Andrew Lang - The Crimson Fairy Book

One day, just before Christmas, he said to his wife: ‘Prepare everything for a great feast, to-morrow we will take things with us to the farm that the shepherds there may make merry.’ The wife obeyed, and all was prepared as he desired. Next day they both went to the farm, and in the evening the master said to the shepherds: ‘Now come, all of you, eat, drink, and make merry. I will watch the flocks myself to-night in your stead.’ Then he went out to spend the night with the flocks.

When midnight struck the wolves howled and the dogs barked, and the wolves spoke in their own tongue, saying:

‘Shall we come in and work havoc, and you too shall eat flesh?’ And the dogs answered in their tongue: ‘Come in, and for once we shall have enough to eat.’

Now amongst the dogs there was one so old that he had only two teeth left in his head, and he spoke to the wolves, saying: ‘So long as I have my two teeth still in my head, I will let no harm be done to my master.’

All this the master heard and understood, and as soon as morning dawned he ordered all the dogs to be killed excepting the old dog. The farm servants wondered at this order, and exclaimed: ‘But surely, sir, that would be a pity?’

The master answered: ‘Do as I bid you’; and made ready to return home with his wife, and they mounted their horses, her steed being a mare. As they went on their way, it happened that the husband rode on ahead, while the wife was a little way behind. The husband’s horse, seeing this, neighed, and said to the mare: ‘Come along, make haste; why are you so slow?’ And the mare answered: ‘It is very easy for you, you carry only your master, who is a thin man, but I carry my mistress, who is so fat that she weights as much as three.’ When the husband heard that he looked back and laughed, which the wife perceiving, she urged on the mare till she caught up with her husband, and asked him why he laughed. ‘For nothing at all,’ he answered; ‘just because it came into my head.’ She would not be satisfied with this answer, and urged him more and more to tell her why he had laughed. But he controlled himself and said: ‘Let me be, wife; what ails you? I do not know myself why I laughed.’ But the more he put her off, the more she tormented him to tell her the cause of his laughter. At length he said to her: ‘Know, then, that if I tell it you I shall immediately and surely die.’ But even this did not quiet her; she only besought him the more to tell her.

Meanwhile they had reached home, and before getting down from his horse the man called for a coffin to be brought; and when it was there he placed it in front of the house, and said to his wife:

‘See, I will lay myself down in this coffin, and will then tell you why I laughed, for as soon as I have told you I shall surely die.’ So he lay down in the coffin, and while he took a last look around him, his old dog came out from the farm and sat down by him, and whined. When the master saw this, he called to his wife: ‘Bring a piece of bread to give to the dog.’ The wife brought some bread and threw it to the dog, but he would not look at it. Then the farm cock came and pecked at the bread; but the dog said to it: ‘Wretched glutton, you can eat like that when you see that your master is dying?’ The cock answered: ‘Let him die, if he is so stupid. I have a hundred wives, which I call together when I find a grain of corn, and as soon as they are there I swallow it myself; should one of them dare to be angry, I would give her a lesson with my beak. He has only one wife, and he cannot keep her in order.’

As soon as the man understood this, he got up out of the coffin, seized a stick, and called his wife into the room, saying: ‘Come, and I will tell you what you so much want to know’; and then he began to beat her with the stick, saying with each blow: ‘It is that, wife, it is that!’ And in this way he taught her never again to ask why he had laughed.

Once upon a time there lived a poor widow who had one little boy. At first sight you would not have thought that he was different from a thousand other little boys; but then you noticed that by his side hung the scabbard of a sword, and as the boy grew bigger the scabbard grew bigger too. The sword which belonged to the scabbard was found by the little boy sticking out of the ground in the garden, and every day he pulled it up to see if it would go into the scabbard. But though it was plainly becoming longer and longer, it was some time before the two would fit.

However, there came a day at last when it slipped in quite easily. The child was so delighted that he could hardly believe his eyes, so he tried it seven times, and each time it slipped in more easily than before. But pleased though the boy was, he determined not to tell anyone about it, particularly not his mother, who never could keep anything from her neighbours.

Still, in spite of his resolutions, he could not hide altogether that something had happened, and when he went in to breakfast his mother asked him what was the matter.

‘Oh, mother, I had such a nice dream last night,’ said he; ‘but I can’t tell it to anybody.’

‘You can tell it to me,’ she answered. ‘It must have been a nice dream, or you wouldn’t look so happy.’

‘No, mother; I can’t tell it to anybody,’ returned the boy, ‘till it comes true.’

‘I want to know what it was, and know it I will,’ cried she, ‘and I will beat you till you tell me.’

But it was no use, neither words nor blows would get the secret out of the boy; and when her arm was quite tired and she had to leave off, the child, sore and aching, ran into the garden and knelt weeping beside his little sword. It was working round and round in its hole all by itself, and if anyone except the boy had tried to catch hold of it, he would have been badly cut. But the moment he stretched out his hand it stopped and slid quietly into the scabbard.

For a long time the child sat sobbing, and the noise was heard by the king as he was driving by. ‘Go and see who it is that is crying so,’ said he to one of his servants, and the man went. In a few minutes he returned saying: ‘Your Majesty, it is a little boy who is kneeling there sobbing because his mother has beaten him.’

‘Bring him to me at once,’ commanded the monarch, ‘and tell him that it is the king who sends for him, and that he has never cried in all his life and cannot bear anyone else to do so.’ On receiving this message the boy dried his tears and went with the servant to the royal carriage. ‘Will you be my son?’ asked the king.

‘Yes, if my mother will let me,’ answered the boy. And the king bade the servant go back to the mother and say that if she would give her boy to him, he should live in the palace and marry his prettiest daughter as soon as he was a man.

The widow’s anger now turned into joy, and she came running to the splendid coach and kissed the king’s hand. ‘I hope you will be more obedient to his Majesty than you were to me,’ she said; and the boy shrank away half-frightened. But when she had gone back to her cottage, he asked the king if he might fetch something that he had left in the garden, and when he was given permission, he pulled up his little sword, which he slid into the scabbard.

Then he climbed into the coach and was driven away.

After they had gone some distance the king said: ‘Why were you crying so bitterly in the garden just now?’

‘Because my mother had been beating me,’ replied the boy.

‘And what did she do that for?’ asked the king again.

‘Because I would not tell her my dream.’

‘And why wouldn’t you tell it to her?’

‘Because I will never tell it to anyone till it comes true,’ answered the boy.