Part 1

MIGHTY MIKKO

A Book of Finnish Fairy Tales and Folk Tales

BY PARKER FILLMORE

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS AND DECORATIONS BY JAY VAN EVEREN

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NEW YORK HARCOURT, BRACE AND COMPANY

Copyright, 1922, by PARKER FILLMORE

PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. BY THE QUINN & BODEN COMPANY RAHWAY, N J

_BY PARKER FILLMORE_

CZECHOSLOVAK FAIRY TALES THE SHOEMAKER'S APRON _Both Illustrated by Jan Matulka_

THE LAUGHING PRINCE _Illustrated by Jay Van Everen_

THE HICKORY LIMB _Illustrated by Rose Cecil O'Neill_

THE ROSIE WORLD _Illustrated by Maginal Wright Enright_

To my niece

Phyllis

These stories of her mother's native land

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NOTE

The spirit of nationalism that swept over the small peoples of Europe in the early nineteenth century touched faraway Finland and started the Finns on the quest of the Finnish. There as elsewhere scholars who were also patriots found that the native tongue, lost to the educated and the well-to-do, had been preserved in the songs and stories which were current among the peasants. Elias Lönnrot spent a long and busy life collecting those ancient _runos_ from which he succeeded in building up a national epic, the _Kalevala_. This is Lönnrot's great contribution to his own country and to the world. Beside the material for the _Kalevala_ Lönnrot made important collections of lyrics, proverbs, and stories.

During his time and since other patriot scholars have made faithful records of the songs and tales which the old Finnish minstrels, the _runolaulajat_, chanted to the strains of the _kantele_. The mass of such material now gathered together in the archives of the Society of Finnish Literature at Helsingfors is imposing in bulk and of great importance to the student of comparative folklore.

My own excursions into the Finnish have been made possible through the kindness and endless patience of my friend, Lydia Tulonen (Mrs. Kurt J. Rahlson). With her as a native guide I have been wandering some time through the byways of Finnish folklore. The present volume is the traveler's pack I have brought home with me filled with strange treasures which will, I hope, seem as lovely to others as they seemed to me when first I came upon them.

The stories as I offer them are not translations but my own versions. Literal translations from the Finnish would make small appeal to the general reader. To English ears the Finnish is stiff, bald, and monotonous. One has only to read or attempt to read Kirby's excellent translation of the _Kalevala_ to realize the truth of this statement. So I make no apology for retelling these tales in a manner more likely to prove entertaining to the English reader, whether child or adult.

In some form or other all the tales in this book may be found in the various folklore collections made by Eero Salmelainen, one of the patriotic young scholars who followed in Lönnrot's footsteps. His books were sponsored by the Society of Finnish Literature and used in its campaign to bring back the Finnish language to the Finns at a time when Swedish was the official language of the country.

Full of local color as these stories are, it would be vain to pretend that they are not, for the most part, variants of stories told the world over. All that I can claim for them is that they are dramatic and picturesque, that they are told with a wealth of charming detail which is essentially Finnish, and that they are certainly new to the generality of English readers. _The Three Chests_, so characteristic in feeling of a country famous for its lakes and marshes, is the variant of a German story which Grimm gives as _Fitcher's Bird_. Of _The Forest Bride_ I have found variants in the folklore of many lands. There are several very beautiful ones in the Russian; in other books I myself have retold two, one current among the Czechs and one among the Serbians; Grimm has two different versions in _The Three Feathers_ and _The Poor Miller's Boy and the Cat_; and Madame d'Aulnoy has used the same story in her elaborate tale, _The White Cat_. There is a well-known Oriental version of _Mighty Mikko_ in which the part of the fox is played by a jackal and I am sure that Mikko's faithful retainer, though neither city-bred nor polished, is after all pretty closely related to that most debonnaire of Frenchmen, _Puss in Boots_. Perrault probably and Madame d'Aulnoy certainly are in turn indebted to Straparola. And so it goes.

