=A simple fellow, named Peter, gets back his wits by the help of a
tunny fish which he spared after having taken it in his net, and
likewise wins for his wife a king’s daughter.=
There is proof enough, dear ladies, both in the chronicles of the past
and in the doings of our own day, that a fool, whether by lucky accident
or by sheer force of blundering, may sometimes score a success where a
wise man might fail. Therefore it has come into my mind to tell you the
story of one of these fools, who, through the issue of a very foolish
deed, got for his wife the daughter of a king and became a wise man
himself into the bargain.
In the Ligurian Sea there is an island called Capraia, which, at the
time I am describing, was ruled by King Luciano. Amongst his subjects
was a poor widow named Isotta, who lived with her only son Peter, a
fisher-lad, but from Peter’s fishing she would scarce have kept body and
soul together, for he was a poor silly creature known to all the
neighbours as Peter the Fool. Though he went fishing every day he never
caught anything, but in spite of his ill-success he would always come up
from his boat shouting and bellowing so that all the town might hear
him: ‘Mother, mother, bring out your tubs and your buckets and your
pails; bring them out all, great and small, for Peter has caught a
boatful of fish.’ The poor woman soon got to know the value of Peter’s
bragging, but in spite of this she always prepared the vessels, only to
find herself jeered at by the silly youth, who, as soon as he came near,
would thrust out his long tongue in ridicule, and otherwise mock at her.
Now it chanced that the widow’s cottage stood just opposite to the
palace of King Luciano, who had only one child, a pretty graceful girl
about ten years old, Luciana by name. She, it happened, was looking out
of the window of the palace one day when Peter came back from fishing,
crying out to his mother to bring out her tubs and her buckets and her
pails to hold the fish with which he was laden, and so much was she
diverted at the silly antics of the fool, that it seemed likely she
would die with laughing. Peter, when he saw that he was made sport of,
grew very angry, and threw some ugly words at her, but the more he raged
the more she—after the manner of wilful children—laughed and made mock
at him. Peter, however, went on with his fishing day after day, and
played the same trick on his mother every evening on his return; but at
last fortune favoured him, and he caught a fine tunny, very big and fat.
Overjoyed at his good luck, he began to shout and cry out over and over
again, ‘Mother and I will have a good supper to-night,’ when, to his
amazement, he heard the tunny which he had just caught begin to speak:
‘Ah! my dear brother, I pray you of your courtesy to give me my life.
When once you have eaten me, what farther benefit do you think you will
get from me? but if you will let me live there is no telling what
service I may not render you.’ But Peter, whose thoughts just then were
set only on his supper, hoisted the fish on his shoulders and set off
homewards; but the tunny still kept on beseeching his captor to spare
his life, promising him first as many fish as he could want, and finally
to do him any favour he might demand. Peter was not hardhearted, and,
though a fool, fancied he might profit by sparing the fish, so he
listened to the tunny’s petition and threw him back into the sea. The
fish, sensible of Peter’s kindness, and not wishing to seem ungrateful,
told Peter to get into his boat again and tilt it over so that the water
could run in. This advice Peter at once followed, and, having leant over
on one side, he let the boat be half filled with water, which brought in
with it such a huge quantity of fish that the boat was in danger of
sinking. Peter was wellnigh beside himself with joy when he saw what had
happened, and, when he had taken as many fish as he could carry, he
betook himself homewards, crying out, as was his wont, when he drew near
to the cottage: ‘Mother, mother, bring out your tubs and your buckets
and your pails; bring out them all, great and small, for Peter has
caught a boatful of fish.’ At first poor Isotta, thinking that he was
only playing his old fool’s game, took no heed; but at last, hearing him
cry out louder than ever, and fearing that he might commit some greater
folly if he should not find the vessels prepared as usual, got them all
ready. What was her surprise to see her simpleton of a son at last
coming back with a brave spoil! The Princess Luciana was at the palace
window, and hearing Peter bellowing louder than ever, she laughed louder
than ever, so that Peter was almost mad with rage, and having left his
fish, he rushed back to the seashore, and called aloud on the tunny to
come and help him. The fish, hearing Peter’s voice, came to the marge of
the shore, and putting his nose up out of the waves, asked what service
was required of him. ‘What service!’ cried Peter. ‘Why I would that
Luciana, that saucy minx, the daughter of our king, should find herself
with child at once.’
