has also absorbed much of
the spirit and tales of the Near and Far East.
_Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc._
757 THIRD AVENUE, NEW YORK 17, N. Y.
80-120
_BY PARKER FILLMORE_
CZECHOSLOVAK FAIRY TALES
THE SHOEMAKER'S APRON
_Illustrated by Jan Matulka_
THE LAUGHING PRINCE
A Book of Jugoslav Fairy Tales and Folk Tales
BY
PARKER FILLMORE
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS AND DECORATIONS
BY
JAY VAN EVEREN
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
HARCOURT, BRACE & WORLD, INC.
COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY
PARKER FILLMORE
RENEWED BY LOUISE FILLMORE
0.1.68
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO BUTTON
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
NOTE
In calling this _A Book of Jugoslav Fairy Tales and Folk Tales_ I have
used the word Jugoslav in its literal sense of Southern Slav. The
Bulgars are just as truly Southern Slavs as the Serbs or Croats or any
other of the Slav peoples now included within the state of Jugoslavia.
Moreover in this case it would be particularly difficult to make the
literary boundaries conform strictly to the political boundaries since
much the same stories and folk tales are current among all these Slav
peoples of the Balkan Peninsula. The special student taking the variants
of the same story might discover special differences that would mark
each variant as the product of some one locality. The work of such a
student would have philological and ethnological value but not a very
strong appeal to the general reader. My appeal is first of all to the
general reader--to the child who loves fairy tales and to the adult who
loves them. I hope they will both find these stories entertaining and
amusing quite aside from any interest in their source.
Yet these tales as presented do give the reader a true idea of the
amazing vigor and the artistic inventiveness of the Jugoslav
imagination, and also of the various influences, Oriental and Northern
as well as Slavic, which have made that imagination what it is to-day.
Here are gay picaresque tales of adventure--how they go on and on and
on!--charming little stories of sentiment, a few folk tales of stark
simplicity and grim humor, one story showing a superficial Turkish
influence, and one spiritual allegory as deep and moving as anything in
the Russian.
The renderings in every case are my own and are not in any sense
translations. I have taken the old stories and retold them in a new
language. To do them justice in this new language I have found it
necessary to present them with a new selection of detail and with an
occasional shifting of emphasis. I do not mean by this that I have
invented detail in any unwarranted fashion. I haven't had to for any
folk tale, however bald, contains all sorts of things by implication.
The true story teller, it seems to me, is he who is able to grasp these
implications and turn them to his own use.
I must confess that the setting in which I have placed the famous old
Serbian nonsense story, _In my young days when I was an old, old man_,
is my own invention. The nonsense story needs a setting and as it
chanced I had one ready as I have long wanted to tell the world what was
back of the determination of that princess who refused to eat until some
one had made her laugh.
So far as I know most of these stories are not familiar to English
readers--certainly not in this form. Madame Mijatovich uses one of them
in her _Serbian Fairy Tales_, but I make no apology for offering a
sprightlier version. Nor do I apologize for presenting any stories that
may have been included somewhere among the indifferent translations to
which Andrew Lang lent his name.
I am of course deeply indebted to the various people who told me these
stories in the first place and to many scholarly folklorists, Jugoslav,
Czechoslovak, Bulgarian, German, and English whose books and reports I
have studied.
P. F.
_Decoration Day, 1921._
[Illustration]
CONTENTS
PAGE
THE LAUGHING PRINCE: The Story of the Boy Who
Could Talk Nonsense 1
BEAUTY AND THE HORNS: The Story of an Enchanted
Maiden 27
THE PIGEON'S BRIDE: The Story of a Princess Who
Kissed and Told 51
THE LITTLE LAME FOX: The Story of the Youngest
Brother Who Found the Magic Grape-Vine and Married
the Golden Maiden 73
THE ENCHANTED PEAFOWL: The Story of the Golden
Apples, the Wicked Dragon, and the Magic Horse 107
THE DRAGON'S STRENGTH: The Story of the Youngest
Prince Who Killed the Sparrow 139
THE LITTLE SINGING FROG: The Story of a Girl
Whose Parents were Ashamed of Her 161
THE NIGHTINGALE IN THE MOSQUE: The Story of
the Sultan's Youngest Son and the Princess Flower o' the
World 171
THE GIRL IN THE CHEST: The Story of the Third
Sister Who was Brave and Good 201
THE WONDERFUL HAIR: The Story of a Poor Man
Who Dreamed of an Angel 219
THE BEST WISH: The Story of Three Brothers and an
Angel 229
THE VILAS' SPRING: The Story of the Brother Who
Knew that Good was Stronger than Evil 241
LORD AND MASTER: The Story of the Man Who Understood
the Language of the Animals 253
THE SILVER TRACKS: The Story of the Poor Man Who
Befriended a Beggar 267
THE LAUGHING PRINCE
[Illustration]
_The Story of the Boy Who Could Talk Nonsense_
THE LAUGHING PRINCE
There was once a farmer who had three sons and one little daughter. The
eldest son was a studious boy who learned so much out of books that the
farmer said:
"We must send Mihailo to school and make a priest of him."
The second boy was a trader. Whatever you had he would get it from you
by offering you something else for it. And always what he gave you was
worth less than what you gave him.
"Jakov will make a fine peddler," the farmer said. "He's industrious and
sharp and some day he will probably be a rich man."