The little cycle of animal stories included under _Mikko the Fox_ will of course instantly invite comparison with the Beast Epic of _Reynard the Fox_. The two have many episodes in common and both have episodes to be found in Æsop and in those books of animal analogues, widely read in mediæval times, _Physiologus_ and the _Disciplina Clericalis_ of Petrus Alfonsus. The _Reynard_ as we have it is a finished satire on church and state and in its present form has been current in Europe since the twelfth century. It was thought at one time that the animal stories found in Finland were debased versions of the _Reynard_ stories, but scholars are now of opinion that they antedate _Reynard_ and are similar to the earlier simpler stories upon which the _Reynard_ cycle was originally built. This makes the little Finnish tales of great interest to the student. Needless to say I do not present them for this reason but because they seem to me charming merely as fables. The animals here are not the clerics and the judges and the nobles that the _Reynard_ animals are, but plain downright Finnish peasants, sometimes stupid, often dull, frequently amusing, and always very human.

I have taken one liberty with spelling. I have transliterated Syöjätär, the name of the dread Finnish witch, as Suyettar. I have been unwilling to translate by the insufficient word, _bath-house_ or _vapor bath_, that very characteristic institution of Finnish family life, the _sauna_, but have retained the Finnish word, _sauna_, allowing the context in each case to indicate the meaning.

P. F.

_New York_ _June 19, 1922_

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CONTENTS

PAGE THE TRUE BRIDE: The Story of Ilona and the King's Son 1

MIGHTY MIKKO: The Story of a Poor Woodsman and a Grateful Fox 25

THE THREE CHESTS: The Story of the Wicked Old Man of the Sea 47

LOG: The Story of the Hero Who Released the Sun 67

THE LITTLE SISTER: The Story of Suyettar and the Nine Brothers 99

THE FOREST BRIDE: The Story of a Little Mouse Who was a Princess 121

THE ENCHANTED GROUSE: The Story of Helli and the Little Locked Box 141

THE TERRIBLE OLLI: The Story of an Honest Finn and a Wicked Troll 155

THE DEVIL'S HIDE: The Story of the Boy Who Wouldn't Lose His Temper 171

THE MYSTERIOUS SERVANT: The Story of a Young Man Who Respected the Dead 193

FAMILIAR FACES:

I Mary, Mary, So Contrary! 209

II Jane, Jane, Don't Complain! 215

III Susan Walker, What a Talker! 221

MIKKO THE FOX: A Nursery Epic in Sixteen Adventures

I The Animals Take a Bite 229

II The Partners 235

III The Fox and the Crow 243

IV The Chief Mourner 251

V Mirri, the Cat 257

VI The Fox's Servant 263

VII The Wolf Sings 267

VIII The Clever Goat 273

IX The Harvest 279

X The Porridge 283

XI Nurse Mikko 287

XII The Bear Says _North_ 293

XIII Osmo's Share 297

XIV The Reward of Kindness 301

XV The Bear and the Mouse 307

XVI The Last of Osmo 309

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FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS

Ilona came floating up through the waves _Frontispiece_

PAGE The old king snake has wound himself around Osmo's arm 15

The King thought that if Mikko should see his daughter 33

She fitted the key in the lock 57

"This last and mightiest battle is for me!" 85

Suyettar bewitching Kerttu 111

She beckoned to Veikko 135

On it flew until it reached the broad Ocean 147

Olli and the Troll's horse 161

From the bones of the cattle he laid three bridges 183

"She is under an evil enchantment and I am delivering her!" 203

When she got to the middle of the stream 208

They were so busy eating and drinking 214

They carried home the treasure on their backs 220

Osmo, the Bear, grunted out: "Huh! That's easy! We'll eat the smallest of us next!" 228

"Wake up, Pekka! Wake up! There's butter running out of your nose!" 239

"I'll teach that Crow to interfere with my affairs!" the Fox muttered to himself as he trotted off 249

