He leaps on his horse, and begins to fight with the serpent. The
serpent makes some terrible bounds. After having fought a long time,
at last Petit Yorge is the conqueror. He cuts off one head, and the
horse another with his foot. The serpent begs quarter till the next
day. Petit Yorge grants it, and the serpent goes away.
The young lady wishes to take the young man home, to show him to
her father; but he will not go by any means. He tells her that he
must go to Rome, and set off that very day; that he has made a vow,
but that to-morrow he will send his cousin, who is very bold, and is
afraid of nothing.
The young lady goes to her father's, Petit Yorge to his garden. Her
father is delighted, and cannot comprehend it at all. The young lady
goes again with the dinner. The gardener says to her,
"You see you have come again to-day, as I told you. To-morrow you
will come again, just the same."
"I should be very glad of it."
On the morrow Petit Yorge went off at eight o'clock to the Tartaro. He
said to him that the serpent had still three heads to be cut off,
and that he had still need of all his help. The Tartaro said to him,
"Keep quiet, keep quiet; you will conquer him."
He gives him a new dress, finer than the others, a more spirited horse,
a terrible dog, [26] a sword, and a bottle of good scented water. [27]
He said to him,
"The serpent will say to you, 'Ah! if I had a spark between my head and
my tail, how I would burn you and your lady, and your horse and your
dog.' And you, you will say to him then, 'I, if I had the good-scented
water to smell, I would cut off a head from thee, the horse another,
and the dog another.' You will give this bottle to the young lady,
who will place it in her bosom, and, at the very moment you shall
say that, she must throw some in your face, and on the horse and on
the dog as well."
He goes off then without fear, because the Tartaro had given him this
assurance. He comes then to the carriage. The young lady says to him,
"Where are you going? The serpent will be here directly. It is enough
if he eats me."