which was to take place immediately, and all sorts of fine clothes were
ordered for the shepherd’s daughter, that she might appear properly as
the wife of the Prince, but for the few days just before the wedding,
the rain fell as it had never been known to have fallen; it beat
through the roofs of the cottages, and the river swelled and overflowed
its banks; everyone was frightened, save indeed the shepherd’s
daughter, who went out into the wet and danced as was her wont, letting
the torrents fall upon her head and shoulders.
But the evening before the wedding-day she knelt beside her mother’s
side. “Dear mother,” she said, “let me stop with you and nurse you when
you are old. Do not send me away to the palace to live with the King’s
son.”
Then the mother was very angry, and told her daughter that she was very
ungrateful, and she ought to be thankful that such luck had come in her
way, and who was she, the daughter of a poor shepherd, that she should
object to marrying the King’s son?
All night long the rain fell in torrents, and when next day the
shepherd’s daughter was dressed in all her finery, it was through pools
on the ground that she had to step into the grand carriage which the
King had sent to fetch her, and while the marriage-service was being
read, the priest’s voice could scarcely be heard for the pattering of
the drops upon the roof, and when they went into the castle to the
banquet, the water burst through the doors opened to receive them,
so that the King and the wedding guests had hard ado to keep dry. It
was a grand feast, and the King’s son sat at one end of the table,
and his young wife was beside him dressed in white and gold. All the
courtiers and all the fine guests declared that surely the world had
never contained such a beautiful young woman as their future Queen. But
just when the goblets were filled with wine, to drink to the health of
the bride and bridegroom, there came a cry, “The floods! the floods!”
and the servants ran into the hall, crying out that the waters were
pouring in, and in one moment the rooms were filled with water, and no
one thought of anything but to save themselves. When the hurricane had
subsided, and the waters gone down, they looked around for the Prince’s
wife, who was nowhere to be found. Every one said that she had been
swept away by the torrents, and that she had been drowned in all her
youth and beauty; only the shepherd’s wife wept alone, and remembered
the words of the woman who came to her on the night of the storm: “When
you love aught on earth better than your daughter and her happiness,
she will go from you.”
The King’s son mourned his wife, and for long would not be comforted;
but when many years had passed, he married a beautiful Princess, and
with her lived very happily; only when the rain fell in torrents and
beat against the window-panes it would seem to him as if he heard the
sound of dancing feet, and a voice that called out, “Come and dance
with me, come and dance with me and my brothers and sisters, oh, King’s
son, and feel our drops upon your face.”
[Illustration: THE PLOUGHMAN & THE GNOME]
A YOUNG ploughman was following his plough in a field one morning when
suddenly the horses stopped, and do what he would he could not make
them stir. Then he tried to push the plough himself, but he could
not move it one hair’s-breadth. He stooped down to see what could be
stopping it, when a deep voice cried, “Stop, I am coming up.” The
voice was so loud that the ploughman shook with fear, but though he
looked all around him, he could see no one from whom it could come.
But presently it spoke again (only this time it was a little lower),
and called out, “Have patience, and I shall be up in a moment.” The
ploughman quaked in every limb, and stood quite still, and the voice
began again (but this time it was no louder than most folks’), and it
said—“If you will only not be in such a hurry, I will tell you what I
want. Look in front of your horse’s right foot, and pick me up.”
He bent down and looked on the ground, and there in the earth, just in
front of his horse’s right foot, he saw what he thought was a little
black lizard. He touched it very cautiously, and started back with
surprise when the voice spoke again, and he found it came from this
tiny creature.
“Yes,” it said, “that is quite right. You can pick me up in your hand
if you like, but I think I must grow a little bigger, as I am really
uncomfortably small,” and while he held it on the palm of his hand,
the ploughman saw that it was beginning to grow larger, and it swelled
so fast that in a few seconds it was near a foot high, and he had to
take both hands to hold it. Then he saw that it was not a lizard, but
a little black woman with a face that looked as though it were made of
india-rubber, and ugly little black hands.