But Stefan, the farmer's youngest son, had no special talent and because
he didn't spend all his time with his nose in a book and because he
never made the best of a bargain his brothers scorned him. Militza, his
little sister, loved him dearly for he was kind and jolly and in the
evening he was always ready to tell her stories and play with her. But
the farmer, of course, listened to the older brothers.
"I don't know about poor Stefan," he used to say. "He's a good boy but
he talks nonsense. I suppose he'll have to stay on the farm and work."
Now the truth is the farm was a fine place for Stefan for he was strong
and lusty and he liked to plow and harvest and he had a wonderful way
with the animals. He talked to them as if they were human beings and the
horses all whinnied when he came near, and the cows rubbed their soft
noses against his shoulder, and as for the pigs--they loved him so much
that whenever they saw him they used to run squealing between his legs.
"Stefan is nothing but a farmer!" Mihailo used to say as though being a
farmer was something to be ashamed of.
And Jakov said:
"If the village people could see the pigs following him about, how
they'd laugh at him! I hope when I go to the village to live he won't be
visiting me all the time!"
Another thing the older brothers couldn't understand about Stefan was
why he was always laughing and joking. He did the work of two men but
whether he was working or resting you could always hear him cracking his
merry jokes and laughing his jolly laugh.
"I think he's foolish!" Mihailo said.
Jakov hoped that the village people wouldn't hear about his carryings
on.
"They'd laugh at him," he said, "and they'd laugh at us, too, because
we're his brothers."
But Stefan didn't care. The more they frowned at him, the louder he
laughed, and in spite of their dark looks he kept on cracking his merry
jokes and talking nonsense. And every evening after supper his little
sister, Militza, clapped her hands and cried:
"Now, Stefan, tell me a story! Tell me a story!"
"Father," Mihailo would say, "you ought to make him keep quiet! He's
foolish and all he does is fill Militza's head with nonsense!"
This always made Militza very indignant and she would stamp her little
foot and say:
"He isn't foolish! He knows more than any one! And he can do more things
than any one else and he's the handsomest brother in the world!"
You see Militza loved Stefan dearly and when you love a person of course
you think that person is wonderful. But the father supposed that Mihailo
must be right for Mihailo studied in books. So he shook his head and
sighed every time he thought of Stefan.
Now the kingdom in which the three brothers lived was ruled over by a
great Tsar who had an only daughter. In disappointment that he had no
son, the Tsar was having his daughter brought up as though she were a
boy. He sent all over the world for tutors and teachers and had the poor
girl taught statecraft and law and philosophy and all the other things
that the heir to the throne ought to know.
The Princess because she was an obedient girl and because she loved her
father tried to spend all her time in study. But the dry old scholars
whom the Tsar employed as teachers were not amusing companions for a
young girl and the first lady-in-waiting who was in constant attendance
was scarcely any better for she, too, was old and thin and very prim.
If the poor little Princess between her geography lesson and her
arithmetic lesson would peep for a moment into a mirror, the first
lady-in-waiting would tap her arm reprovingly and say:
"My dear, vanity is not becoming in a princess!"
One day the little Princess lost her temper and answered sharply:
"But I'm a girl even if I am a princess and I love to look in mirrors
and I love to make myself pretty and I'd love to go to a ball every
night of my life and dance with handsome young men!"
"You talk like the daughter of a farmer!" the first lady-in-waiting
said.
Then the Princess, because she lost her temper still further, said
something she should not have said.
"I wish I were the daughter of a farmer!" she declared. "Then I could
wear pretty ribbons and go dancing and the boys would come courting me!
As it is I have to spend all my time with funny old men and silly old
women!"
Now even if her tutors and teachers were funny looking old men, even if
the first lady-in-waiting was a silly old woman, the Princess should not
have said so. It hurt the feelings of the first lady-in-waiting and made
her angry and she ran off to the Tsar at once and complained most
bitterly.
"Is this my reward after all my years of loving service to your
daughter?" she asked. "It is true that I've grown old and thin looking
after her manners and now she calls me a silly old woman! And all the
learned wise men and scholars that you have gathered from the far
corners of the earth--she points her finger at them and calls them funny
old men!"
The fact is they were funny looking, most of them, but yet the first
lady-in-waiting was right: the Princess should not have said so.
"And think of her ingratitude to yourself, O Tsar!" the first
lady-in-waiting continued. "You plan to make her the heir to your throne
and yet she says she wishes she were a farmer's daughter so that she
could deck herself out in ribbons and have the boys come courting her! A
nice thing for a princess to say!"
The Tsar when he heard this fell into an awful rage. (The truth is
whatever temper the Princess had she inherited direct from her father.)
"Wow! Wow!" he roared, just that way. "Send the Princess to me at once.
I'll soon have her singing another tune!"
So the first lady-in-waiting sent the Princess to her father and as soon
as he saw her he began roaring again and saying:
"Wow! Wow! What do you mean--funny old men and silly old women?"
Now whenever the Tsar began roaring and saying, "Wow! Wow!" the Princess
always stiffened, and instead of being the sweet and obedient daughter
she usually was she became obstinate. Her pretty eyes would flash and
her soft pretty face would harden and people would whisper: "Mercy on
us, how much she looks like her father!"
"That's just what I mean!" the Princess said. "They're a lot of funny
old men and silly old women and I'm tired of them! I want to be amused!
