=Galeotto, King of Anglia, has a son who is born in the shape of a
pig. This son marries three wives, and in the end, having thrown
off his semblance, becomes a handsome youth.=
Fair ladies, if man were to spend a thousand years in rendering thanks
to his Creator for having made him in the form of a human and not of a
brute beast, he could not speak gratitude enough. This reflection calls
to mind the story of one who was born as a pig, but afterwards became a
comely youth. Nevertheless, to his dying day he was known to the people
over whom he ruled as King Pig.
You must know, dear ladies, that Galeotto, King of Anglia, was a man
highly blest in worldly riches, and in his wife Ersilia, the daughter of
Matthias, King of Hungary, a princess who, in virtue and beauty,
outshone all the other ladies of the time. And Galeotto was a wise king,
ruling his land so that no man could hear complaint against him. Though
they had been several years married they had no child, wherefore they
both of them were much aggrieved. While Ersilia was walking one day in
her garden she felt suddenly weary, and remarking hard by a spot covered
with fresh green turf, she went up to it and sat down thereon, and,
overcome with weariness and soothed by the sweet singing of the birds in
the green foliage, she fell asleep.
And it chanced that while she slept there passed by three fairies who
held mankind somewhat in scorn, and these, when they beheld the sleeping
queen, halted, and gazing upon her beauty, took counsel together how
they might protect her and throw a spell upon her. When they were agreed
the first cried out, ‘I will that no man shall be able to harm her, and
that, the next time she lie with her husband, she may be with child and
bear a son who shall not have his equal in all the world for beauty.’
Then said the second, ‘I will that no one shall ever have power to
offend her, and that the prince who shall be born of her shall be gifted
with every virtue under the sun.’ And the third said, ‘And I will that
she shall be the wisest among women, but that the son whom she shall
conceive shall be born in the skin of a pig, with a pig’s ways and
manners, and in this state he shall be constrained to abide till he
shall have three times taken a woman to wife.’
As soon as the three fairies had flown away Ersilia awoke, and
straightway arose and went back to the palace, taking with her the
flowers she had plucked. Not many days had passed before she knew
herself to be with child, and when the time of her delivery was come,
she gave birth to a son with members like those of a pig and not of a
human being. When tidings of this prodigy came to the ears of the king
and queen they lamented sore thereanent, and the king, bearing in mind
how good and wise his queen was, often felt moved to put this offspring
of hers to death and cast it into the sea, in order that she might be
spared the shame of having given birth to him. But when he debated in
his mind and considered that this son, let him be what he might, was of
his own begetting, he put aside the cruel purpose which he had been
harbouring, and, seized with pity and grief, he made up his mind that
the son should be brought up and nurtured like a rational being and not
as a brute beast. The child, therefore, being nursed with the greatest
care, would often be brought to the queen and put his little snout and
his little paws in his mother’s lap, and she, moved by natural
affection, would caress him by stroking his bristly back with her hand,
and embracing and kissing him as if he had been of human form. Then he
would wag his tail and give other signs to show that he was conscious of
his mother’s affection.
The pigling, when he grew older, began to talk like a human being, and
to wander abroad in the city, but whenever he came near to any mud or
dirt he would always wallow therein, after the manner of pigs, and
return all covered with filth. Then, when he approached the king and
queen, he would rub his sides against their fair garments, defiling them
with all manner of dirt, but because he was indeed their own son they
bore it all.
One day he came home covered with mud and filth, as was his wont, and
lay down on his mother’s rich robe, and said in a grunting tone,
‘Mother, I wish to get married.’ When the queen heard this, she replied,
‘Do not talk so foolishly. What maid would ever take you for a husband,
and think you that any noble or knight would give his daughter to one so
dirty and ill-savoured as you?’ But he kept on grunting that he must
have a wife of one sort or another. The queen, not knowing how to manage
him in this matter, asked the king what they should do in their trouble:
‘Our son wishes to marry, but where shall we find anyone who will take
him as a husband?’ Every day the pig would come back to his mother with
the same demand: ‘I must have a wife, and I will never leave you in
peace until you procure for me a certain maiden I have seen to-day, who
pleases me greatly.’
It happened that this maiden was a daughter of a poor woman who had
three daughters, each one of them being very lovely. When the queen
heard this, she had brought before her the poor woman and her eldest
daughter, and said, ‘Good mother, you are poor and burdened with
children. If you will agree to what I shall say to you, you will be
rich. I have this son who is, as you see, in form a pig, and I would
fain marry him to your eldest daughter. Do not consider him, but think
of the king and of me, and remember that your daughter will inherit this
whole kingdom when the king and I shall be dead.’
