Rachel Harriette Busk

“ On, on, on he went, till one day he met a little old woman, who stopped him, saying: ‘Whither so fast, fair prince?’
He replied, ‘I walk the earth till I find one who is fair as snow, tinted like rosy blood, to make her my wife.’
‘That can I help you to, and I alone,’ said the little old woman, who was a fairy; and then she gave him the three love-oranges, telling him that when he opened one such a maiden as he was in search of would appear, but he must immediately look for water and sprinkle her, or she would disappear again. ”

“ You will marry the princess, and share her kingdom; and all her people will be set free. For all those who waited on you as servants are noblemen of her court, who are under a spell.’
‘How am I to get up to the top of that high mountain?’ said the youth; ‘it would take me a life of weariness to arrive there!’
‘Take this divining-rod,’ said the old man, ‘and whatever difficulty comes in your way, touch it with this wand, and it will disappear.’
The youth took the wand, and bent his steps towards the mountain. ”

“ Not long had her body lain in the ditch when a king’s son came by hunting, and the dogs scented the blood of a Christian lying in the ditch, and bayed over it till the huntsmen came and took out the body; when they saw it was the body of a fair maiden, yet warm, they showed it to the prince, and the prince when he saw the maiden, loved her, and took her to a convent to be healed of her wound, and afterwards married her; and when his father died, he was king and she became a queen. ”

“ When she saw a woman like herself, with a child too, for all that she looked so bright and majestic, she was consoled; and she poured all her story into her ear. ‘And I would go to S. Giacomo di Galizia to ask that my husband’s love may be restored to me, for I know the viceroy will calumniate me to him; but how can I leave these children?’ Then the lady said, ‘Leave your children with me, and they shall be with my child, and go you to Galizia as you have said, and be consoled.’ So she put on pilgrim’s weeds, and went to Galizia. ”

“ No sooner had she spoken the promise than in the twinkling of an eye all was changed. The monster became a handsome prince, the casino a palace, the garden a flourishing country, and each several rose-tree a city. For the prince had been enchanted by an enemy, and had to remain transformed as a monster till he should be redeemed by the love of a maiden. ”

“ You mustn’t mind that,’ said the count.
‘Oh, of course not,’ replied the old peasant; ‘that’s just what I say: when Eve had all the fruits in the garden, what did she want with just that one that was forbidden? And if we, who are used to the scantiest victuals, are supplied with enough to live well, what does it matter to us whether there is an extra dish or not on the table?’
‘Very well reasoned,’ said the count. ‘We quite understand each other, then?’
‘Perfectly,’ replied both husband and wife. ”

“ Then came the Carneval; and on the last three days every servant had license to don a domino and dance at the king’s ball. What an opportunity for Maria Wood! After serving in her unbecoming disguise with so much endurance and perseverance for now a full year, here was one day on which she might wear a becoming dress, and enjoy herself according to the measure of her age and sex, and due position in the world. ”

“ Great was her delight when she saw that it was really he, and she told him that there was a horrid old man who had possession of the palace, and persecuted her every day to marry him, saying her husband was dead. And she, to keep him at a distance, yet without offending him lest he should kill her, had said: ‘No, I have always resolved never to marry an old man, because then if he dies I should be left alone, and that would be too sad.’ ‘But when I say that,’ she continued, ‘he always says, “You need not be afraid of that, for I shall never die!” ”

“ The princess was waiting for him at the window.
‘Here is the stone,’ said the prince; and he gave it to her, and with it a bottle of opium. ‘To-night,’ he said, ‘you must say you are ready to marry the wizard; make a great feast again, and have ready some of this opium in his wine. He will sleep heavily, and not see what you are doing; then you can put the stone under his pillow and when he is dead call me.’
All this the princess did. She told the wizard that she was now ready to do as he wished. The magician was so delighted that he ordered a great banquet. ”

“ We had another Giovanni who had done worse things even than these, and who never became a penitent at all. Don Giovanni he was called. Everybody in Rome knew him by the name of Don Giovanni.
Among the other bad things he did, he killed a great man who was called the Commendatore; and though he had the crime of murder on his conscience he took no account of it, but swaggered about with an air of bravado as if he cared for no one.
One day when he was walking out in the Campagna he saw a great white skeleton coming to meet him. It was the skeleton of the commendatore whom he had killed. ”