I want to laugh!"
"Wow! Wow! Wow!" roared the Tsar. "A fine princess you are! Go straight
back to the schoolroom and behave yourself!"
So the little Princess marched out of the throne room holding her head
very high and looking so much like the Tsar that the first
lady-in-waiting was positively frightened.
The Princess went back to the schoolroom but she did not behave herself.
She was really very naughty. When the poor man who knew more than
anybody in the world about the influence of the stars upon the destinies
of nations came to give her a lesson, she threw his book out the window.
When the superannuated old general who was teaching her military
manoeuvers offered her a diagram on which the enemy was represented by
a series of black dots and our soldiers by a series of red dots, she
took the paper and tore it in two. And worst of all when the old scholar
who was teaching her Turkish--for a princess must be able to speak all
languages--dropped his horn spectacles on the floor, she deliberately
stepped on them and broke them.
When the Tsar heard all these things he just _wow-wowed_ something
terrible.
"Lock that young woman in her chamber!" he ordered. "Feed her on bread
and water until she's ready to apologize!"
But the Princess, far from being frightened by this treatment, calmly
announced:
"I won't eat even your old bread and water until you send me some one
who will make me laugh!"
Now this frightened the Tsar because he knew how obstinate the Princess
could be on occasions. (He ought to know, too, for the Princess had that
streak of obstinacy direct from himself.)
"This will never do!" he said.
He hurried to the Princess's chamber. He found her in bed with her
pretty hair spread out on the pillow like a golden fan.
"My dear," the Tsar said, "I was joking. You don't have to eat only
bread and water. You may have anything you want."
"Thank you," the Princess said, "but I'll never eat another bite of
anything until you send me some one who will make me laugh. I'm tired of
living in this gloomy old castle with a lot of old men and old women who
do nothing but instruct me and with a father who always loses his
temper and says, 'Wow! Wow!'"
"But it's a beautiful castle!" the poor Tsar said. "And I'm sure we're
all doing our very best to educate you!"
"But I want to be amused as well as educated!" the little Princess said.
And then, because she felt she was going to cry, she turned her face to
the wall and wouldn't say another word.
What was the Tsar to do? He called together his councilors and asked
them how was the Princess to be made to laugh. The councilors were wise
about state matters but not one of them could suggest a means of amusing
the Princess. The Master of Ceremonies did indeed begin to say something
about a nice young man but instantly the Tsar roared out such a
wrathful, "Wow! Wow!" that the Master of Ceremonies coughed and
pretended he hadn't spoken.
Then the Tsar called together the scholars and the teachers and the
first lady-in-waiting. He glared at them savagely and roared:
"Wow! Wow! A nice lot you are! I put you in charge of my daughter and
not one of you has sense enough to know that the poor child needs a
little amusement! I have a good mind to have you all thrown into the
dungeon!"
"But, Your Majesty," quavered one poor old scholar, "I was not employed
as a buffoon but as a teacher of astrology!"
"And I," another said, "as a teacher of languages!"
"And I as a teacher of philosophy!"
"Silence!" roared the Tsar. "Between you all you have about killed my
poor child! Now I ask you: With all your learning doesn't one of you
know how to make a young girl laugh?"
Apparently not one of them did, for no one answered.
"Not even you?" the Tsar said, looking at the first lady-in-waiting.
"When you called me to Court," the first lady-in-waiting answered,
drawing herself up in a most refined manner, "you said you wished me to
teach your daughter etiquette. As you said nothing about amusement,
quite naturally I confined myself to the subject of behavior. If I do
say it myself, no one has ever been more devoted to duty than I. I am
constantly saying to her: 'That isn't the way a princess should act!' In
fact for years there has hardly been a moment in the day when I haven't
corrected her for something!"
"Poor child!" groaned the Tsar. "No wonder she wants a change! Oh, what
fools you all are in spite of your learning! Don't you know that a young
girl is a young girl even if she is a Princess!"
Well, the scholars weren't any more help to the Tsar than the
councilors, and finally in desperation he sent heralds through the land
to announce that to any one who could make the Princess laugh he would
give three bags of gold.
Three bags of gold don't grow on the bushes every day and instantly all
the youths and men and old men who had stories that their sweethearts
and their wives and their daughters laughed at hurried to the castle.
One by one they were admitted to the Princess's chamber. They entered
hopefully but when they saw the Tsar sitting at one side of the door
muttering, "Wow! Wow!" in his beard, and the old first lady-in-waiting
at the other side of the door watching them scornfully, and the Princess
herself in bed with her lovely hair spread out like a golden fan on the
pillow, they forgot their funny stories and hemmed and hawed and
stammered and had finally, one after another, to be turned out in
disgrace.
One day went by and two and three and still the Princess refused to eat.
In despair the Tsar sent out his heralds again. This time he said that
to any one who would make the Princess laugh he would give the
Princess's hand in marriage and make him joint heir to the kingdom.
"I had expected to wed her to the son of some great Tsar," he sighed,
"but I'd rather marry her to a farmer than see her die of starvation!"
The heralds rode far and wide until every one, even the people on the
most distant farms, had heard of the Tsar's offer.
"I won't try again," said Mihailo, the oldest son of the farmer I've
already told you about. "When I went there the day before yesterday I
began telling her a funny story out of my Latin book but instead of
laughing she said: 'Oh, send him away!' So now she'll have to starve to
death for all of me!"
