“Welcome, Your Majesty!” he mewed. “Welcome to the castle of My Lord the Marquis of Carabas!”
“This too?” cried the King, astonished, looking about him at the magnificent castle and throngs of servants. “Truly, sir, you are worthy to be a member of the royal family!”
Puss hid a smile behind his paw and led the way indoors where a splendid banquet was prepared. At the end of it the King, who had noticed that the Princess and the young man were holding hands under the table, wiped his mouth on a napkin, hiccoughed happily, and said,
“Marquis, I know of no one whom I would rather have for a son-in-law than yourself. I can see that my daughter likes you, and if she is willing, let the wedding take place immediately.”
The Miller’s youngest son held his breath. Was he really to become a Prince – perhaps a King?
Then “I will marry him gladly,” replied the king’s daughter.
Puss purred.
Rapunzel
A man and his wife both longed to have a child. As years went by and still there was no sign of one, they began to despair. But one day the wife was down by the stream washing clothes when a frog put his head out of the water and told her that soon her wish was to be granted.
The wife was overjoyed, and hurried home to tell her husband, who immediately set about making a wooden cradle ready for the baby.
Now next to the cottage where these two lived was a great, overgrown garden, belonging to a strange old woman whom they had hardly ever seen. People said she was a witch, and were afraid of her.
One day the wife was peering over the wall into this garden when she saw a clump of green rampion growing there. Immediately she began to long for a taste of it, though she had never been very fond of it before.
“Dear husband, I must eat some rampion or die!” she told him when he came home from working in the forest. “Climb over the wall and fetch me some, I beg you.”
The husband did not like the idea at all.
“It doesn’t belong to us,” he told her. “And as for that old woman who owns the garden, for all we know she may be a witch, and if she catches me out – what then?”
“What nonsense!” cried the wife. “Witch indeed! I must have some rampion, I tell you, or I shall die!”
And so the man, although he knew full well that the old woman was a witch, waited until twilight and then climbed softly over the wall and began to pull up the rampion as quickly as he could. But when he straightened up to climb back over the wall, he found himself face to face with the old witch herself, eyes a-glitter in the gloom.
“How dare you climb into my garden and tear up my plants!” she cried in a terrible voice. “I have caught you red-handed, and now it will be the worse for you!”
The poor man, shaking and trembling, explained how greatly his wife had longed for the rampion, and begged the witch to forgive him.
“Never!” she cried. “But I will make a bargain with you. Your wife is about to have a child. I will let you go free and take with you as much rampion as you like, on condition that when the child is born I shall have it, to bring up as my own.”
The man agreed, for he was so terrified that he hardly knew what he was saying, and scrambled safely back over the wall with the stolen rampion and a heavy heart.
Soon afterwards, a daughter was born, and when she was only a few days old the witch came and carried the child off with her. She gave her the name Rapunzel (which is another name for rampion).
When Rapunzel was twelve years old the witch locked her in a tall stone tower that stood in the thickest and darkest part of a great wood. It had neither staircase nor doors, only a little window in Rapunzel’s own room right at the very top.
Whenever the witch wanted to enter, she would stand below and call up,
“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!”
Rapunzel had long yellow hair, which she wore in plaits wound about her head. When she heard the witch, she would twist them round a hook by the window and let them down. They fell like thick golden ropes, and the witch would climb up by them.
When Rapunzel had been in the tower for several years it happened one day that the king’s son rode by. He heard a beautiful voice singing nearby, and pushing his way through the dim green thicket came for the first time upon the lonely sunless tower. Rapunzel’s voice drifted down from the little window, and she sang so sweetly of her loneliness that the Prince longed to join her. He searched about the tower to find a door, but in vain, and in the end he was forced to ride away.
After that, he would often ride in the wood and make his way to the tower in its secret thicket. And one day, while he was hidden there among the laurel leaves, the old witch herself appeared, and he heard her call out,
“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!”
The Prince saw Rapunzel’s face at the high window, he saw her lift her hands to unpin her braids, and a minute later the golden ropes of hair came tumbling to the ground. The witch climbed up while the Prince watched.
“If that is the ladder that will take me up to that fair lady, then I shall try my own luck,” he thought.
Next day he went at evening into the forest and came to the tower in the half darkness. He called from the shadow of the thicket in a voice as hoarse as the witch’s own,
“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!”
Then at last he was grasping the smooth warm ropes of hair and climbing upwards and into the little stone room.
Rapunzel was terrified when first she saw him, for she had never so much as set eyes on a man before. But the Prince spoke gently to her, telling how he had come each day to hear her sing, and how his heart had been won by her song. When he told her that he wished to take her away and marry her, he looked so kind and handsome that she could not help thinking, “He is better by far than old Mother Gothel, and surely he will love me better.”
So she put her hand in his, and said “Yes”.