And Mikko, beginning with a little whimpering sound, slowly rose to a high heartrending cry 253

He jerked quickly away and fled and the Bear was left standing with his mouth wide open 259

A terrible creature landed on his nose and drove it full of pins and needles 262

The Wolf went staggering around the room howling at the top of his voice 269

In the confusion that followed the Wolves stampeded, running helter-skelter in all directions 272

"Here are three of us and, see, here on the floor is our harvest already divided into three heaps" 278

He dropped it in the water and of course it spread out far and wide and the current carried it off 282

He ran after Mikko and was about to overtake him when Mikko slipped into a crevice in the rocks. Only one paw stuck out 289

Of course the instant he opened his mouth, the Grouse flew away 292

"Why, do you know," he said, "my turnips and my bread don't taste a bit like this!" 296

The first person they met was an old Horse. They put their case to him 300

With that the Bear lifted his paw and the little Mouse scampered off 306

So that was the End 315

THE TRUE BRIDE

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_The Story of Ilona and the King's Son_

THE TRUE BRIDE

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There were once two orphans, a brother and a sister, who lived alone in the old farmhouse where their fathers before them had lived for many generations. The brother's name was Osmo, the sister's Ilona. Osmo was an industrious youth, but the farm was small and barren and he was hard put to it to make a livelihood.

"Sister," he said one day, "I think it might be well if I went out into the world and found work."

"Do as you think best, brother," Ilona said. "I'm sure I can manage on here alone."

So Osmo started off, promising to come back for his sister as soon as he could give her a new home. He wandered far and wide and at last got employment from the King's Son as a shepherd.

The King's Son was about Osmo's age, and often when he met Osmo tending his flocks he would stop and talk to him.

One day Osmo told the King's Son about his sister, Ilona.

"I have wandered far over the face of the earth," he said, "and never have I seen so beautiful a maiden as Ilona."

"What does she look like?" the King's Son asked.

Osmo drew a picture of her and she seemed to the King's Son so beautiful that at once he fell in love with her.

"Osmo," he said, "if you will go home and get your sister, I will marry her."

So Osmo hurried home not by the long land route by which he had come but straight over the water in a boat.

"Sister," he cried, as soon as he saw Ilona, "you must come with me at once for the King's Son wishes to marry you!"

He thought Ilona would be overjoyed, but she sighed and shook her head.

"What is it, sister? Why do you sigh?"

"Because it grieves me to leave this old house where our fathers have lived for so many generations."

"Nonsense, Ilona! What is this little old house compared to the King's castle where you will live once you marry the King's Son!"

But Ilona only shook her head.

"It's no use, brother! I can't bear to leave this old house until the grindstone with which our fathers for generations ground their meal is worn out."

When Osmo found she was firm, he went secretly and broke the old grindstone into small pieces. He then put the pieces together so that the stone looked the same as before. But of course the next time Ilona touched it, it fell apart.

"Now, sister, you'll come, will you not?" Osmo asked.

But again Ilona shook her head.

"It's no use, brother. I can't bear to go until the old stool where our mothers have sat spinning these many generations is worn through."

So again Osmo took things into his own hands and going secretly to the old spinning stool he broke it and when Ilona sat on it again it fell to pieces.

Then Ilona said she couldn't go until the old mortar which had been in use for generations should fall to bits at a blow from the pestle. Osmo cracked the mortar and the next time Ilona struck it with the pestle it broke.

Then Ilona said she couldn't go until the old worn doorsill over which so many of their forefathers had walked should fall to splinters at the brush of her skirts. So Osmo secretly split the old doorsill into thin slivers and, when next Ilona stepped over it, the brush of her skirts sent the splinters flying.

"I see now I must go," Ilona said, "for the house of our forefathers no longer holds me."

So she packed all her ribbons and her bodices and skirts in a bright wooden box and, calling her little dog Pilka, she stepped into the boat and Osmo rowed her off in the direction of the King's castle.