"Me, too!" said Jakov, the second son. "When I tried to tell her that
funny story of how I traded the moldy oats for the old widow's fat pig,
instead of laughing she looked me straight in the face and said:
'Cheat!'"
"Stefan ought to go," Mihailo suggested. "Maybe she'd laugh at him!
Everybody else does!"
He spoke sneeringly but Stefan only smiled.
"Who knows? Perhaps I will go. If I do make her laugh then, O my
brothers, the laugh will be on you for I shall become Tsar and you two
will be known as my two poor brothers. Ho! Ho! Ho! What a joke that
would be!"
Stefan laughed loud and heartily and his little sister joined him, but
his brothers looked at him sourly.
"He grows more foolish all the time!" they told each other.
When they were gone to bed, Militza slipped over to Stefan and whispered
in his ear:
"Brother, you must go to the Princess. Tell her the story that begins:
_In my young days when I was an old, old man_.... I think she'll just
have to laugh, and if she laughs then she can eat and she must be very
hungry by this time."
At first Stefan said no, he wouldn't go, but Militza insisted and
finally, to please her, he said he would.
So early the next morning he dressed himself in his fine Sunday shirt
with its blue and red embroidery. He put on his bright red Sunday sash
and his long shiny boots. Then he mounted his horse and before his
brothers were awake rode off to the Tsar's castle.
There he awaited his turn to be admitted to the Princess's chamber. When
he came in he was so young and healthy and vigorous that he seemed to
bring with him a little of the freshness of outdoors. The first
lady-in-waiting looked at him askance for without doubt he was a farmer
lad and his table manners probably were not good. Well, he was a farmer
lad and for that reason he didn't know that she was first
lady-in-waiting. He glanced at her once and thought: "What an ugly old
woman!" and thereafter he didn't think of her at all. He glanced
likewise at the Tsar and the Tsar reminded him of a bull of his own. He
wasn't afraid of the bull, so why be afraid of the Tsar?
Suddenly he saw the Princess lying in bed with her lovely hair spread
out on the pillow like a golden fan and for a moment he couldn't speak.
Then he knelt beside the bed and kissed her hand.
"Princess," he said, "I'm not learned and I'm not clever and I don't
suppose I can succeed where so many wise men have failed. And even if I
do make you laugh you won't have to marry me unless you want to because
the reason I really came was to please Militza."
"Militza?"
"Yes, Princess, my little sister, Militza. She loves me very much and so
she thinks the stories I tell are funny and she laughs at them. Last
night she said to me: 'Stefan, you must go to the Princess and tell her
the story that begins: _In my young days when I was an old, old
man_.... I think she'll just have to laugh and if she laughs then she
can eat and she must be very hungry by this time.'"
"I am," the Princess said, with a catch in her voice. Then she added: "I
think I like that little sister of yours and I think I like you, too. I
wish you would tell me the story that begins: _In my young days when I
was an old, old man_...."
"But, Princess, it's a very foolish story."
"The foolisher, the better!"
Just here the first lady-in-waiting tried to correct the Princess for of
course she should have said: "The more foolish, the better!" but the
Tsar shut her up with a black frown and one fierce, "Wow!"
"Well, then," Stefan began:
_In my young days when I was an old, old man I used to count my bees
every morning. It was easy enough to count the bees but not the beehives
because I had too many hives. One day when I finished counting I found
that my best bee was missing. At once I saddled a rooster and set out to
find him._
"Father!" cried the Princess. "Did you hear what Stefan said? He said he
saddled his rooster!"
"Umph!" muttered the Tsar, and the first lady-in-waiting said severely:
"Princess, do not interrupt! Young man, continue."
_His track led to the sea which I rode across on a bridge. The first
thing I saw on the other side of the sea was my bee. There he was in a
field of millet harnessed to a plow. "That's my bee!" I shouted to the
man who was driving him. "Is that so?" the man said, and without any
words he gave me back my bee and handed me a bag of millet to pay for
the plowing. I took the bag and tied it securely on the bee. Then I
unsaddled the rooster and mounted the bee. The rooster, poor thing, was
so tired that I had to take him by the hand and lead him along beside
us._
"Father!" the Princess cried, "did you hear that? He took the rooster by
the hand! Isn't that funny!"
"Umph!" grunted the Tsar, and the first lady-in-waiting whispered:
"Hush! Let the young man finish!"
_Whilst we were crossing the bridge, the string of the bag broke and all
my millet spilled out. When night came I tied the rooster to the bee and
lay down on the seashore to sleep. During the night some wolves came
and killed my bee and when I woke up I found that all the honey had run
out of his body. There was so much honey that it rose up and up until it
reached the ankles of the valleys and the knees of the mountains. I took
a hatchet and swam down to a forest where I found two deer leaping about
on one leg. I shot at the deer with my hatchet, killed them, and skinned
them. With the skins I made two leather bottles. I filled these with the
honey and strapped them over the rooster's back. Then I rode home. I no
sooner arrived home than my father was born. "We must have holy water
for the christening," I said. "I suppose I must go to heaven to fetch
some." But how was I to get there? I thought of my millet. Sure enough
the dampness had made it grow so well that its tops now reached the sky.