“There, that will do,” said the strange little gnome. “That is a nice
useful size. Oh dear, how tiring growing is! I don’t think I’ll be any
bigger just yet. Now be sure you don’t drop me, and handle me very
carefully, for I do not like to be roughly touched. I have not slept
nearly as long as I meant to. I wanted a hundred years’ nap, and it
cannot be more than fifty, but now that I am awake I think I will keep
so for a bit. You seem to be rather a nice civil young man. How would
you like to take me for a lodger?”
“A lodger!” gasped the ploughman. “Why, what should I do with you?”
“I should give no trouble,” said the gnome. “But are there any women in
your house?”
“No,” said the ploughman, “for I have no wife, and I am too poor to
keep a servant.”
“So much the better,” said the gnome. “For though I am a woman myself,
I detest women, and only get on with men.”
“You a woman!” cried the ploughman, and he laughed outright.
“Of course I am a woman,” said the creature. “Come, say quickly, do you
like to have me for a lodger or not? Of course you will have to agree
to my terms.”
“And what are your terms?” asked the ploughman.
“Only this. Whatever comes into the house, you must always give the
best of it to me. I will choose where I shall live for myself, when I
see the house, but of all the food you have, you must save the best and
give it to me. Not much of it, but the very best pieces. As you are
a man I cannot wear your clothes, but you can give me some of their
material, and of everything else that comes into the house of any sort,
tobacco, or carpets, or furniture, I must have some of the best. And at
meals I must always be helped first. If you agree to this, I may stay
with you for a very long time.”
“Oh, oh,” said the ploughman, “and pray what shall I get by it? It
seems to me as if you wanted to get the best of everything and give
nothing in return.”
“On the contrary,” replied the gnome, “I shall give a very great deal.
For as long as I remain in your house, all things will go well with
you. You are a poor man now, but you will soon be a rich one. If you
sow seeds they will give twice as much crop as other people’s. All your
animals will do well, and in a little time, instead of being a poor
ploughman, you will be the richest farmer in the countryside.”
“Well,” quoth the ploughman, “I don’t mind trying. I think it would
rather amuse me to take you to my cottage; but if you don’t keep your
part of the bargain, and I don’t find things are going very well with
me, I warn you I’ll pretty soon turn you out.”
“Agreed,” said the gnome; “but remember, if you fail in your compact
with me, I shall go by myself. Now carry me home and let me choose
where I will live.”
The ploughman carried the odd little figure back to his cottage, gaping
with astonishment; there he put it down on the kitchen-table in the
little kitchen. It looked all round it, and twisted about its little
black head.
“That will do nicely,” it said at last; “there is a little hole in
that corner, down which I can go, and near that hole you must place all
your daintiest bits, and remember that I must always be helped first
at all your meals.” And without a word it leaped from the table, and
scuttled away down a big hole that the rats had made, and was no more
to be seen.
But when in the evening the ploughman came in to eat his meal, before
he began it he took the very best bit of meat and the nicest of the
vegetable, and laid them down near the hole. Then he watched eagerly
to see what would happen, but while he looked there they remained.
Suddenly, however, the door shut with a bang, and he turned his head
for a moment to see what caused it, and when he looked back the food
had disappeared. Every day it was much the same. He put some of the
best food on the table down near the hole, but as long as he watched
there it remained, but when he took his eyes off for a moment it had
disappeared. In the same way when he had new clothes, he took a choice
bit of material and laid it near the hole, and it vanished also. And of
whatever came into the house he took some of the best and did the same
with it.
Meantime things began to improve very much with him. He had only a
little bit of land round his cottage, but this year the vegetables and
fruit he had planted there grew so well that he had a large quantity to
send to market, and he sold them for such good prices, that soon he was
able to get more land and buy his own animals, and in a little while
had a farm of his own, and had grown to be quite a rich man, while all
his neighbours said his luck was extraordinary. Meantime he saw or
heard nothing more of the little black gnome, and except when he put
the food and other thing’s near the hole almost forgot all about her.
Time passed, and the time came when the ploughman began to think he
would like to take a wife; he made up his mind to marry a very pretty
girl in the next village, who was said to be the prettiest girl in all
the neighbourhood. Many of the young men would have liked to marry
her, but the ploughman was a handsome, cheery young fellow, and she
preferred him to all of the others, and so they were married, and she
came home to live at the farm. The evening after their wedding they had
a fine fat fowl for supper, and the ploughman before he helped his
wife cut off the choicest slice from the breast and took it as usual to
the hole.