What followed was a proof that the tunny had not made an empty promise
to Peter, for before many days had passed the figure of the young girl,
who was not twelve years old, began to show signs of maternity. Her
mother, when she marked this, fell into great trouble, but she could not
believe that a child of eleven could be pregnant, and rather set down
the swelling to the working of an incurable disease; so she brought
Luciana to be examined by some women expert in such cases, and these, as
soon as they saw the girl, declared that she was certainly with child.
The queen, overwhelmed by this terrible news, told it also to the king,
and he, when he heard it, cried aloud for death rather than such
ignominy. Strict inquisition was made to discover who could have
violated the child, but nothing was found out; so Luciano, to hide her
dire disgrace, determined to have his daughter secretly killed.
The queen, on hearing this, begged her husband to spare the unfortunate
Luciana till the child should be born, and then do with her what he
would. The king, moved with compassion for his only daughter, gave way
so far; and in due time Luciana was delivered of a boy so fine and
beautiful that the king could no longer harbour the thought of putting
them away, but, on the other hand, gave order to the queen that the boy
should be well tended till he was a year old. When this time was
completed the child had become beautiful beyond compare, and then it
came into the king’s mind that he would again make a trial to find out
who the father might be. He issued a proclamation that every man in the
city who had passed fourteen years should, under pain of losing his
head, present himself at the palace bearing in his hand some fruit or
flower which might attract the child’s attention. On the appointed day,
in obedience to the proclamation, all those summoned came to the palace,
bearing, this man one thing and that man another, and, having passed
before the king, sat down according to their rank.
Now it happened that a certain young man as he was betaking himself to
the palace met Peter, and said to him, ‘Peter, why are you not going to
the palace like all the others to obey the order of the king?’ ‘What
should I do in such a crowd as that?’ said Peter. ‘Cannot you see I am a
poor naked fellow, and have hardly a rag to my back, and yet you ask me
to push myself in amongst all those gentlemen and courtiers? No.’ Then
the young man, laughing at him, said, ‘Come with me, and I will give you
a coat. Who knows whether the child may not turn out to be yours?’ In
the end Peter let himself be persuaded to go to the young man’s house,
and having put on a decent coat, they went together to the palace; but
when they arrived there Peter’s heart again failed him, and he hid
himself behind a door. By this time all the men had presented themselves
to the king, and were seated in the hall. Then Luciano commanded the
nurse to bring in the child, thinking that if the father should be there
the sense of paternity would make him give some sign. As the nurse
carried the child down the hall everyone, as he passed, began to caress
him and to give him, this one a fruit and that one a flower; but the
infant, with a wave of his hand, refused them all. When the nurse passed
by the entrance door the child began to laugh and crow, and threw
himself forward so lustily that he almost jumped out of the woman’s
arms, but she, not knowing that anyone was there, walked on down the
hall. When she came back to the same place, the child was more delighted
than ever, laughing and pointing with his finger to the door; so that
the king, who had already noticed the child’s actions, called to the
nurse, and asked her who was behind the door. The nurse, being somewhat
confused, said that surely some beggar must be hidden there. By the
king’s command Peter was at once haled forth, and everybody recognized
the town fool; but the child, who was close to him, stretched out his
arms and clasped Peter round the neck, and kissed him lovingly. The
king, recognizing the sign, was stricken to the heart with grief, and
having discharged the assembly, commanded that Peter and Luciana and the
child should be put to death forthwith.