So all I had to do was to climb a millet stalk and there I was in
heaven. Up there they had mown down some of my millet which they baked
into a loaf and were eating with boiled milk. "That's my millet!" I
said. "What do you want for it?" they asked me. "I want some holy water
to christen my father who has just been born." So they gave me some holy
water and I prepared to descend again to earth. But on earth there was a
violent storm going on and the wind carried away my millet. So there I
was with no way of getting down. I thought of my hair. It was so long
that when I stood up it covered my ears and when I lay down it reached
all the way to earth. So I pulled out a hair, tied it to a tree of
heaven, and began descending by it. When it grew dark I made a knot in
the hair and just sat where I was. It was cold, so I took a needle which
I happened to have in my coat, split it up, and lighted a fire with the
chips._
"Oh, father!" the Princess cried, "Stefan says he split a needle into
kindling wood! Isn't he funny!"
"If you ask me--" the first lady-in-waiting began, but before she could
say more the Tsar reached over and stepped on her toe so hard that she
was forced to end her sentence with a little squeally, "Ouch!" The
Princess, you see, was smiling and the Tsar was hoping that presently
she would burst into a laugh. So he motioned Stefan to continue.
[Illustration: _Stefan Tells the Princess a Story_]
_Then I lay down beside the fire and fell asleep. While I slept a spark
from the fire fell on the hair and burned it through. I fell to earth
with such force that I sank into the ground up to my chest. I couldn't
budge, so I was forced to go home and get a spade and dig myself out. On
the way home I crossed a field_ _where the reapers were cutting corn.
The heat was so great that they had to stop work. "I'll get our mare," I
said, "and then you'll feel cooler." You know our mare is two days long
and as broad as midnight and she has willow trees growing on her back.
So I ran and got her and she cast such a cool shadow that the reapers
were at once able to go back to work. Now they wanted some fresh
drinking water, but when they went to the river they found it had frozen
over. They came back to me and asked me would I get them some water.
"Certainly," I said. I went to the river myself, then I took off my head
and with it I broke a hole in the ice. After that it was easy enough to
fetch them some water. "But where is your head?" they asked. "Oh!" I
said, "I must have forgotten it!"_
"Oh, father!" the Princess cried with a loud laugh, "he says he forgot
his head! Then, Stefan, what did you do? What did you do?"
_I ran back to the river and got there just as a fox was sniffing at my
skull. "Hi, there!" I said, pulling the fox's tail. The fox turned
around and gave me a paper on which was written these words: =NOW THE
PRINCESS CAN EAT FOR SHE HAS LAUGHED AND STEFAN AND HIS LITTLE SISTER
ARE VERY HAPPY.=_
"What nonsense!" the first lady-in-waiting murmured with a toss of her
head.
"Yes, beautiful nonsense!" the Princess cried, clapping her hands and
going off into peal after peal of merry laughter. "Isn't it beautiful
nonsense, father? And isn't Stefan a dear lad? And, father, I'm awfully
hungry! Please have some food sent in at once and Stefan must stay and
eat with me."
So the Tsar had great trays of food brought in: roast birds and
vegetables and wheaten bread and many kinds of little cakes and honey
and milk and fruit. And Stefan and the Princess ate and made merry and
the Tsar joined them and even the first lady-in-waiting took one little
cake which she crumbled in her handkerchief in a most refined manner.
Then Stefan rose to go and the Tsar said to him:
"Stefan, I will reward you richly. You have made the Princess laugh and
besides you have not insisted on her marrying you. You are a fine lad
and I shall never forget you."
"But, father," the Princess said, "I don't want Stefan to go. He amuses
me and I like him. He said I needn't marry him unless I wanted to but,
father, I think I want to."
"Wow! Wow!" the Tsar roared. "What! My daughter marry the son of a
farmer!"
"Now, father," the Princess said, "it's no use your _wow-wowing_ at me
and you know it isn't. If I can't marry Stefan I won't marry any one.
And if I don't marry any one I'm going to stop eating again. So that's
that!" And still holding Stefan's hand, the Princess turned her face to
the wall.
What could the poor Tsar do? At first he fumed and raged but as usual
after a day or two he came around to the Princess's way of thinking. In
fact it soon seemed to him that Stefan had been his choice from the
first and when one of his councilors remarked: "Then, Your Majesty,
there's no use sending word to the neighboring kings that the Princess
has reached a marriageable age and would like to look over their sons,"
the Tsar flew into an awful temper and roared:
"Wow! Wow! You blockhead! Neighboring kings, indeed, and their
good-for-nothing sons! No, siree! The husband I want for my daughter is
an honest farmer lad who knows how to work and how to play! That's the
kind of son-in-law we need in this kingdom!"
So Stefan and the little Princess were married and from that day the
castle was no longer gloomy but rang with laughter and merriment.
Presently the people of the kingdom, following the example of their
rulers, were laughing, too, and cracking jokes and, strange to say, they
soon found they were working all the better for their jollity.
Laughter grew so fashionable that even Mihailo and Jakov were forced to
take it up. They didn't do it very well but they practised at it
conscientiously. Whenever people talked about Stefan, they always pushed
forward importantly and said:
"Ho! Ho! Ho! Do you mean Stefan, the Laughing Prince? Ha! Ha! Ha! Why,
do you know, he's our own brother!"
As for Militza, the Princess had her come to the castle and said to her:
"I owe all my happiness to you, my dear, for you it was who knew that of
course I would laugh at Stefan's nonsense! What sensible girl
wouldn't?"
