Popular Tales from the Norse by Sir George Webbe Dasent

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When the morning came the old dame was so poorly that she couldn't
utter a word but groans and sighs. She was sure she should never be
well again, unless she had some of those apples that grew in the
orchard near the castle where the man's brothers lived; only she had
no one to send for them.

Oh! the lad was ready to go that instant; but the eleven lions went
with him. So when he came to the orchard, he climbed up into the
apple tree and ate as many apples as he could, and he had scarce got
down before he fell into a deep sleep; but the lions all lay round
him in a ring. The third day came the Troll's brothers, but they did
not come in man's shape. They came snorting like man-eating steeds,
and wondered who it was that dared to be there, and said they would
tear him to pieces, so small that there should not be a bit of him
left. But up rose the lions and tore the Trolls into small pieces, so
that the place looked as if a dung heap had been tossed about it; and
when they had finished the Trolls they lay down again. The lad did
not wake till late in the afternoon, and when he got on his knees and
rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, he began to wonder what had been
going on, when he saw the marks of hoofs. But when he went towards
the castle, a maiden looked out of a window who had seen all that had
happened, and she said:

'You may thank your stars you weren't in that tussle, else you must
have lost your life.'

'What! I lose my life! No fear of that, I think,' said the lad.

So she begged him to come in, that she might talk with him, for she
hadn't seen a Christian soul ever since she came there. But when she
opened the door the lions wanted to go in too, but she got so
frightened that she began to scream, and so the lad let them lie
outside. Then the two talked and talked, and the lad asked how it
came that she, who was so lovely, could put up with those ugly
Trolls. She never wished it, she said; 'twas quite against her will.
They had seized her by force, and she was the King of Arabia's
daughter. So they talked on, and at last she asked him what he would
do; whether she should go back home, or whether he would have her to
wife. Of course he would have her, and she shouldn't go home.

After that they went round the castle, and at last they came to a
great hall, where the Trolls' two great swords hung high up on the
wall.

'I wonder if you are man enough to wield one of these,' said the
Princess.

'Who?--I?' said the lad. ''Twould be a pretty thing if I couldn't
wield one of these.'

With that he put two or three chairs one a-top of the other, jumped
up, and touched the biggest sword with his finger tips, tossed it up
in the air, and caught it again by the hilt; leapt down, and at the
same time dealt such a blow with it on the floor that the whole hall
shook. After he had thus got down, he thrust the sword under his arm
and carried it about with him.

So, when they had lived a little while in the castle, the Princess
thought she ought to go home to her parents, and let them know what
had become of her; so they loaded a ship, and she set sail from the
castle.

After she had gone, and the lad had wandered about a little, he
called to mind that he had been sent on an errand thither, and had
come to fetch something for his mother's health; and though he said
to himself, 'After all, the old dame was not so bad but she's all
right by this time'--still he thought he ought to go and just see how
she was. So he went and found both the man and his mother quite fresh
and hearty.

'What wretches you are to live in this beggarly hut', said the lad.
'Come with me up to my castle, and you shall see what a fine fellow I
am.'

Well! they were both ready to go, and on the way his mother talked to
him, and asked, 'How it was he had got so strong?'

'If you must know, it came of that blue belt which lay on the hill-
side that time when you and I were out begging', said the lad.

'Have you got it still?' asked she.

'Yes'--he had. It was tied round his waist.

'Might she see it?'

'Yes, she might'; and with that he pulled open his waistcoat and
shirt to show it her.

Then she seized it with both hands, tore it off, and twisted it round
her fist.

'Now', she cried, 'what shall I do with such a wretch as you? I'll
just give you one blow, and dash your brains out!'

'Far too good a death for such a scamp', said the Troll. 'No! let's
first burn out his eyes, and then turn him adrift in a little boat.'

So they burned out his eyes and turned him adrift, in spite of his
prayers and tears; but, as the boat drifted, the lions swam after,
and at last they laid hold of it and dragged it ashore on an island,
and placed the lad under a fir tree. They caught game for him, and
they plucked the birds and made him a bed of down; but he was forced
to eat his meat raw, and he was blind. At last, one day the biggest
lion was chasing a hare which was blind, for it ran straight over
stock and stone, and the end was, it ran right up against a fir-stump
and tumbled head over heels across the field right into a spring; but
lo! when it came out of the spring it saw its way quite plain, and so
saved its life.