“But I cannot escape without a ladder,” she said. “So each time you come, you must bring with you a skein of silk. I will weave it into a ladder, and when it is long enough, then I shall climb down by it, and you can take me away on your horse.”
“I will come every day,” the Prince promised.
“But you must come in the evening,” Rapunzel told him. “Old Mother Gothel comes in the daytime, and so she will never discover you.”
And so the Prince began to visit Rapunzel every evening, and they would sit together in the twilight while Rapunzel sang and wove her silken ladder. And all would have been well for them if one day Rapunzel had not said to the witch, quite without thinking, “How is it, Mother Gothel, that you are twice as heavy to draw up as the young Prince who comes at evening?”
No sooner were the words out than Rapunzel saw her mistake, and clapped her hand to her mouth with a little cry. But it was too late.
“What is that you say?” cried the witch in a fury. “Wicked girl, – have you deceived me?”
And she seized Rapunzel’s beautiful hair in one hand and with the other snatched up a pair of shears and cut off the long plaits in two fierce snips. They fell to the floor in shining coils.
Rapunzel’s tears and pleas were all in vain. The merciless witch spirited her from the stone tower to a far-off wilderness, where she left her to wander all alone and fend for herself.
Then, at evening, the old witch fastened the plaits of hair to the hook by the window, and waited. Sure enough, as the light faded, the Prince came riding into the thicket and she heard him call,
“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!”
With an evil smile she let the long ropes fall.
The Prince climbed eagerly upward and in his joy he did not notice that the golden ropes were cold as ice between his hands. He swung over the stone sill into the little room and was face to face with the towering witch.
“So you’ve come to visit your lady love!” she shrieked. “But the pretty bird has flown, my dear, the cat has got her,
and she’ll sing no more, I promise you! And as for you, the cat shall scratch out your eyes, too! Rapunzel is gone forever, and you shall never set eyes on her again!”
At this the Prince was so beside himself with grief and despair that he threw himself down from the window. He fell into the dark thicket, and though he was not killed, the sharp thorns scratched out his eyes and he was left in darkness.
Alone and blind he wandered the woods, living on roots and berries and lamenting the loss of his bride. Years and years went by, until at last he came to that very wilderness where Rapunzel had been cast by the witch and where she was still living.
As he went in darkness he heard a sweet voice singing and knew instantly that he had found Rapunzel, and called her name out loud.
She came running to him and fell into his arms, weeping. Two of her warm tears fell upon his eyes and in that moment he could see as well as ever before, and the very first thing he saw with his new eyes was Rapunzel’s face.
Then he took her away to his own kingdom where they were welcomed with great rejoicing and married at last, to live long and happily together.
The Sleeping Beauty
There once lived a King and Queen who were married for many years without having any children. Then at last a daughter was born to them, and so delighted were they that they gave a feast for the baby’s christening. Invitations were sent to all the lords and ladies in the land and to far off kings and queens.
Thirteen fairies lived in this kingdom, but the King had only twelve golden plates to set before them, and so he had to leave one of the fairies out.
On the day of the christening the King and his guests feasted merrily, and in the evening before they left, all the fairies presented the Princess with a magic gift. One gave her the gift of wisdom, another the gift of beauty, a third wished her all the riches she desired. And so it went on until the eleventh fairy had spoken, when suddenly the glittering crowd of guests parted and between them went the thirteenth fairy, all in black. She looked neither left nor right and greeted no one. She stopped by the side of the baby’s cradle and lifted her arms like great black wings and cried in a terrible voice, “When the Princess is fifteen years old, she shall prick herself with a spindle and fall down dead!”
Her arms fell and in a great silence she turned and went out of the hall.
Now the twelfth fairy still had not made her gift. It was beyond her power to undo the wicked spell entirely, but she was able to soften it, by saying, “When the Princess pricks herself with a spindle, she shall not die, but fall into a deep sleep lasting for a hundred years.”
Even this seemed tragedy enough to the King and Queen, and they gave orders that all the spindles in the land should be burned. As the Princess grew up, growing wiser and lovelier and kinder each day, the fairy’s curse began to seem very faint and far away, so that they hardly thought of it at all.
On the Princess’s fifteenth birthday a party was held at the Palace. The Princess begged for a game of hide-and-seek. The guests scattered and the Princess herself began to run up and down the stone corridors, looking for a hiding place. At last she came to a crumbling tower that she had never noticed before.
“They will never find me here!” she thought.
She climbed the narrow, winding stairs and came to a studded door with a great rusty key in the lock. The Princess turned it and went inside.
There in the cold stone room sat an old woman with a spindle, spinning flax. The Princess stared. All the spindles in the kingdom had disappeared long ago, because of the fairy’s curse, and so she had never set eyes on one before.
“Good day, Granny,” said the Princess. She had quite forgotten the game of hide-and-seek. “What are you doing?”
“I am spinning,” replied the old woman, nodding her head.
“And what is this that whirls round so merrily?” asked the Princess. With these words she took the spindle and tried to spin too.