BEAUTY AND THE HORNS
[Illustration]
_The Story of an Enchanted Maiden_
BEAUTY AND THE HORNS
There was once a rich man who when he was dying called his son to his
bedside and said:
"Danilo, my son, I am leaving you my riches. The only thing I ask of you
is this: close your ears to all reports of an enchanted maiden who is
known as Peerless Beauty and when the time comes that you wish to marry
choose for wife some quiet sensible girl of your native village."
Now if the father had not mentioned Peerless Beauty all might have been
well. Danilo might never have heard of her and after a time he would
probably have fallen in love with a girl of his native village and
married her. As it was, after his father's death he kept saying to
himself:
"Peerless Beauty, the enchanted maiden of whom my father warned me! I
wonder is she really as beautiful as all that! I wonder where she
lives!"
He thought about her until he could think of nothing else.
"Peerless Beauty! Peerless Beauty! Oh, I must see this enchanted maiden
even if it costs me my life!"
His father had a brother, a wise old man, who was supposed to know
everything in the world.
"I will go to my uncle," the young man said. "Perhaps he will tell me
where I can find Peerless Beauty."
So he went to his uncle and said:
"My dear uncle, my father as he lay dying told me about a wonderful
maiden called Peerless Beauty. Can you tell me where she lives because I
want to see her for myself and judge whether she is as beautiful as my
father said."
His uncle looked at him gravely and shook his head.
"My poor boy, how can I tell you where that enchanted maiden lives when
I know it would mean death to you if ever you saw her? Think no more
about her but go, find some suitable maid in the village, and marry her
like a sensible young man."
But his uncle's words, far from dissuading Danilo, only excited him the
more.
"If my uncle knows where Peerless Beauty lives," he thought, "other men
also know."
So one by one he went to all the old men in the village and asked them
what they knew of Peerless Beauty. One by one they shook their heads and
told him that Peerless Beauty was no maiden for him to be thinking
about.
"Put her out of your mind," they said. "These enchanted maidens are a
snare to young men. What you want to do is marry some quiet industrious
girl here in the village and settle down like a sensible young man."
But the oftener Danilo heard this advice, the more firmly convinced he
became that it was just what he did not want to do.
"Time enough to settle down after I've seen Peerless Beauty," he told
himself. "She must be beautiful indeed, or all these old men would not
be so anxious to keep me from seeing her. Well, if they won't tell me
where she is, I'll go out in the world and find her for myself."
So he put on rich clothes as befitted his wealth, took a bag of the gold
his father had left him, mounted his horse, and rode off into the world.
Everywhere he went he made inquiries about Peerless Beauty and
everywhere he found old men who knew about the enchanted maiden but
would tell him nothing. Every one of them advised him to go home like a
sensible young man and think no more about her. But all they said only
made him the more determined to see the maiden for himself.
Finally one day as evening approached he came to a little hut in the
woods. At the door of the hut sat a poor old woman. She held out her
hand as he passed and begged an alms. Danilo, being a kind hearted young
man, gave her a gold piece.
"May God reward you!" the old woman said.
"Granny," Danilo asked, "can you tell me the way to Peerless Beauty?"
"Aye, my son, that I can but he is a rash youth who seeks that maiden!
It were better for you to turn back than to go on!"
"But I'm not going to turn back!" Danilo declared. "Whatever the outcome
I'm going to find Peerless Beauty and see for myself why all men fear
her."
When the old woman saw that Danilo was determined, she gave up pleading
with him and pointed out a faint trail in the forest which, she told
him, would lead him to Peerless Beauty's castle.
He slept that night in the old woman's hut and early next morning set
out on the forest trail. By afternoon he reached the castle.
"What do you want?" the guards demanded roughly.
"I want to see Peerless Beauty."
"Have you gold?" they asked him.
Danilo showed them his bag of ducats.
They led him into a hall of the castle and told him to put his gold on a
table. If he did so, perhaps Peerless Beauty would show herself and
perhaps she wouldn't.
Danilo did as the guards directed and then faced a curtain behind which,
they told him, Peerless Beauty was seated. The curtain opened a little,
but instead of showing her face Peerless Beauty extended only one
finger. However, that finger was so ravishingly beautiful that Danilo
almost fainted with delight. He would have stayed gazing on that one
enchanting finger for hours if the guards had not taken him roughly by
the shoulders and thrown him out of the castle.
"Come again when you've got more gold!" they shouted after him.
Like a man in a dream Danilo rode back to the old woman's hut.
"Now, my son, are you satisfied?" she asked him. "Are you ready now to
go home and settle down like a sensible young man?"
"Oh, granny!" Danilo raved. "Such a finger! I must see that finger again
if it cost me my whole fortune!"
He slept that night in the old woman's hut and the next day returned to
his native village. There he got another bag of the golden ducats which
his father had left him and at once started back to the castle of
Peerless Beauty.
This time that heartless maiden stripped him again of his gold, showed
him two of her enchanting fingers, and as before had her guards throw
him out of the castle.
"Come again when you've got more gold!" they shouted after him.
That's exactly what the poor young man did. He went back and back until
the fortune that his father had left him was entirely squandered. And
all he had seen of Peerless Beauty up to that time were the fingers of
one hand! Shouldn't you suppose that now with all his wealth lost he
would get over his foolish infatuation? Well, he didn't.