“Husband,” cried the wife, “have you gone mad that you should give the
best of the food to the rats and the mice?”
“I am not mad at all,” said the ploughman, “but my grandfather loved
nothing in the world so well as rats and mice, and he made me promise
before he died that they should always be well cared for in my house,
and have of the best.”
“Then if you are not mad,” replied the wife, “I think your grandfather
was! It is only the best poison that is good for rats and mice,
and they shall have it soon, now that I am in the house.” But the
ploughman caressed his wife and begged her to let him keep his promise
to his grandfather, and the wife held her peace, not liking to seem
bad-tempered on her wedding-day. After a bit she got used to her
husband putting down little bits of food, as he said, for the rats and
mice, and though she always declared she was going to poison them, she
did not try to do so, as her husband seemed grieved when she talked
about it.
Thus things went on very happily for some months, when the wife began
to think that her clothes were getting very old, and that she must
have some new ones. So she took plenty of money and went into the
neighbouring town, and came home with new dresses, and hats, and
bonnets, and very pretty she looked in them, and her husband was very
much pleased with them. But that evening after his wife was gone
to bed, as the ploughman was finishing his pipe in the kitchen, he
suddenly heard a deep voice from the hole, which called out just as it
had done months before, “Stop, I am coming up.”
For an instant the ploughman quaked with fear, then he saw something no
bigger than a black beetle creeping through the hole, and it came in
front of his chair, and he heard the voice, which was not so loud this
time, say—
“That will do, now I am going to begin to grow a little,” and it began
to grow, and grow, and grow, till it was about eight inches high, and
the ploughman saw it was the little black woman. “There,” she said,
speaking quite quietly, “that is a nice useful size, that will do.
Now I have something to say to you, and you will have to attend very
carefully. I consider that you are breaking your compact. In the first
place, you married without asking my leave, and, as I told you, I don’t
like women in the house, but I will say nothing about that, as we had
not spoken about it before, but how can you explain about all the fine
clothes that your wife fetched home to-day? She has taken them to her
room and not given one to me!”
“Nay,” cried the ploughman, “they are my wife’s clothes, not mine.”
“Nonsense,” said the gnome, “you gave her the money for them. Now
understand that whatever she buys for herself in the future, she must
buy the same for me. Two of everything: dresses, hats, gloves, whatever
she has, I must have too, and be sure that mine are quite as good as
hers.”
“But how am I to manage that?” cried the ploughman; “how can I explain
it to her without telling her that you are there?”
“That is your business,” said the gnome. “All I say is that I must
have the things if I am to remain in your house. You can tell her what
you please. So now you know, and see that you do as I tell you,” and
suddenly the little figure shrunk up till it was about the size of a
black beetle, and then disappeared down the hole without another word.
The ploughman rubbed his head, and wondered what he could do. He did
not at all want to tell his wife about the little gnome, for he was
sure she would not like it, but at the same time he did not want the
gnome to leave his house and take away his luck.
A few days after, his wife told him she was going to the shoemaker’s
to buy herself some smart new shoes, and the ploughman thought of the
gnome, and knew he must do as she had told him. So he said to his wife,
“Wife, when you get those shoes for yourself, I wish you would get a
pair just like them for my cousin who has written to me to ask me for a
present. I should like to send her some nice boots and shoes as she is
very poor, so I shall be very much obliged if you will get two pairs of
whatever you may get for yourself that I may send her one.”
The wife wondered very much, for she did not know the ploughman had any
cousin; however, she went into the town, and brought home two pairs of
smart red shoes with bows on the top.
When she had gone to bed at night, the ploughman took one pair and
laid it by the hole in the same place where he had put the food, and
it disappeared just as the food did without his seeing where it went.
“Now,” thought he, “when she sees I am quite honest, perhaps the ugly
little gnome will be content, and let us go on in peace.”
So time went on, and the ploughman and his wife lived very happily
and quietly, till one evening a pedlar came round with a tray holding
all sorts of pretty things to sell. The ploughman’s wife went to the
door, and looked at the things: then she bought a pretty comb for her
hair, but she would not show it to her husband, as she meant to wear it
before him as a surprise next day.