The queen, though assenting to this doom, was fearful lest the public
execution of the victims might draw down upon the king the anger of the
people; so she persuaded him to have made a huge cask into which the
three might be put and cast into the sea to drift at random; then, at
least, no one might witness their dying agony. This the king agreed to;
and when the cask was made, the condemned ones were put therein, with a
basket of bread and a flask of wine, and a drum of figs for the child,
and thrust out into the rough sea, with the expectation that the waves
would soon dash it to pieces against the rocks; but this was not to be
their fate.
Peter’s poor old mother, when she heard of her son’s misfortune, died of
grief in a few days; and the unhappy Luciana, tossed about by the cruel
waves, and seeing neither sun nor moon, would have welcomed a similar
fate. The child, since she had no milk to give it, had to be soothed to
sleep with now and then a fig; but Peter seemed to care for nothing, and
ate the bread and drank the wine steadily, laughing the while. ‘Alas!
alas!’ cried Luciana in despair, ‘you care nothing for this evil which
you have brought upon me, a poor innocent girl. You eat and drink and
laugh without a thought of the danger around us.’ ‘Why,’ replied Peter,
‘this misfortune is more your own fault than mine. If you had not mocked
me so, it would never have happened; but do not lose heart, our troubles
will soon be over,’ ‘I believe that,’ cried Luciana, ‘for the cask will
soon be split on a rock, and then we must all be drowned.’ ‘No, no,’
said Peter, ‘calm yourself. I have a secret, and were you to know what
it is, you would be vastly surprised and vastly delighted too, I
believe.’ ‘What secret can you know,’ said Luciana, ‘which will avail us
in such danger as this?’ ‘I will soon tell you,’ Peter replied. ‘I have
a faithful servant, a great fish, who will do me any service I ask of
him, and there is nothing he cannot do. I may as well tell you it was
through his working that you became with child.’ ‘That I cannot
believe,’ said Luciana; ‘and what may this fish of yours be called?’
‘His name is Signor Tunny,’ replied Peter. ‘Then,’ said Luciana, ‘to put
your fish to the test, I will ask you to transfer to me the power you
exercise over him, and to command him to do my bidding instead of
yours.’ ‘Be it as you will,’ said Peter; and without more ado he called
the tunny, who at once rose up near the cask, whereupon Peter commanded
him to do everything that Luciana might require of him. She at once
exercised her power over the fish by ordering him to make the waves cast
the cask ashore in a fair safe cleft in the rocks on an island, a short
sail from her father’s kingdom. As soon as the fish had worked her will
so far, she laid other and much harder tasks upon him: one was to change
Peter from the ugly fool he was into a clever, handsome gallant; another
was, to have built for her forthwith a rich and sumptuous palace, with
lofty halls and chambers, and girt with carven terraces. Within the
court there was to be laid out a beautiful garden, full of trees which
should bear, instead of fruit, pearls and precious stones, and in the
midst of it two fountains, one of the freshest water and the other of
the finest wine. All these wonders were wrought by the fish almost as
soon as Luciana had spoken.
Now all this time the king and the queen were in deep misery in thinking
of the cruel death they had contrived for Luciana and her child, how
they had given their own flesh and blood to be eaten by the fishes;
therefore, to find some solace in their woe, they determined to go to
Jerusalem and to visit the Holy Land. So they ordered a ship to be put
in order for them, and furnished with all things suited to their state.
They set sail with a favouring wind, and before they had gone a hundred
miles they came in sight of an island upon which they could see a
stately palace, built a little above the level of the sea. Seeing that
this palace was so fair and sumptuous, and standing, moreover, within
Luciano’s kingdom, they were seized with a longing to view it more
closely; so, having put into a haven, they landed on the island. Before
they had come to the palace Luciana and Peter saw and recognized them,
and, having gone forth to meet them, greeted them with a cordial
welcome, but the king and queen did not know their hosts for the great
change which had come over them. The guests were taken first into the
palace, which they examined in every part, praising loudly its great
beauty, and then they were led by a secret staircase into the garden,
the splendour of which pleased them so amazingly that they swore they
had never at any time before looked upon a place so delightful. In the
centre of this garden there stood a noble tree, which bore on one of its
branches three golden apples. These the keeper of the garden was charged
to guard jealously against robbers, and now, by some secret working
which I cannot unravel, the finest of these apples was transported into
the folds of the king’s robe about his bosom, and there hidden. Luciano
and the queen were about to take their leave when the keeper approached
and said to Luciana, ‘Madam, the most beautiful of the three golden
apples is missing, and I can find no trace of the thief.’