"I must go back again!" he kept telling himself.
His gold was gone but he still had his father's house. It was a big old
house with garrets and cellars.
"Perhaps if I hunt I shall find some treasures hidden away in odd
corners," Danilo said.
So he hunted upstairs and down. He opened old boxes and rummaged about
among the dark rafters. One day he came upon a funny looking little cap.
"I wonder whose this was," he thought to himself.
He went to a mirror and tried the cap on. Then a strange thing happened.
The moment the cap touched his head, Danilo disappeared.
"Ah!" he cried, "it's a magic cap and the moment I put it on I become
invisible! Now I can slip into Peerless Beauty's chamber and see her
lovely face!"
With his magic cap pulled tightly down over his forehead, he set off
once more for Peerless Beauty's castle. Sure enough he was able to pass
unseen the guards at the gate, he was able to go boldly into the great
hall, and beyond it through the curtain into Peerless Beauty's own
chamber.
The Beauty was seated with her back to the curtain and a serving maid
was combing out her hair for the night. It was lovely hair and it fell
down over Beauty's shoulders like a mantle of gold. At mere sight of it
Danilo was so overcome with emotion that he sighed.
"What's that?" Beauty cried. "There's some one in my chamber!"
The serving maid looked under the bed and behind the chairs and in the
corners.
"There's no one here, my lady."
"That's strange!" Beauty said. "I feel as though some one were looking
at me."
When Danilo saw the actual face of the enchanted maiden, it was all he
could do to keep from crying aloud. She was so unutterably beautiful
that he almost swooned away in ecstacy.
Presently the maiden went to bed and fell into an uneasy sleep. The
light of a single candle shed a faint radiance over her face making it
lovelier than ever. Through all the long hours of night Danilo stood
perfectly still, gazing at her, afraid almost to breathe lest he should
disturb her.
"Unless I win her for wife," he thought to himself, "I shall nevermore
be happy!"
When morning came the maiden awoke with a start and said:
"There's some one looking at me! Who is it? Who is it?"
"It's only your poor Danilo," a voice answered.
"Danilo? Who is Danilo?"
"The youth whom you have been treating so cruelly. But though you have
treated me cruelly, I love you still!"
"If you love me still," the maiden said, "let me see you."
Danilo took off the magic cap and there he stood, a handsome youth, at
the foot of her bed. Then the crafty maiden spoke him fair and Danilo
told her about the magic cap, and when she said to him that she repented
having treated him so cruelly and asked him to let her see the cap, the
poor young man was so dazzled by her beauty and her seeming kindness
that he handed it to her at once.
Instantly she clapped it on her head and disappeared. Then she laughed
in derision and called out loudly to the guards:
"Ho, there! Take out this young man and drive him forth! Let him return
when he has another treasure to offer me!"
So the guards dragged Danilo out and drove him away.
With no more gold, with no more magic cap, Danilo returned to his
father's house.
"Perhaps there are other treasures hidden away," he thought. "I'll
search further."
In his search he came upon an old pitcher and thinking it might be
silver he began rubbing it. Instantly there was a clap of thunder and a
company of soldiers appeared. Their captain saluted Danilo respectfully
and said:
"We are the servants of that magic pitcher. What does our master wish?"
"Magic pitcher?" stammered Danilo. "And am I your master?"
"Yes," said the captain, "you are our master as long as you hold the
magic pitcher in your hands."
"You may disappear now," Danilo said. "I will rub the pitcher when I
need you."
Delighted with this unexpected good fortune, he hurried off to the woods
to the hut of the old woman who had befriended him before. He showed her
the pitcher and demonstrated for her how it worked. Then he asked her to
carry a message to Peerless Beauty.
"Tell her," he said, "that unless she consents to marry me at once I'll
lead a mighty army against her, take her captive, and then send her off
in exile to that howling wilderness which people call the Donkeys'
Paradise."
"I will deliver your message," the old woman said, "on condition that
you promise me to be on your guard this time. Don't let the maiden trick
you again. She is under an enchantment that makes her cruel and crafty
and the enchantment will never be broken until she meets a man upon whom
her wiles have no effect."
"Trust me this time," Danilo said. "I've had my lesson."
So the old woman delivered the message and when Peerless Beauty
received it with scorn, Danilo at once set out for the castle with the
magic pitcher in his hand. He began rubbing and every time he rubbed a
company of soldiers appeared. Soon the castle was surrounded by a great
army and in fright and dismay Peerless Beauty sent out word that she was
ready to make an unconditional surrender.
When Danilo entered the castle he found her humble and meek.
"I have treated you cruelly," she said. "Now I am in your power, do with
me what you will." And she began weeping softly until the sight of her
tears drove Danilo distracted.
"Weep no more, dear lady!" he cried. "You have nothing to fear from me!
I love you! I am your slave!"
The Peerless one slowly dried her tears.
"If you love me as you say you do, you will tell me by what magic you
have raised this great army."
Then Danilo, forgetting the old woman's warning, took the magic pitcher
out of his shirt and showed the maiden how it worked.
"Ah!" she murmured wonderingly. "It looks like any old pitcher! Please,
Danilo, let me see it in my own hands."
Danilo handed her the pitcher and, quick as a flash, she rubbed it.
There was a clap of thunder, a company of soldiers appeared, and their
captain saluting her respectfully said:
"What does the mistress of the pitcher want?"
