Part 12

So he got the rye and the wheat, and put them into the kneading trough he had brought with him from home, got in, and rowed across the lake. When he reached the other side he began to walk along the shore, and to sprinkle and strew the grain, and at last he coaxed the ducks into his kneading-trough, and rowed back as fast as ever he could.

When he got half over, the Troll came out of his house, and set eyes on him.

“HALLOA!” roared out the Troll; “is it you that has gone off with my seven silver ducks?”

“AYE! AYE!” said the lad.

“Shall you be back soon?” asked the Troll.

“Very likely,” said the lad.

So when he got back to the king, with the seven silver ducks, he was more liked than ever, and even the king was pleased to say, “Well done!” But at this his brothers grew more and more spiteful and envious; and so they went and told the coachman that their brother had said, if he chose, he was man enough to get the king the Troll’s bed-quilt, which had a gold patch and a silver patch, and a silver patch and a gold patch; and this time, too, the coachman was not slow in telling all this to the king. So the king said to the lad, how his brothers had said he was good to steal the Troll’s bed-quilt, with gold and silver patches; so now he must go and do it, or lose his life.

Boots answered, he had never thought or said any such thing; but when he found there was no help for it, he begged for three days to think over the matter.

So when the three days were gone, he rowed over in his kneading-trough, and went spying about. At last he saw those in the Troll’s cave come out and hang the quilt out to air, and as soon as ever they had gone back into the face of the rock, Boots pulled the quilt down, and rowed away with it as fast as he could.

And when he was half across, out came the Troll and set eyes on him, and roared out,—

“HALLOA! It is you who took my seven silver ducks?”

“AYE! AYE!” said the lad.

“And now, have you taken my bed-quilt, with silver patches and gold patches, and gold patches and silver patches?”

“Aye! aye!” said the lad.

“Shall you come back again?”

“Very likely,” said the lad.

But when he got back with the gold and silver patch-work quilt, every one was fonder of him than ever, and he was made the king’s body-servant.

At this, the other two were still more vexed, and to be revenged they went and told the coachman,—

“Now, our brother has said, he is man enough to get the king the gold harp which the Troll has, and that harp is of such a kind, that all who listen when it is played grow glad, however sad they may be.”

Yes! the coachman went and told the king, and he said to the lad,—

“If you have said this, you shall do it. If you do it, you shall have the Princess and half the kingdom. If you don’t, you shall lose your life.”

“I’m sure I never thought or said anything of the kind,” said the lad; “but if there’s no help for it, I may as well try; but I must have six days to think about it.”

Yes! he might have six days, but when they were over he must set out.

Then he took a tenpenny nail, a birch-pin, and a waxen taper-end in his pocket, and rowed across, and walked up and down before the Troll’s cave, looking stealthily about him. So when the Troll came out, he saw him at once.

“HO, HO!” roared the Troll; “is it you who took my seven silver ducks?”

“AYE! AYE!” said the lad.

“And it is you who took my bed-quilt, with the gold and silver patches?” asked the Troll.

“Aye! aye!” said the lad.

So the Troll caught hold of him at once, and took him off into the cave in the face of the rock.

“Now, daughter dear,” said the Troll, “I’ve caught the fellow who stole the silver ducks and my bed-quilt with gold and silver patches; put him into the fattening coop; and when he’s fat we’ll kill him, and make a feast for our friends.”

She was willing enough, and put him at once into the fattening coop, and there he stayed eight days, fed on the best, both in meat and drink, and as much as he could cram. So, when the eight days were over, the Troll said to his daughter to go down and cut him in his little finger, that they might see if he were fat. Down she came to the coop.

“Out with your little finger!” she said.

But Boots stuck out his tenpenny-nail, and she cut at it.

“Nay! nay! he’s as hard as iron still,” said the Troll’s daughter, when she got back to her father; “we can’t take him yet.”

After another eight days the same thing happened, and this time Boots stuck out his birchen pin.

“Well, he’s a little better,” she said, when she got back to the Troll; “but still he’ll be as hard as wood to chew.”