Soon they passed a long narrow spit of land at the end of which stood a woman waving her arms. That is she looked like a woman. Really she was Suyettar but they, of course, did not know this.

"Take me in your boat!" she cried.

"Shall we?" Osmo asked his sister.

"I don't think we ought to," Ilona said. "We don't know who she is or what she wants and she may be evil."

So Osmo rowed on. But the woman kept shouting:

"Hi, there! Take me in your boat! Take me!"

A second time Osmo paused and asked his sister:

"Don't you think we ought to take her?"

"No," Ilona said.

So Osmo rowed on again. At this the creature raised such a pitiful outcry demanding what they meant denying assistance to a poor woman that Osmo was unable longer to refuse and in spite of Ilona's warning he rowed to land.

Suyettar instantly jumped into the boat and seated herself in the middle with her face towards Osmo and her back towards Ilona.

"What a fine young man!" Suyettar said in whining flattering tones. "See how strong he is at the oars! And what a beautiful girl, too! I daresay the King's Son would fall in love with her if ever he saw her!"

Thereupon Osmo very foolishly told Suyettar that the King's Son had already promised to marry Ilona. At that an evil look came into Suyettar's face and she sat silent for a time biting her fingers. Then she began mumbling a spell that made Osmo deaf to what Ilona was saying and Ilona deaf to what Osmo was saying.

At last in the distance the towers of the King's castle appeared.

"Stand up, sister!" Osmo said. "Shake out your skirts and arrange your pretty ribbons! We'll soon be landing now!"

Ilona could see her brother's lips moving but of course she could not hear what he was saying.

"What is it, brother?" she asked.

Suyettar answered for him:

"Osmo orders you to jump headlong into the water!"

"No! No!" Ilona cried. "He couldn't order anything so cruel as that!"

Presently Osmo said:

"Sister, what ails you? Don't you hear me? Shake out your skirts and arrange your pretty ribbons for we'll soon be landing now."

"What is it, brother?" Ilona asked.

As before Suyettar answered for him:

"Osmo orders you to jump headlong into the water!"

"Brother, how can you order so cruel a thing!" Ilona cried, bursting into tears. "Is it for this you made me leave the home of my fathers?"

A third time Osmo said:

"Stand up, sister, and shake out your skirts and arrange your ribbons! We'll soon be landing now!"

"I can't hear you, brother! What is it you say?"

Suyettar turned on her fiercely and screamed:

"Osmo orders you to jump headlong into the water!"

"If he says I must, I must!" poor Ilona sobbed, and with that she leapt overboard.

Osmo tried to save her but Suyettar held him back and with her own arms rowed off and Ilona was left to sink.

"What will become of me now!" Osmo cried. "When the King's Son finds I have not brought him my sister he will surely order my death!"

"Not at all!" Suyettar said. "Do as I say and no harm will come to you. Offer me to the King's Son and tell him I am your sister. He won't know the difference and anyway I'm sure I'm just as beautiful as Ilona ever was!"

With that Suyettar opened the wooden box that held Ilona's clothes and helped herself to skirt and bodice and gay colored ribbons. She decked herself out in these and for a little while she really did succeed in looking like a pretty young girl.

So Osmo presented Suyettar to the King's Son as Ilona, and the King's Son because he had given his word married her. But before one day was past, he called Osmo to him and asked him angrily:

"What did you mean by telling me your sister was beautiful?"

"Isn't she beautiful?" Osmo faltered.

"No! I thought she was at first but she isn't! She is ugly and evil and you shall pay the penalty for having deceived me!"

Thereupon he ordered that Osmo be shut up in a place filled with serpents.

"If you are innocent," the King's Son said, "the serpents will not harm you. If you are guilty they will devour you!"