Luciana forthwith gave orders that the whole household should be
searched, one by one, for such a loss as this was no light matter. The
keeper, after he had searched thoroughly everyone, came back and told
Luciana that the apple was nowhere to be found. At these words Luciana
fell into great confusion, and, turning to the king, said: ‘Your majesty
must not be wroth with me if I ask that even you allow yourself to be
searched, for I prize the golden apple that is lost almost as highly as
my life.’ The king, unsuspicious of any trick, and sure of his
innocence, straightway loosened his robe, and lo! the golden apple fell
from it to the ground.
The king stood as one dazed, ignorant as to how the golden apple could
have come into his robe, and Luciana spoke: ‘Sire, we have welcomed you
to our house with all the worship fitting to your rank, and now, as a
recompense, you would privily rob our garden of its finest fruit.
Meseems you have proved yourself very ungrateful.’ The king, in his
innocence, attempted to prove to her that he could not have taken the
apple, and Luciana, seeing his confusion, knew that the time had come
for her to speak, and reveal herself to her father. ‘My lord,’ she said,
with the tears in her eyes, ‘I am Luciana, your hapless daughter, whom
you sentenced to a cruel death along with my child and Peter the
fisher-boy. Though I bore a child, I was never unchaste. Here is the
boy, and here is he whom men were wont to call Peter the Fool. You
wonder at this change. It has all been brought about by the power of a
marvellous fish whose life Peter spared when he had caught it in his
net. By this power Peter has been turned into the wisest of men, and the
palace you see has been built. In the same way I became pregnant without
knowledge of a man, and the golden apple was conveyed into the folds of
your robe. I am as innocent of unchastity as you are of theft.’
When the king heard these words his eyes were opened, and he knew his
child. Then, weeping with joy, they embraced each other, and all were
glad and happy. After spending a few days on the island, they all
embarked and returned together to Capraia, where with sumptuous
feastings and rejoicings Peter was duly married to Luciana, and lived
with her in great honour and contentment, until Luciano died, and then
he became king in his stead.
The story of Cateruzza had at one time moved the ladies to tears; but,
when its happy issue was made known to them, they rejoiced and thanked
God therefor. Then the Signora, when Cateruzza had ended, commanded her
to continue in the order they had followed hitherto, and she, not
willing to hold in suspense the attention of her hearers, smilingly
proposed to them the following enigma:
Sir Redman stands behind a tree,
Now hidden, now in sight is he.
To him four runners speed along,
Bearing a warrior huge and strong.
Two darts into the trunk he wings,
And Redman from his lair upsprings,
And smites him from behind with skill;
Thus ten little men one giant kill.
Now he who shall this speech unfold,
Shall be a witty rogue and bold.
Cateruzza’s graceful and ingenious enigma was received by the whole
company with applause. Many interpretations were put forth; but none
came so near the mark as Lauretta: “Our sister’s enigma can have but one
meaning—the wild bull of the forest,’ she said. ‘He has four runners to
carry his huge bulk. The sight of a red rag maddens him, and thinking to
rend it, he strikes his horns into the tree. Straightway the huntsman,
who was hidden behind the trunk, comes forth and kills him with a dart
sped by ten little men, that is, the ten fingers of his two hands.”
This speedy solution of her riddle raised an angry humour in Cateruzza’s
heart, for she had hoped it might prove beyond the wit of any; but she
had not reckoned for Lauretta’s quickness. The Signora, who perceived
that the two were fain to wrangle, called for silence, and gave the word
to Arianna to begin a story which should please them all, and the
damsel, somewhat bashful, began as follows.