But when another eight days were gone, the Troll told his daughter to go down and see if he wasn’t fat now.

“Out with your little finger,” said the Troll’s daughter, when she reached the coop, and this time Boots stuck out the taper end.

“Now he’ll do nicely,” she said.

“Will he?” said the Troll. “Well, then, I’ll just set off and ask the guests; meantime you must kill him, and roast half and boil half.”

So when the Troll had been gone a little while, the daughter began to sharpen a great long knife.

“Is that what you’re going to kill me with?” asked the lad.

“Yes it is,” said she.

“But it isn’t sharp,” said the lad. “Just let me sharpen it for you, and then you’ll find it easier work to kill me.”

So she let him have the knife, and he began to rub and sharpen it on the whetstone.

“Just let me try it on one of your hair plaits; I think it’s about right now.”

So he got leave to do that; but at the same time that he grasped the plait of hair, he pulled back her head, and at one gash, cut off the Troll’s daughter’s head; and half of her he roasted and half of her he boiled, and served it all up.

After that he dressed himself in her clothes, and sat away in the corner.

So when the Troll came home with his guests, he called out to his daughter—for he thought all the time it was his daughter—to come and take a snack.

“No thank you,” said the lad, “I don’t care for food, I’m so sad and downcast.”

“Oh!” said the Troll, “if that’s all, you know the cure; take the harp and play a tune on it.”

“Yes!” said the lad; “but where has it got to; I can’t find it.”

“Why, you know well enough,” said the Troll; “you used it last; where should it be but over the door yonder?”

The lad did not wait to be told twice; he took down the harp, and went in and out playing tunes; but, all at once he shoved off the kneading trough, jumped into it, and rowed off, so that the foam flew around the trough.

After a while the Troll thought his daughter was a long while gone, and went out to see what ailed her; and then he saw the lad in the trough, far, far out on the lake.

“HALLOA! Is it you,” he roared, “that took my seven silver ducks?”

“AYE, AYE!” said the lad.

“Is it you that took my bed-quilt with the gold and silver patches?”

“Yes!” said the lad.

“And now you have taken off my gold harp?” screamed the Troll.

“Yes!” said the lad; “I’ve got it, sure enough.”

“And haven’t I eaten you up after all, then?”

“No, no! ’twas your own daughter you ate,” answered the lad.

But when the Troll heard that, he was so sorry, he burst; and then Boots rowed back, and took a whole heap of gold and silver with him, as much as the trough could carry. And so, when he came to the palace with the gold harp, he got the Princess and half the kingdom as the king had promised him; and, as for his brothers, he treated them well, for he thought they had only wished his good when they said what they had said.

THE LAD WHO WENT TO THE NORTH WIND.

ONCE on a time there was an old widow who had one son; and as she was poorly and weak, her son had to go up into the safe to fetch meal for cooking; but when he got outside the safe and was just going down the steps, there came the North Wind, puffing and blowing, caught up the meal, and so away with it through the air. Then the lad went back into the safe for more; but when he came out again on the steps, if the North Wind didn’t come again and carry off the meal with a puff; and more than that, he did so the third time. At this the lad got very angry; and as he thought it hard that the North Wind should behave so, he thought he’d just look him up, and ask him to give up his meal.

So off he went, but the way was long, and he walked and walked; but at last he came to the North Wind’s house.

“Good day!” said the lad, “and thank you for coming to see us yesterday.”

“GOOD DAY!” answered the North Wind, for his voice was loud and gruff, “AND THANKS FOR COMING TO SEE ME. WHAT DO YOU WANT?”

“Oh!” answered the lad, “I only wished to ask you to be so good as to let me have back that meal you took from me on the safe steps, for we haven’t much to live on; and if you’re to go on snapping up the morsel we have, there’ll be nothing for it but to starve.”

“I haven’t got your meal,” said the North Wind; “but if you are in such need, I’ll give you a cloth which will get you everything you want, if you only say ‘Cloth, spread yourself, and serve up all kind of good dishes!’”