“ The bad fairy Lagrée, who is so old that she has only one tooth and one eye, carries her off to an underground palace, where her task is to tend a fire, instead of feeding pigeons. Here she is courted by a prince transformed into a rainbow, whom she finds of course always seated in the sunshine on a fountain. While talking to him, she lets her fire out. Lagrée sends her to get fresh fire from the giant Locrinos, devourer of maidens; the giant’s wife takes compassion on her, and gives her the fire, and with it a stone to use in time of distress. ”

“ The idea of a ‘Gran Signore’ coming on a visit from a land where all are rich is the first fantastic element of the tradition. The idea that all English people are rich is very common among the Roman lower classes, and is not an unnatural fancy for people to take up who have seen no specimens of the creature but such as are rich. There is one old woman whom I have never been able to disabuse of the idea. I shall never forget the blank astonishment with which she repeated my words the first time I broke it to her that there were poor people in England, and she has never thoroughly grasped it. ”

“ Then the king said, ‘What a contemptible comparison! She only loves me as much as the cheapest and commonest thing that comes to table. This is as much as to say, she doesn’t love me at all. I always thought it was so. I will never see her again.’
Then he ordered that a wing of the palace should be shut up from the rest, where she should be served with everything belonging to her condition in life, but where she should live by herself apart, and never come near him. ”

“ Padre Filippo was walking one day through the streets of Rome when he saw a great crowd very much excited. ‘What’s the matter?’ asked ‘good Philip.’
‘There’s a man in that house up there beating his wife fit to kill her, and for nothing at all, for she’s an angel of goodness. Nothing at all, but because she’s so ugly.’
Padre Filippo waited till the husband was tired of beating her and had gone out, and all the crowd had dispersed. Then he went up to the room where the poor woman lived, and knocked at the door. ”

“ Last of all the queen remained.
‘The queen can’t be treated like common people,’ he said; ‘she must be treated by herself. I must go into her room with her, and I can cure her with one drop of my cordial.’
‘You think yourself very clever that you talk of curing with one drop of your cordial, but you’re not the only person who can work wonders. I’ve got greater wonders than yours. ”

“ She went, however, to a young woman who lived opposite, and said: ‘If you want a rich husband I will find you one.’
‘To be sure I should like a rich husband,’ replied the young woman; ‘who would not?’
‘Very well, then,’ continued the neighbour; ‘I will tell you what to do. You have only, every day at dinner-time, to stand at the window and suck in the air, and move your lips as if you were eating. But eat nothing; take nothing into your mouth but air. The old miser who lives opposite wants a wife who can live on air; and if he thinks you can do this he will marry you. ”

“ The next day Maria put on her dress of the colour of the noontide sky, covered with stars like the sky at midnight, with the parure made to wear with it, and came to the feast. Every lady made place before her dazzling appearance, and the prince alone dared to ask her to dance. With her he danced all the evening, and fairly fell in love with her,8 nor could he leave her side; and as they sat together, he took the ring off his own finger and put it on to her hand. She appeared equally satisfied with his attentions, and seemed to desire no other partner. ”

“ The father does not die; but, notwithstanding his recovery, he has nothing more to do with the story further than to give an unwilling consent that the youngest daughter, though his favourite, shall go forth with her sword and roam the world till she finds a husband. ”

“ The ladies waiting on the queen laughed at the old woman’s pretensions, and would have driven her away with contumely, but the queen said: ‘Nay, who knows but there may be healing in it. Experience often teaches the old remedies which science has failed to discover.’
Then she dismissed Maria with a present, and took the cake in to the king, trying to amuse him with the old woman’s story; but the king refused to be amused, and let the cake be. ”

“ I am growing old and have no children, and you are worthy in all ways to wear the crown. Come up, therefore, if you will, to the palace and live with me, and when I die you shall be king.’
Scioccolone, now no longer feeling himself so ill-adapted to live in a palace, willingly consented, and a few days after, with his wife and his little son, he went up to the palace to live with the king.
But the king’s delight can scarcely be imagined when he found that the wife of the polished stranger was indeed his very own daughter. ”