But that evening after his wife had gone to bed, as the ploughman
sat finishing his pipe by the fire, he heard the voice from the hole
calling as loudly as ever, “Stop! I am coming up.” Again the ploughman
quaked with fear, and then he saw coming through the hole something no
bigger than a black beetle, and again the voice said in a lower tone,
“Now I will begin to grow a little,” and presently the tiny black
thing had swelled into the ugly little black woman with the face like
india-rubber.
“Listen to me,” she said, “and know that I am beginning to feel very
angry. You are beginning to cheat me. To-day your wife bought herself
a brand-new comb from a pedlar at the door, and never got one for me.
To-morrow evening I must have that comb. I don’t care how you get it,
but have it I must.”
The ploughman scratched his head and was sore perplexed. “What on earth
am I to do?” he cried, “for my wife will think me very cruel if I take
away all the pretty little things she buys for herself.”
“I can’t help that,” answered the gnome. “I have got to have that comb
by this time to-morrow night, and I warn you if you begin to deceive
me, just as if I were an ordinary human being, I shall pretty soon take
myself off,” and with that the gnome disappeared through the hole in an
instant.
Next morning at breakfast the wife came down with the new comb in her
hair, and said to her husband, “See, husband, I bought this of the
pedlar yesterday, and he tells me they are quite the newest fashion,
and all the great ladies in town are wearing them.”
“Well,” quoth the ploughman, “such a fashion may be all very well for
the great ladies who have scarce any hair of their own, but, for my own
part, I had rather see your beautiful hair just as it is without any
adornment.”
At this the wife pouted, and was very cross. “’Tis too bad of you
to say that. I thought you would like your wife to wear all the new
fashions, and be smart like other folks.”
“Nay,” cried the ploughman, “my wife is much prettier than other folks,
and she looks prettiest of all when she has little to adorn her. If any
of these great ladies had hair like yours you may be sure they would
pretty soon throw away any combs or caps or pins, so that nothing but
their hair should be seen.”
When her husband was gone, the wife went to her glass and looked at
herself, and took out the comb and then put it in, and tried it every
way. “’Tis true, for sure,” said she, “my hair is very beautiful, and
maybe it looks best done up as I used to wear it, still it seems a pity
not to use the comb when I have bought it.” So when her husband came
back, she said to him, “I believe you are right, husband, and it suits
me better not to have anything in my hair, but maybe if you are wanting
to send a present to that cousin of yours, you would like to send her
that comb. It would save buying anything fresh.”
On this the ploughman laughed to himself, but he thanked his wife very
much and put the comb in his pocket. In the evening after the wife had
gone to bed, the ploughman took it, and put it down by the hole, and
then went on smoking his pipe without waiting to see if it disappeared.
But in a few minutes he heard the voice crying, “Stop! I am coming up,”
and saw again the gnome come through the hole and then begin to grow as
before. “Now this is too bad,” cried the ploughman. “What can you want
now? Here I have just given you the comb you wanted, and nothing else
new has come into the house.” “On the contrary,” answered the gnome, “I
consider that you have brought a great many new things into the house
since I came to live here, and I mean now to have my choice of some of
them, since I do not find that you are honest enough to offer them to
me. To begin with, I want your wife’s hair. I have been trying mine
with that comb, and I find I can’t make it do at all, and so I mean to
have your wife’s.”
“My wife’s!” gasped the ploughman. “You must be mad!”
“Mad or not mad,” replied the gnome, “I mean to have it, and, moreover,
it is my due. You married without consulting me, and if I kept you to
your bargain, I should have a great deal that I have not got. Certainly
your wife has the best head of hair in the house, so you must cut it
off near her head and bring it all to me.”
“But whatever shall I say to my wife?” cried the ploughman in distress.
“That is your look-out, not mine,” said the gnome. “Anyhow you have got
to give it to me. But as the thought of it seems to annoy you I will
give you a week to get it in.”
The ploughman sat and thought and thought, and very sad did he feel
at thinking of all his wife’s beautiful hair being given away to the
little gnome.
Next day he took his horse and cart, and told his wife he had to go for
a long drive on business to a big town, a long way off. It was quite
the biggest town in that neighbourhood, and many very fine people
lived there. At first the wife wanted to go too, but her husband said
it was too far and she would be too tired, as he could not be back till
very late at night.