With this the lad was well content. But, as the way was so long he couldn’t get home in one day, so he turned into an inn on the way; and when they were going to sit down to supper he laid the cloth on a table which stood in the corner, and said,—

“Cloth, spread yourself, and serve up all kinds of good dishes.”

He had scarce said so before the cloth did as it was bid; and all who stood by thought it a fine thing, but most of all the landlady. So, when all were fast asleep, at dead of night, she took the lad’s cloth, and put another in its stead, just like the one he had got from the North Wind, but which couldn’t so much as serve up a bit of dry bread.

So, when the lad woke, he took his cloth and went off with it, and that day he got home to his mother.

“Now,” said he, “I’ve been to the North Wind’s house, and a good fellow he is, for he gave me this cloth, and when I only say to it, ‘Cloth, spread yourself, and serve up all kind of good dishes,’ I get any sort of food I please.”

“All very true, I dare say,” said his mother; “but seeing is believing, and I shan’t believe it till I see it.”

So the lad made haste, drew out a table, laid the cloth on it, and said,—

“Cloth, spread yourself, and serve up all kind of good dishes.”

But never a bit of dry bread did the cloth serve up.

“Well!” said the lad, “there’s no help for it but to go to the North Wind again;” and away he went.

So he came to where the North Wind lived late in the afternoon.

“Good evening!” said the lad.

“Good evening!” said the North Wind.

“I want my rights for that meal of ours which you took,” said the lad; “for, as for that cloth I got, it isn’t worth a penny.”

“I’ve got no meal,” said the North Wind; “but yonder you have a ram which coins nothing but golden ducats as soon as you say to it,—

“Ram, ram! make money!”

So the lad thought this a fine thing; but as it was too far to get home that day, he turned in for the night to the same inn where he had slept before.

Before he called for anything, he tried the truth of what the North Wind had said of the ram, and found it all right; but, when the landlord saw that, he thought it was a famous ram, and, when the lad had fallen asleep, he took another which couldn’t coin gold ducats, and changed the two.

Next morning off went the lad; and when he got home to his mother, he said,—

“After all, the North Wind is a jolly fellow; for now he has given me a ram which can coin golden ducats if I only say, ‘Ram, ram! make money.’”

“All very true, I daresay,” said his mother; “but I shan’t believe any such stuff until I see the ducats made.”

“Ram, ram! make money!” said the lad! but if the ram made anything it wasn’t money.

So the lad went back again to the North Wind and blew him up, and said the ram was worth nothing, and he must have his rights for the meal.

“Well!” said the North Wind; “I’ve nothing else to give up but that old stick in the corner yonder; but it’s a stick of that kind that if you say,—

“‘Stick, stick! lay on!’ it lays on till you say,—

“‘Stick, stick! now stop!’”

So, as the way was long, the lad turned in this night too to the landlord; but as he could pretty well guess how things stood as to the cloth and the ram, he lay down at once on the bench and began to snore as if he were asleep.

Now the landlord, who easily saw that the stick must be worth something, hunted up one which was like it, and when he heard the lad snore was going to change the two; but, just as the landlord was about to take it, the lad bawled out,—

“Stick, stick! lay on!”

So the stick began to beat the landlord, till he jumped over chairs, and tables, and benches, and yelled and roared,—

“Oh my! oh my! bid the stick be still, else it will beat me to death, and you shall have back both your cloth and your ram.”

When the lad thought the landlord had got enough, he said,

“Stick, stick! now stop.”

Then he took the cloth and put it into his pocket, and went home with his stick in his hand, leading the ram by a cord round its horns; and so he got his rights for the meal he had lost.

THE BEST WISH.

ONCE on a time there were three brothers; I don’t quite know how it happened, but each of them had got the right to wish one thing, whatever he chose. So the two elder were not long a-thinking; they wished that every time they put their hands in their pockets they might pull out a piece of money; for, said they,—

“The man who has as much money as he wishes for is always sure to get on in the world.”

But the youngest wished something better still. He wished that every woman he saw might fall in love with him as soon as she saw him; and you shall soon hear how far better this was than gold and goods.

