There was once on a time a widower who had a son and a daughter by his
first wife. They were both good children, and loved each other with all
their hearts. After some time had gone by the man married again, and he
chose a widow with one daughter who was ugly and wicked, and her mother
was ugly and wicked too. From the very day that the new wife came into
the house there was no peace for the man’s children, and not a corner
to be found where they could get any rest; so the boy thought that the
best thing he could do was to go out into the world and try to earn his
own bread.
When he had roamed about for some time he came to the King’s palace,
where he obtained a place under the coachman; and very brisk and active
he was, and the horses that he looked after were so fat and sleek, that
they shone again.
But his sister, who was still at home, fared worse and worse. Both her
step-mother and her step-sister were always finding fault with her,
whatsoever she did and whithersoever she went, and they scolded her and
abused her so that she never had an hour’s peace. They made her do all
the hard work, and hard words fell to her lot early and late, but
little enough food accompanied them.
One day they sent her to the brook to fetch some water home, and an
ugly and horrible head rose up out of the water, and said, ‘Wash me,
girl!’
‘Yes, I will wash you with pleasure,’ said the girl, and began to wash
and scrub the ugly face, but she couldn’t help thinking that it was a
very unpleasant piece of work. When she had done it, and done it well,
another head rose up out of the water, and this one was uglier still.
‘Brush me, girl!’ said the head.
‘Yes, I will brush you with pleasure,’ said the girl, and set to work
with the tangled hair, and, as may be easily imagined, this too was by
no means pleasant work.
When she had got it done, another and a much more ugly and
horrible-looking head rose up out of the water.
‘Kiss me, girl!’ said the head.
‘Yes, I will kiss you,’ said the man’s daughter, and she did it, but
she thought it was the worst bit of work that she had ever had to do in
her life.
So the heads all began to talk to each other, and to ask what they
should do for this girl who was so full of kindliness.
‘She shall be the prettiest girl that ever was, and fair and bright as
the day,’ said the first head.
‘Gold shall drop from her hair whenever she brushes it,’ said the
second.
‘Gold shall drop from her mouth whenever she speaks,’ said the third
head.
So when the man’s daughter went home, looking as beautiful and bright
as day, the step-mother and her daughter grew much more ill-tempered,
and it was worse still when she began to talk, and they saw that golden
coins dropped from her mouth. The step-mother fell into such a towering
passion that she drove the man’s daughter into the pig-stye—she might
stay there with her fine show of gold, the step-mother said, but she
should not be permitted to set foot in the house.
It was not long before the mother wanted her own daughter to go to the
stream to fetch some water.
When she got there with her pails, the first head rose up out of the
water close to the bank. ‘Wash me, girl!’ it said.
‘Wash yourself!’ answered the woman’s daughter.
Then the second head appeared.
‘Brush me, girl!’ said the head.
‘Brush yourself!’ said the woman’s daughter.
So down it went to the bottom, and the third head came up.
‘Kiss me, girl!’ said the head.
‘As if I would kiss your ugly mouth!’ said the girl.
So again the heads talked together about what they should do for this
girl who was so ill-tempered and full of her own importance, and they
agreed that she should have a nose that was four ells long, and a jaw
that was three ells, and a fir bush in the middle of her forehead, and
every time she spoke ashes should fall from her mouth.
When she came back to the cottage door with her pails, she called to
her mother who was inside, ‘Open the door!’
‘Open the door yourself, my own dear child!’ said the mother.
‘I can’t get near, because of my nose,’ said the daughter.
When the mother came and saw her you may imagine what a state of mind
she was in, and how she screamed and lamented, but neither the nose nor
the jaw grew any the less for that.
Now the brother, who was in service in the King’s palace, had taken a
portrait of his sister, and he had carried the picture away with him,
and every morning and evening he knelt down before it and prayed for
his sister, so dearly did he love her.