Next morning, when they sat at breakfast, he told his wife all he had
heard and seen in the big town, and then he added, “And all the very
fine ladies there have now the funniest fashion.”
“And what is that?” asked his wife; “pray tell me, for I love to hear
the new fashions.”
“Why,” said the ploughman, “’tis with their hair. Instead of wearing it
long, they have it cut quite close all round their heads, because they
say it looks smarter now.”
“Well, I do call that a silly fashion,” said the wife; “they can’t have
had much hair to consent to have had it cut off.”
“No, indeed,” said her husband, “and yet with some of them, they look
very smart and pretty with their little curly heads.”
“Much like boys, I should think,” said the wife scornfully.
“No, not quite that, either,” said the ploughman, “more like the
pictures of angels in the old churches, and they say it is the great
thing for it to curl up all round the head, and when it does that of
itself, they are very proud of it.”
“Well, then, some of them might be very proud of mine,” said the wife,
“for it’s as curly as may be, and if I were to cut it short would be
all in tiny curls.”
When her husband had gone to his work, the ploughman’s wife could do
nothing but think of the strange new fashion of which her husband had
told her. “I wonder how it would suit me,” she thought, and when he
came in to dinner she said to him—
“Husband, is it really true that all those fine ladies looked very
pretty and smart with their hair short?”
“Ay, that they did,” he said; “I was quite surprised to see them, and
I heard they said ’twas a wonderful saving of trouble, and that their
hair could never grow untidy.”
“That is true,” said the wife, “yet I should be sorry to cut mine off.”
[Illustration: “I wonder how it would look?” and she snipped off a big
bit.]
“No need that you should,” said the ploughman, “and there are not many
folks up here to see if we are in the fashion or not. All the same,
you are sure to look prettier than the town ladies any way, whichever
way your hair is done, for your face is prettier.”
But when her husband had gone away again the wife went to her glass
with the scissors in her hand. “As my husband says,” she quoth, “it
would be a wonderful saving of trouble, and then it would be very nice
to let all the women round see that I could be in the fashion before
they. I wonder how it would look?” and she snipped off a big bit. “Here
goes,” she cried; “after all ’tis best to follow the fashions, whatever
they are,” and she went on cutting till, when her husband came in, he
found her with her hair all cut off beside her.
“There, husband,” cried she, “do I look like the smart ladies in town?”
“Ay, that you do,” he answered, “only ten times prettier; but as for
all that beautiful hair, you must just give it to me, for it is so
beautiful I would not let it be lost for anything,” and he took up all
the heap of fine gold hair and tied it together with a bright ribbon.
The wife looked at herself in the glass, and thought she really looked
very nice with little curls all round her head, and though the
ploughman grieved over it in his heart, yet he was glad he had got her
hair, and thought, “Now at last that miserable little gnome will be
content, and leave me alone.” So that evening, when his wife was gone
to bed, he took the bunch of hair and laid it near the hole, and it
disappeared, and he knew the gnome had it.
So for a time all went on quietly with the ploughman, and he hoped he
should not hear more of the gnome, but one evening, after his wife had
gone to bed and he was in the kitchen smoking his pipe alone, he heard
the hated voice shouting, “Stop! I am coming up,” and then he saw the
little black thing like a black beetle coming through the hole, and all
happened just as before.
“Well, what do you want now?” cried the ploughman when he saw the ugly
little woman in front of him. “I have given you my wife’s hair, and
surely you ought to be content.”
“Not at all,” said the gnome, “for I have tried on her hair, and I find
it does not suit my complexion. I have never seen her myself, and I
don’t think you any judge, but I heard you telling her that her face
was prettier than any of the town ladies. In that case you have no
right to keep it for yourself. I must have your wife’s face.”
“My wife’s face!” screamed the ploughman, “I think you must be mad. How
can I give you my wife’s face? And what would you do with it?”
“Wear it,” answered the gnome; “and all you have to do is to fetch your
wife in here this day week, and tell her what I wish; and I will come
up and scrape off as much of her face as I want.”
“Why, it would kill her,” cried the ploughman.