So, when they had all wished their wishes, the two elder were for setting out to see the world; and Boots, their youngest brother, asked if he mightn’t go along with them; but they wouldn’t hear of such a thing.

“Wherever we go,” they said, “we shall be treated as counts and kings; but you, you starveling wretch, who haven’t a penny, and never will have one, who do you think will care a bit about you?

“Well, but in spite of that, I’d like to go with you,” said Boots; “perhaps a dainty bit may fall to my share too off the plates of such high and mighty lords.”

At last, after begging and praying, he got leave to go with them, if he would be their servant, else they wouldn’t hear of it.

So when they had gone a day or so, they came to an inn, where the two who had the money alighted, and called for fish, and flesh, and fowl, and brandy and mead, and everything that was good; but Boots, poor fellow, had to look after their luggage and all that belonged to the two great people. Now, as he went to and fro outside, and loitered about in the inn-yard, the innkeeper’s wife looked out of window and saw the servant of the gentlemen up stairs; and, all at once, she thought she had never set eyes on such a handsome chap. So she stared and stared, and the longer she looked the handsomer he seemed.

“Why what, by the Deil’s skin and bones, is it that you are standing there gaping at out of the window?” said her husband. “I think ’twould be better if you just looked how the sucking pig is getting on, instead of hanging out of window in that way. Don’t you know what grand folk we have in the house to-day?”

“Oh!” said his old dame, “I don’t care a farthing about such a pack of rubbish; if they don’t like it they may lump it, and be off; but just do come and look at this lad out in the yard, so handsome a fellow I never saw in all my born days; and, if you’ll do as I wish, we’ll ask him to step in and treat him a little, for, poor lad, he seems to have a hard fight of it.”

“Have you lost the little brains you had Goody?” said the husband, whose eyes glistened with rage; “into the kitchen with you, and mind the fire; but don’t stand there glowering after strange men.”

So the wife had nothing left for it but to go into the kitchen, and look after the cooking; as for the lad outside, she couldn’t get leave to ask him in, or to treat him either; but just as she was about spitting the pig in the kitchen, she made an excuse for running out into the yard, and then and there she gave Boots a pair of scissors, of such a kind that they cut of themselves out of the air the loveliest clothes any one ever saw, silk and satin, and all that was fine.

“This you shall have because you are so handsome,” said the innkeeper’s wife.

So when the two elder brothers had crammed themselves with roast and boiled, they wished to be off again, and Boots had to stand behind their carriage, and be their servant; and so they travelled a good way, till they came to another inn.

There the two brothers again alighted and went in-doors, but Boots, who had no money, they wouldn’t have inside with them; no, he must wait outside and watch the luggage.

“And mind,” they said, “if any one asks whose servant you are, say we are two foreign Princes.”

But the same thing happened now as it happened before; while Boots stood hanging about out in the yard, the innkeeper’s wife came to the window and saw him, and she too fell in love with him, just like the first innkeeper’s wife; and there she stood and stared, for she thought she could never have her fill of looking at him. Then her husband came running through the room with something the two Princes had ordered.

“Don’t stand there staring like a cow at a barn-door, but take this into the kitchen, and look after your fish-kettle, Goody,” said the man; “don’t you see what grand people we have in the house to-day?”

“I don’t care a farthing for such a pack of rubbish,” said the wife; “if they don’t like what they get they may lump it, and eat what they brought with them. But just do come here, and see what you shall see! Such a handsome fellow as walks here, out in the yard, I never saw in all my born days. Shan’t we ask him in and treat him a little; he looks as if he needed it, poor chap?” and then she went on,—

“Such a love! such a love!”

“You never had much wit, and the little you had is clean gone, I can see,” said the man, who was much more angry than the first innkeeper, and chased his wife back, neck and crop, into the kitchen.

“Into the kitchen with you, and don’t stand glowering after lads,” he said.

So she had to go in and mind her fish-kettle, and she dared not treat Boots, for she was afraid of her old man; but as she stood there making up the fire, she made an excuse for running out into the yard, and then and there she gave Boots a table-cloth, which was such that it covered itself with the best dishes you could think of, as soon as it was spread out.