Meanwhile poor Ilona when she jumped into the water sank down, down, down, until she reached the Sea King's palace. They received her kindly there and comforted her and the Sea King's Son, touched by her grief and beauty, offered to marry her. But Ilona was homesick for the upper world and would not listen to him.

"I want to see my brother again!" she wept.

They told her that the King's Son had thrown her brother to the serpents and had married Suyettar in her stead, but Ilona still begged so pitifully to be allowed to return to earth that at last the Sea King said:

"Very well, then! For three successive nights I will allow you to return to the upper world. But after that never again!"

So they decked Ilona in the lovely jewels of the sea with great strands of pearls about her neck and to each of her ankles they attached long silver chains. As she rose in the water the sound of the chains was like the chiming of silver bells and could be heard for five miles.

Ilona came to the surface of the water just where Osmo had landed. The first thing she saw was his boat at the water's edge and curled up asleep in the bottom of the boat her own little dog, Pilka.

"Pilka!" Ilona cried, and the little dog woke with a bark of joy and licked Ilona's hand and yelped and frisked.

Then Ilona sang this magic song to Pilka:

"Peely, peely, Pilka, pide, Lift the latch and slip inside! Past the watchdog in the yard, Past the sleeping men on guard! Creep in softly as a snake, Then creep out before they wake! Peely, peely, Pilka, pide, Peely, peely, Pilka!"

Pilka barked and frisked and said:

"Yes, mistress, yes! I'll do whatever you bid me!"

Ilona gave the little dog an embroidered square of gold and silver which she herself had worked down in the Sea King's palace.

"Take this," she said to Pilka, "and put it on the pillow where the King's Son lies asleep. Perhaps when he sees it he will know that it comes from Osmo's true sister and that the frightful creature he has married is Suyettar. Then perhaps he will release Osmo before the serpents devour him. Go now, my faithful Pilka, and come back to me before the dawn."

So Pilka raced off to the King's palace carrying the square of embroidery in her teeth. Ilona waited and half an hour before sunrise the little dog came panting back.

"What news, Pilka? How fares my brother and how is my poor love, the King's Son?"

"Osmo is still with the serpents," Pilka answered, "but they haven't eaten him yet. I left the embroidered square on the pillow where the King's Son's head was lying. Suyettar was asleep on the bed beside him where you should be, dear mistress. Suyettar's awful mouth was open and she was snoring horribly. The King's Son moved uneasily for he was troubled even in his sleep."

"And did you go through the castle, Pilka?"

"Yes, dear mistress."

"And did you see the remains of the wedding feast?"

"Yes, dear mistress, the remains of a feast that shamed the King's Son, for Suyettar served bones instead of meat, fish heads, turnip tops, and bread burned to a cinder."

"Good Pilka!" Ilona said. "Good little dog! You have done well! Now the dawn is coming and I must go back to the Sea King's palace. But I shall come again to-night and also to-morrow night and do you be here waiting for me."

Pilka promised and Ilona sank down into the sea to a clanking of chains that sounded like silver bells. The King's Son heard them in his sleep and for a moment woke and said:

"What's that?"

"What's what?" snarled Suyettar. "You're dreaming! Go back to sleep!"

A few hours later when he woke again, he found the lovely square of embroidery on his pillow.

"Who made this?" he cried.

Suyettar was busy combing her snaky locks. She turned on him quickly.

"Who made what?"

When she saw the embroidery she tried to snatch it from him, but he held it tight.

"I made it, of course!" she declared. "Who but me would sit up all night and work while you lay snoring!"

But the King's Son, as he folded the embroidery, muttered to himself:

"It doesn't look to me much like your work!"

After he had breakfasted, the King's Son asked for news of Osmo. A slave was sent to the place of the serpents and when he returned he reported that Osmo was sitting amongst them uninjured.

"The old king snake has made friends with him," he added, "and has wound himself around Osmo's arm."

The King's Son was amazed at this news and also relieved, for the whole affair troubled him sorely and he was beginning to suspect a mystery.