But she had scarcely touched it before the curse was fulfilled and she pricked her finger with the spindle. She fell back on to the bed nearby, and the old woman, her work done, went away down the stone stairs with her evil laughter echoing about her.
At the very moment when the Princess fell to the bed her guests, too, closed their eyes and slept just where they happened to be – some in cupboards, some behind pillars and others under the great four poster beds. Even the King and Queen fell asleep in the great hall. Their courtiers yawned and rubbed their eyes and soon were sprawling on the strewn rushes. The horses lay sleeping in the stables, the dogs in the yard, the doves on the roof, the flies on the wall. Even the fire on the hearth stopped its flickering and the meat on the spit stopped crackling. The cook, who was about to box the scullion’s ears, began to snore with her arm still raised for the blow. Outside, the wind dropped. Not a bough stirred, not a twig, not a leaf. All slept.
Round the castle a hedge of briers began to grow up, minute by minute. It grew higher and higher, surrounding the whole castle with live green walls of thorn and bramble. Soon nothing could be seen from the outside world, not even a turret, not even a flag on the roof. Within, the clocks ticked to a standstill, the dust settled, there was nothing but sleep and silence.
A legend grew up as years went by about the sleeping Brier Rose, as the Princess was called. Princes came from far off lands to try to force their way through the high thickets. But the greedy thorns clutched them like hands so that they could never escape and were left there to die.
Then, one day, when the hundred years were nearly up, a bold and handsome prince rode by. He met an old man working in the woods, who told him the legend of the beautiful sleeping Princess. He begged the Prince not to try to enter, and warned him of the terrible fate that had befallen the rest.
“I am not afraid,” replied the Prince. “I am determined to go and see Brier Rose with my own eyes.”
He rode to the thicket, never knowing that this very day the one hundred years were ended, and the Princess would wake from her spellbound sleep. As the Prince drew near, he saw to his astonishment that the hedge was covered with large and beautiful flowers. They seemed to be unfurling their petals even as he watched. As he rode up the briers curled back and made way for him so that he could pass unharmed, and then closed up again into a hedge behind him.
In the courtyard he found brindled dogs lying asleep, nose on paws. He saw doves on the roof, heads under wings. He pushed the door and entered the silent palace and saw there the King and Queen themselves, lying by the throne. The Prince had to step over the sleeping forms of guards and courtiers and passed next through the kitchen where the cook had stood for a hundred years with her arm raised ready to box the scullion’s ears. Nearby sat a maid who had been fixed in time while she plucked the black feathers from a fowl on her knee.
The Prince went tiptoe through all the palace, and so great was the hush that he could hear his own breathing. Then at last he came to the ancient tower and climbing the winding stair came to the chamber where Brier Rose lay sleeping.
The Princess looked so beautiful lying there that the Prince knelt by the bedside and kissed her gently on the lips. And to his wonder, Brier Rose opened her eyes and gazed up at him. Then she sat up and yawned.
And then she stretched and asked the time of day for all the world as if she had woken from a nap.
The Prince and Brier Rose went down together and found the whole palace astir. The hounds sprang up and wagged their tails, the doves on the roof stretched their wings and fluttered off to the fields. The flies buzzed, the fire leapt, the meat began to roast. And the scullion received at last the box on the ears that had threatened him for a hundred years, and let out a yell that woke the maid who was plucking the fowl.
Everything went on as if nothing had ever happened, as if a century were no more than the twinkling of an eye. And soon the dust of a hundred years was flying in clouds through open doors and windows as the palace was prepared for the wedding of Brier Rose and her gallant pri
nce.
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
A Queen sat sewing by the window one day when the snow was falling. She lifted her head to see a raven walking on the white lawns, and as she did so, pricked her finger. A drop of blood fell, and in that moment the Queen made a wish.
“I wish that I might have a little daughter, and that her skin might be as white as snow, her lips red as blood and her hair black as a raven’s wing.”
She spoke the wish out loud and when she had finished the raven spread his black wings and flew off into the swirling snow.
Not long afterwards a daughter was born to the King and Queen, and the Queen, remembering her wish, called the child Snow White. And as she grew older her skin was white as snow, her lips were red as blood and her hair shone like a raven’s wing.
After a few years the Queen died and the King married again. His new wife was beautiful and proud. She would gaze and gaze at herself in the magic glass that hung in her room, and say to it,
“Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
Who is the fairest of us all?”
Then the glass would answer,
“Pale as the moon, bright as a star,
Thou art the fairest, Queen by far!”
And the Queen would smile at her reflection in the cold glass and stretch her neck like a swan and preen.
But Snow White grew more and more beautiful each day, and when she was seven years old she was even fairer than the Queen herself.
The magic mirror could not tell a lie, and so when next the Queen asked it,
“Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
Who is the fairest of us all?”
the reply came,
“Fair as the day, O Queen, you are,
A Treasury of Fairy Tales Page 4