“This you shall have,” she said, “because you’re so handsome.”

So when the two brothers had eaten and drank of all that was in the house, and had paid the bill in hard cash, they set off again, and Boots stood up behind their carriage. But when they had gone so far that they grew hungry again, they turned into a third inn, and called for the best and dearest they could think of.

“For,” said they, “we are two kings on our travels, and as for our money, it grows like grass.”

Well, when the innkeeper heard that, there was such a roasting, and baking, and boiling; why! you might smell the dinner at the next neighbour’s house, though it wasn’t so very near; and the innkeeper was at his wit’s end to find all he wished to put before the two kings. But Boots, he had to stand outside here too, and look after the things in the carriage.

So it was the same story over again. The innkeeper’s wife came to the window and peeped out, and there she saw the servant standing by the carriage. Such a handsome chap she had never set eyes on before; so she looked and looked, and the more she stared the handsomer he seemed to the innkeeper’s wife. Then out came the innkeeper, scampering through the room, with some dainty which the travelling kings had ordered, and he wasn’t very soft-tongued when he saw his old dame standing and glowering out of the window.

“Don’t you know better than to stand gaping and staring there, when we have such great folk in the house,” he said; “back into the kitchen with you this minute, to your custards.”

“Well! well!” she said, “as for them, I don’t care a pin. If they can’t wait till the custards are baked, they may go without—that’s all. But do, pray, come here, and you’ll see such a lovely lad standing out here in the yard. Why, I never saw such a pretty fellow in my life. Shan’t we ask him in now, and treat him a little, for he looks as if it would do him good. Oh! what a darling! What a darling!”

“A wanton gadabout you’ve been all your days, and so you are still,” said her husband, who was in such a rage he scarce knew which leg to stand on; but if you don’t be off to your custards this minute, I’ll soon find out how to make you stir your stumps; see if I don’t.”

So the wife had off to her custards as fast as she could, for she knew that her husband would stand no nonsense; but as she stood there over the fire she stole out into the yard, and gave Boots a tap.

“If you only turn this tap,” she said; “you’ll get the finest drink of whatever kind you choose, both mead, and wine, and brandy; and this you shall have because you are so handsome.”

So when the two brothers had eaten and drunk all they could, they started from the inn, and Boots stood up behind again as their servant, and thus they drove far and wide till they came to a king’s palace. There the two elder gave themselves out for two emperor’s sons, and as they had plenty of money, and were so fine that their clothes shone again ever so far off, they were well treated. They had rooms in the palace, and the king couldn’t tell how to make enough of them. But Boots, who went about in the same rags he stood in when he left home, and who had never a penny in his pocket, he was taken up by the king’s guard, and put across to an island, whither they used to row over all the beggars and rogues that came to the palace. This the king had ordered, because he wouldn’t have the mirth at the palace spoilt by those dirty blackguards; and thither, too, only just as much food as would keep body and soul together was sent over every day. Now Boots’ brothers saw very well that the guard was rowing him over to the island, but they were glad to be rid of him, and didn’t pay the least heed to him.

But when Boots got over there, he just pulled out his scissors and began to snip and cut in the air; so the scissors cut out the finest clothes any one would wish to see; silk and satin both, and all the beggars on the island were soon dressed far finer than the king and all his guests in the palace. After that, Boots pulled out his table-cloth, and spread it out, and so they got food too, the poor beggars. Such a feast had never been seen at the king’s palace, as was served that day at the Beggar’s Isle.

“Thirsty, too, I’ll be bound you all are,” said Boots, and out with his tap, gave it a turn, and so the beggars got all a drop to drink; and such ale and mead the king himself had never tasted in all his life.

So, next morning, when those who were to bring the beggars their food on the island, came rowing over with the scrapings of the porridge-pots and cheese parings—that was what the poor wretches had—the beggars wouldn’t so much as taste them, and the king’s men fell to wondering what it could mean; but they wondered much more when they got a good look at the beggars, for they were so fine the guard thought they must be Emperors or Popes at least, and that they must have rowed to a wrong island; but when they looked better about them, they saw they were come to the old place.