When the young girl listened to the words of the queen she was greatly
disturbed in her mind and blushed red for shame, and then said that on
no account would she listen to the queen’s proposition; but the poor
mother besought her so pressingly that at last she yielded. When the pig
came home one day, all covered with dirt as usual, his mother said to
him, ‘My son, we have found for you the wife you desire.’ And then she
caused to be brought in the bride, who by this time had been robed in
sumptuous regal attire, and presented her to the pig prince. When he saw
how lovely and desirable she was he was filled with joy, and, all foul
and dirty as he was, jumped round about her, endeavouring by his pawing
and nuzzling to show some sign of his affection. But she, when she found
he was soiling her beautiful dress, thrust him aside; whereupon the pig
said to her, ‘Why do you push me thus? Have I not had these garments
made for you myself?’ Then she answered disdainfully, ‘No, neither you
nor any other of the whole kingdom of hogs has done this thing.’ And
when the time for going to bed was come the young girl said to herself,
‘What am I to do with this foul beast? This very night, while he lies in
his first sleep, I will kill him.’ The pig prince, who was not far off,
heard these words, but said nothing, and when the two retired to their
chamber he got into the bed, stinking and dirty as he was, and defiled
the sumptuous bed with his filthy paws and snout. He lay down by his
spouse, who was not long in falling to sleep, and then he struck her
with his sharp hoofs and drove them into her breast so that he killed
her.
The next morning the queen went to visit her daughter-in-law, and to her
great grief found that the pig had killed her; and when he came back
from wandering about the city he said, in reply to the queen’s bitter
reproaches, that he had only wrought with his wife as she was minded to
deal with him, and then withdrew in an ill humour. Not many days had
passed before the pig prince again began to beseech the queen to allow
him to marry one of the other sisters, and because the queen at first
would not listen to his petition he persisted in his purpose, and
threatened to ruin everything in the place if he could not have her to
wife. The queen, when she heard this, went to the king and told him
everything, and he made answer that perhaps it would be wiser to kill
their ill-fated offspring before he might work some fatal mischief in
the city. But the queen felt all the tenderness of a mother towards him,
and loved him very dearly in spite of his brutal person, and could not
endure the thought of being parted from him; so she summoned once more
to the palace the poor woman, together with her second daughter, and
held a long discourse with her, begging her the while to give her
daughter in marriage. At last the girl assented to take the pig prince
for a husband; but her fate was no happier than her sister’s, for the
bridegroom killed her, as he had killed his other bride, and then fled
headlong from the palace.
When he came back, dirty as usual and smelling so foully that no one
could approach him, the king and queen censured him gravely for the
outrage he had wrought; but again he cried out boldly that if he had not
killed her she would have killed him. As it had happened before, the pig
in a very short time began to importune his mother again to let him have
to wife the youngest sister, who was much more beautiful than either of
the others; and when this request of his was refused steadily, he became
more insistent than ever, and in the end began to threaten the queen’s
life in violent and bloodthirsty words, unless he should have given to
him the young girl for his wife. The queen, when she heard this shameful
and unnatural speech, was wellnigh broken-hearted and like to go out of
her mind; but, putting all other considerations aside, she called for
the poor woman and her third daughter, who was named Meldina, and thus
addressed her: ‘Meldina, my child, I should be greatly pleased if you
would take the pig prince for a husband; pay no regard to him, but to
his father and to me; then, if you will be prudent and bear patiently
with him, you may be the happiest woman in the world.’ To this speech
Meldina answered, with a grateful smile upon her face, that she was
quite content to do as the queen bade her, and thanked her humbly for
deigning to choose her as a daughter-in-law; for, seeing that she
herself had nothing in the world, it was indeed great good fortune that
she, a poor girl, should become the daughter-in-law of a potent
sovereign. The queen, when she heard this modest and amiable reply,
could not keep back her tears for the happiness she felt; but she feared
all the time that the same fate might be in store for Meldina as her
sisters.
When the new bride had been clothed in rich attire and decked with
jewels, and was awaiting the bridegroom, the pig prince came in,
filthier and more muddy than ever; but she spread out her rich gown and
besought him to lie down by her side. Whereupon the queen bade her to
thrust him away, but to this she would not consent, and spoke thus to
the queen: ‘There are three wise sayings, gracious lady, which I
remember to have heard. The first is that it is folly to waste time in
searching for that which cannot be found. The second is that we should
believe nothing we may hear, except those things which bear the marks of
sense and reason. The third is that, when once you have got possession
of some rare and precious treasure, prize it well and keep a firm hold
upon it.’
[Illustration: The Pig Prince]
When the maiden had finished speaking, the pig prince, who had been wide
awake and had heard all that she had said, got up, kissed her on the
face and neck and bosom and shoulders with his tongue, and she was not
backward in returning his caresses; so that he was fired with a warm
love for her. As soon as the time for retiring for the night had come,
the bride went to bed and awaited her unseemly spouse, and, as soon as
he came, she raised the coverlet and bade him lie near to her and put
his head upon the pillow, covering him carefully with the bed-clothes
and drawing the curtains so that he might feel no cold. When morning had
come the pig got up and ranged abroad to pasture, as was his wont, and
very soon after the queen went to the bride’s chamber, expecting to find
that she had met with the same fate as her sisters; but when she saw her
lying in the bed, all defiled with mud as it was, and looking pleased
and contented, she thanked God for this favour, that her son had at last
found a spouse according to his liking.