The other stable-boys had heard him doing this, so they peeped through
the key-hole into his room, and saw that he was kneeling there before a
picture; so they told everyone that every morning and evening the youth
knelt down and prayed to an idol which he had; and at last they went to
the King himself, and begged that he too would peep through the
key-hole, and see for himself what the youth did. At first the King
would not believe this, but after a long, long time, they prevailed
with him, and he crept on tip-toe to the door, peeped through, and saw
the youth on his knees, with his hands clasped together before a
picture which was hanging on the wall.
‘Open the door!’ cried the King, but the youth did not hear.
So the King called to him again, but the youth was praying so fervently
that he did not hear him this time either.
‘Open the door, I say!’ cried the King again. ‘It is I! I want to come
in.’
So the youth sprang to the door and unlocked it, but in his haste he
forgot to hide the picture.
When the King entered and saw it, he stood still as if he were in
fetters, and could not stir from the spot, for the picture seemed to
him so beautiful.
‘There is nowhere on earth so beautiful a woman as this!’ said the
King.
But the youth told him that she was his sister, and that he had painted
her, and that if she was not prettier than the picture she was at all
events not uglier.
‘Well, if she is as beautiful as that, I will have her for my Queen,’
said the King, and he commanded the youth to go home and fetch her
without a moment’s delay, and to lose no time in coming back. The youth
promised to make all the haste he could, and set forth from the King’s
palace.
When the brother arrived at home to fetch his sister, her stepmother
and step-sister would go too. So they all set out together, and the
man’s daughter took with her a casket in which she kept her gold, and a
dog which was called Little Snow. These two things were all that she
had inherited from her mother. When they had travelled for some time
they had to cross the sea, and the brother sat down at the helm, and
the mother and the two half-sisters went to the fore-part of the
vessel, and they sailed a long, long way. At last they came in sight of
land.
‘Look at that white strand there; that is where we shall land,’ said
the brother, pointing across the sea.
‘What is my brother saying?’ inquired the man’s daughter.
‘He says that you are to throw your casket out into the sea,’ answered
the step-mother.
‘Well, if my brother says so, I must do it,’ said the man’s daughter,
and she flung her casket into the sea.
When they had sailed for some time longer, the brother once more
pointed over the sea. ‘There you may see the palace to which we are
bound,’ said he.
‘What is my brother saying?’ asked the man’s daughter.
‘Now he says that you are to throw your dog into the sea,’ answered the
step-mother.
The man’s daughter wept, and was sorely troubled, for Little Snow was
the dearest thing she had on earth, but at last she threw him
overboard.
‘If my brother says that, I must do it, but Heaven knows how unwilling
I am to throw thee out, Little Snow!’ said she.
So they sailed onwards a long way farther.
‘There may’st thou see the King coming out to meet thee,’ said the
brother, pointing to the sea-shore.
‘What is my brother saying?’ asked his sister again.
‘Now he says that you are to make haste and throw yourself overboard,’
answered the step-mother.
She wept and she wailed, but as her brother had said that, she thought
she must do it; so she leaped into the sea.
But when they arrived at the palace, and the King beheld the ugly bride
with a nose that was four ells long, a jaw that was three ells, and a
forehead that had a bush in the middle of it, he was quite terrified;
but the wedding feast was all prepared, as regarded brewing and baking,
and all the wedding guests were sitting waiting, so, ugly as she was,
the King was forced to take her.
But he was very wroth, and none can blame him for that; so he caused
the brother to be thrown into a pit full of snakes.
On the first Thursday night after this, a beautiful maiden came into
the kitchen of the palace, and begged the kitchen-maid, who slept
there, to lend her a brush. She begged very prettily, and got it, and
then she brushed her hair, and the gold dropped from it.
A little dog was with her, and she said to it, ‘Go out, Little Snow,
and see if it will soon be day!’
This she said thrice, and the third time that she sent out the dog to
see, it was very near dawn. Then she was forced to depart, but as she
went she said:
‘Out on thee, ugly Bushy Bride,
Sleeping so soft by the young King’s side,
On sand and stones my bed I make,
And my brother sleeps with the cold snake,
Unpitied and unwept.’