"Nay!" cried Danilo, "it is I who own the pitcher, not she!"
"We are the servants," the captain said, "of whoever holds the pitcher."
At that Peerless Beauty laughed loud and scornfully until the castle
rang with her merriment.
"Seize that wretch!" she said, pointing to Danilo. "Tie his hands and
drive him out in exile to the Donkeys' Paradise! Let him stay there
until he has another treasure to present me!"
So they drove Danilo out to the wilderness and left him there.
He wandered about for many days hungry and thirsty, subsisting on roots
and berries, and having for drink only the water that collected in the
hoof prints of the wild beasts.
"See what I've come to!" he cried aloud. "Why didn't I heed the old
woman's warning! If I had, I should have broken the evil enchantment
that binds my Peerless Beauty and all would have been well!"
One day as he wandered about he came upon a vine that was laden with
great clusters of luscious red grapes. He fell upon them ravenously and
ate bunch after bunch. Suddenly he felt something in his hair and
lifting his hands he found that horns had grown out all over his head.
"Fine grapes these are!" he exclaimed, "to bring out horns on a person's
head!"
However, he was so hungry that he kept on eating until his head was one
mass of horns.
The next day he found a vine that had clusters of white grapes. He began
eating the white grapes and he hadn't finished a bunch before the horns
all fell off his head.
"Ha!" he said. "The red grapes put horns on and the white grapes take
them off! That's a trick worth knowing!"
He took some reeds and fashioned two baskets one of which he filled with
red grapes and the other with white grapes. Then staining his face with
the dark juice of a leaf until he looked brown and sunburned like a
countryman, he went back to Peerless Beauty's castle. There he marched
up and down below the Peerless one's window crying his wares like a
huckster:
"Sweet grapes for sale! Who wants my fresh sweet grapes!"
Now it was not the season for grapes, so Peerless Beauty when she heard
the cry was surprised and said to her serving maid:
"Go quickly and buy me some grapes from that huckster and mind you don't
eat one yourself!"
The serving maid hurried out to Danilo and he sold her some of the red
grapes. As she carried them in, she couldn't resist the temptation of
slipping a few into her mouth. Instantly some horns grew out on her
head.
"That's to punish me for disobeying my mistress!" the poor girl cried.
"Oh, dear, what shall I do?"
She was afraid to show herself to Peerless Beauty, so she pretended she
was taken sick and she went to bed and pulled the sheet over her head
and sent in the grapes by another serving maid.
Peerless Beauty ate them all before she discovered their frightful
property. Then there was a great to-do, and cries of anger and of
fright, and a quick sending out of the guards to find the huckster. But
the huckster had disappeared.
What could Peerless Beauty do now? She tried to pull the horns out but
they wouldn't come. She tried to cut them off but they resisted the edge
of the sharpest knife. She was too proud to show herself with horns, so
she swathed her head with jewels and ribbons and pretended she was
wearing an elaborate head-dress.
Then she sent heralds through the land offering a huge reward to any one
who could cure her serving maid of some strange horns that had grown out
on her head. You see she thought if she could get hold of some one who
would cure the maid, then she could make him cure her, too.
Well, doctors and quacks and all sorts of people came and tried every
kind of remedy, but all in vain. The horns stayed firmly rooted.
A whole week went by and when the last of the quacks had come and gone,
Danilo, disguised as an old physician, presented himself and craved
audience with the Peerless one. He carried two small jars in his hands
one of which was filled with a conserve made from the white grapes and
the other with a conserve made from the red grapes.
Peerless Beauty, her horns swathed in silk and gleaming with jewels,
received him coldly.
"Are you one more quack?" she asked.
"Not a quack," he said, bowing low, "but a man who has happened upon a
strange secret of nature. I can cure your serving maid of her horns
provided she confess to me all her misdeeds and hand over to me anything
she has that does not belong to her."
Peerless Beauty had him shown to the room where the serving maid lay in
bed. The poor frightened girl at once confessed that she had stolen a
few of her mistress's grapes and eaten them. Danilo spoke kindly to her,
gave her some of the white grape conserve, and as soon as she had tasted
it the horns of course dropped off.
Thereupon Peerless Beauty led Danilo to her own chamber, ordered all her
people out, and then acknowledged that she, too, was suffering from
horns.
"I am sure I can cure you," Danilo told her, "provided you confess to me
all your misdeeds and hand over to me whatever you have that belongs to
some one else."
"I cheated a foolish young man out of five bags of gold," Peerless
Beauty said. "Here they are in this chest. Take them."
Danilo opened the chest and took out his own five bags of gold.
"Is that all?" he asked.
[Illustration: _The Magic Pitcher_]
"Yes, that is all."
Danilo gave her some of the red grape conserve and of course, instead of
the horns already on her head falling off, more grew on.
"You're not telling me the truth," Danilo said, "and I can't cure you.
There's no use my treating you further."
He turned to go and Peerless Beauty, in great fright, begged him to
stay.
"I do remember another misdeed," she confessed. "I took by trickery a
magic pitcher from the same foolish young man."
She gave Danilo the pitcher and he hid it in his shirt.
"Is that all?"
"Yes, that is all."
Danilo gave her some more of the red grape conserve and, of course, more
horns grew out on her head. Then he pretended to get angry.
"How can you expect to be cured when you don't tell me the truth? I told
you I could not cure you unless you confessed all!"