“ In this city was a king, who lived in a palace with an only daughter. Now this daughter had never been known [125] to laugh. What pains soever the king her father took to divert her were all unavailing; nothing brought a smile to her lips.
Now, however, when all the people ran to the windows to see a man riding on a faggot, the king’s daughter ran to look out too; and when she saw the faggot moving by itself, and the uncouth figure of Scioccolone sitting on it, and heard all the people laughing at the sight, then the king’s daughter laughed too; laughed for the first time in her life. ”

“ Maria threw herself in his arms and told him all her distress, but when it was told it sounded childish and unreasonable.
‘Can anything be more absurd?’ replied the old man. ‘To-morrow I may be dead, and what will become of you? What can you desire more than a husband suited to you in age and person, with every advantage the world can offer? ”

“ She only takes service in a large house in a big town, however; but there falls in love with a melancholy youth, son of a count, who lives opposite. For the sake of being nearer him, she obtains the place of kitchen-maid in his palace, and thus acquires her title of Zendrarola in a very different way from her counterparts in other lands. One day she hears he is going to a ball, and she makes her wishing-sword give her a dress like the sky; and the young Count, who has never admired anyone before, of course falls in love with her. ”

“ He hadn’t gone a hundred yards before the widow called him back.
‘Ah, she’s beginning to think better of it!’ said he to himself; and he continued his way, pretending not to hear.
‘Good pilgrim!’ shouted the widow; ‘I forgot one thing. Would any money be of use to my poor dear husband?’ [363]
‘Oh dear yes, all the use in the world,’ replied the pilgrim; ‘you can always get anything for money everywhere.’
‘Oh, do come back then, and I’ll trouble you with a hundred scudi for him.’
The pretended pilgrim came back willingly for the hundred scudi, and the widow counted them out to him. ”

“ Death climbed up the fig-tree. [181]
‘Now stick there!’ said the host, and for all her struggling Mrs. Death could by no means extricate herself any more.
‘I can’t stay here, so take off your spell; I have my business to attend to,’ said she.
‘So have I,’ answered the host; ‘and if you want to go about your business, you must promise me, on your honour, you will leave me to attend to mine.’
‘I can’t do it, my man! What are you asking? It’s more than my place is worth. Every man alive has to pass through my hands. ”

“ But the answer ever was, ‘Nay, prince, he looks hale and stout. Every day his face is fresher and fatter. Every day he seems stronger and firmer.’
Then the prince grew in despair of ever accomplishing his design, and he said, ‘It cannot be as you say, unless there is treachery,’ and he changed the guards, and set a watch upon them; but the same thing happened, and the old king continued to grow stouter and stronger. He made them search the princess, too, when she went to see her father, and they assured themselves that she took nothing to him. ”

“ I have another Stepmother story, the place of which is here, but it is too long to give in its entirety. It begins like the last, and the next, and many others, with a widower, the teacher of whose children, a boy and girl, insists on marrying him. Soon after, of course, she turns the children out of doors; the boy is made the slave of a witch, and comes well at last out of many adventures; it is one of the nearest approaches to a heroic story that I have met with in Rome. There are details in it, however, like Filagranata and others, not actually of the Stepmother group. ”

“ The princess is attracted towards the plant, and tends it with the greatest care, without knowing it is her husband. The enraged fairy queen orders her to pluck a branch, and she is obliged to obey. The plant flows with blood, and Zelindor declares she is the cause of his death; at this juncture the husband of the fairy queen, fetched by the benevolent governess, appears. His return reconciles the queen to her daughter; and with an elixir she heals Zelindor’s wounds, and restores him to his bride. ”

“ As she was going away Monsu Mostro gave her a comb, wrapped up in paper, and said, ‘Take care of this, and don’t forget you have got it.’ The girl was too full of her happiness to pay much heed, but she put it in her bosom and went away.
As she drove along, a pair of horns like a cow’s began to grow on her head, and they had already attained a considerable size before she arrived at the royal palace. The queen was horrified at her appearance, and refused to let her come in. ‘How can it possibly be that such a beautiful girl should have all of a sudden got a pair of horns?’ said the prince. ”