One day, soon after this, when the pig prince was conversing pleasantly
with his wife, he said to her: ‘Meldina, my beloved wife, if I could be
fully sure that you could keep a secret, I would now tell you one of
mine; something I have kept hidden for many years. I know you to be very
prudent and wise, and that you love me truly; so I wish to make you the
sharer of my secret.’ ‘You may safely tell it to me, if you will,’ said
Meldina, ‘for I promise never to reveal it to anyone without your
consent.’ Whereupon, being now sure of his wife’s discretion and
fidelity, he straightway shook off from his body the foul and dirty skin
of the pig, and stood revealed as a handsome and well-shaped young man,
and all that night rested closely folded in the arms of his beloved
wife. But he charged her solemnly to keep silence about this wonder she
had seen, for the time had not yet come for his complete delivery from
this misery. So when he left the bed he donned the dirty pig’s hide once
more. I leave you to imagine for yourselves how great was the joy of
Meldina when she discovered that, instead of a pig, she had gained a
handsome and gallant young prince for a husband. Not long after this she
proved to be with child, and when the time of her delivery came she gave
birth to a fair and shapely boy. The joy of the king and queen was
unbounded, especially when they found that the new-born child had the
form of a human being and not that of a beast.
But the burden of the strange and weighty secret which her husband had
confided to her pressed heavily upon Meldina, and one day she went to
her mother-in-law and said: ‘Gracious queen, when first I married your
son I believed I was married to a beast, but now I find that you have
given me the comeliest, the worthiest, and the most gallant young man
ever born into the world to be my husband. For know that when he comes
into my chamber to lie by my side, he casts off his dirty hide and
leaves it on the ground, and is changed into a graceful handsome youth.
No one could believe this marvel save they saw it with their own eyes.’
When the queen heard these words she deemed that her daughter-in-law
must be jesting with her, but Meldina still persisted that what she said
was true. And when the queen demanded to know how she might witness with
her own eyes the truth of this thing, Meldina replied: ‘Come to my
chamber to-night, when we shall be in our first sleep; the door will be
open, and you will find that what I tell you is the truth.’
That same night, when the looked-for time had come, and all were gone to
rest, the queen let some torches be kindled and went, accompanied by the
king, to the chamber of her son, and when she had entered she saw the
pig’s skin lying on the floor in the corner of the room, and having gone
to the bedside, found therein a handsome young man in whose arms Meldina
was lying. And when they saw this, the delight of the king and queen was
very great, and the king gave order that before anyone should leave the
chamber the pig’s hide should be torn to shreds. So great was their joy
over the recovery of their son that they wellnigh died thereof.
And King Galeotto, when he saw that he had so fine a son, and a
grandchild likewise, laid aside his diadem and his royal robes, and
advanced to his place his son, whom he let be crowned with the greatest
pomp, and who was ever afterwards known as King Pig. Thus, to the great
contentment of all the people, the young king began his reign, and he
lived long and happily with Meldina his beloved wife.
When Isabella’s story was finished, the whole company broke into
laughter at the notion of the pig prince, all dirty and muddy as he was,
kissing his beloved spouse and lying by her side. “But let us give over
laughter,” cried Signora Lucretia, “in order that Isabella’s enigma may
be given in due course.” And forthwith Isabella, with a smile,
propounded her riddle.
I prithee, sir, to give to me,
What never did belong to thee,
Or ever will, what though thy span
Of life exceed the wont of man.
Dream not this treasure to attain;
Thy longing will be all in vain;
But if you deem me such a prize,
And pine for me with loving eyes,
Give me this boon, my wish fulfil,
For you can grant it if you will.
When Isabella had set forth her cunningly devised enigma, the listeners
were all in a state of bewilderment, for no one could understand how a
man could give what he did not possess or ever could possess. But
Isabella, when she saw that they were troubled overmuch, said, with much
good taste and judgment: “There is no reason for wonder, my good
friends, for a man certainly can give to a woman that which he has not
or ever will have; that is to say, a man has no husband nor ever will
have one, but it is an easy matter for him to give one to a lady.” The
whole company received this solution with much applause, and when
silence had once more been imposed on the assembly, Fiordiana, who sat
next to Isabella, arose from her seat and, smiling merrily, said:
“Signora, and you gentle folks all, does it not seem meet to you that
Signor Molino, our good friend, should enliven this honourable company
with one of his merry conceits; and I say this, not because I want to
escape the task of telling my own story (for I have ready more than
one), but because I feel that a tale, told with all his accustomed
pleasant grace and style, would, just now, give the company the greater
delight. He, as you well know, is ingenious and full of wit, and gifted
with all those good parts which pertain to a man of breeding. And as for
ourselves, dear ladies, it is better that we should ply our needles than
be always telling stories.”
All agreed with these prudent and well-timed words of Fiordiana, and
warmly applauded them, and the Signora, casting her eyes towards Molino,
said: “Come, Signor Antonio, it is now your turn to enliven us with an
example of your graceful wit.” And she signed to him to begin. Molino,
who had not reckoned on being named as a story-teller for this evening,
first gave his thanks to Fiordiana for the flattering words she had
spoken of him, and then in obedience to the Signora’s direction began
his fable.