'So, so!' thought the lion, and went and dragged the lad to the
spring, and dipped him over head and ears in it. So, when he had got
his sight again, he went down to the shore and made signs to the
lions that they should all lie close together like a raft; then he
stood upon their backs while they swam with him to the mainland. When
he had reached the shore he went up into a birchen copse, and made
the lions lie quiet. Then he stole up to the castle, like a thief, to
see if he couldn't lay hands on his belt; and when he got to the
door, he peeped through the keyhole, and there he saw his belt
hanging up over a door in the kitchen. So he crept softly in across
the floor, for there was no one there; but as soon as he had got hold
of the belt, he began to kick and stamp about as though he were mad.
Just then his mother came rushing out.

'Dear heart, my darling little boy! do give me the belt again', she
said.

'Thank you kindly', said he. 'Now you shall have the doom you passed
on me', and he fulfilled it on the spot. When the old Troll heard
that, he came in and begged and prayed so prettily that he might not
be smitten to death.

'Well, you may live', said the lad, 'but you shall undergo the same
punishment you gave me'; and so he burned out the Troll's eyes, and
turned him adrift on the sea in a little boat, but he had no lions to
follow him.

Now the lad was all alone, and he went about longing and longing for
the Princess; at last he could bear it no longer; he must set out to
seek her, his heart was so bent on having her. So he loaded
four ships and set sail for Arabia. For some time they had fair wind
and fine weather, but after that they lay wind-bound under a rocky
island. So the sailors went ashore and strolled about to spend the
time, and there they found a huge egg, almost as big as a little
house. So they began to knock it about with large stones, but, after
all, they couldn't crack the shell. Then the lad came up with his
sword to see what all the noise was about, and when he saw the egg,
he thought it a trifle to crack it; so he gave it one blow and the egg
split, and out came a chicken as big as an elephant.

'Now we have done wrong', said the lad; 'this can cost us all our
lives'; and then he asked his sailors if they were men enough to sail
to Arabia in four-and-twenty hours if they got a fine breeze. Yes!
they were good to do that, they said, so they set sail with a fine
breeze, and got to Arabia in three-and-twenty hours. As soon as they
landed, the lad ordered all the sailors to go and bury themselves up
to the eyes in a sandhill, so that they could barely see the ships.
The lad and the captains climbed a high crag and sate down under a
fir.

In a little while came a great bird flying with an island in its
claws, and let it fall down on the fleet, and sunk every ship. After
it had done that, it flew up to the sandhill and flapped its wings,
so that the wind nearly took off the heads of the sailors, and it
flew past the fir with such force that it turned the lad right about,
but he was ready with his sword, and gave the bird one blow and
brought it down dead.

After that he went to the town, where every one was glad because the
king had got his daughter back; but now the king had hidden her away
somewhere himself, and promised her hand as a reward to any one who
could find her, and this though she was betrothed before. Now as the
lad went along he met a man who had white bear-skins for sale, so he
bought one of the hides and put it on; and one of the captains was to
take an iron chain and lead him about, and so he went into the town
and began to play pranks. At last the news came to the king's ears,
that there never had been such fun in the town before, for here was a
white bear that danced and cut capers just as it was bid. So a
messenger came to say the bear must come to the castle at once, for
the king wanted to see its tricks. So when it got to the castle every
one was afraid, for such a beast they had never seen before; but the
captain said there was no danger unless they laughed at it. They
mustn't do that, else it would tear them to pieces. When the king
heard that, he warned all the court not to laugh. But while the fun
was going on, in came one of the king's maids, and began to laugh and
make game of the bear, and the bear flew at her and tore her, so that
there was scarce a rag of her left. Then all the court began to
bewail, and the captain most of all.

'Stuff and nonsense', said the king; 'she's only a maid, besides it's
more my affair than yours.'

When the show was over, it was late at night. 'It's no good your
going away, when it's so late', said the king. 'The bear had best
sleep here.'

'Perhaps it might sleep in the ingle by the kitchen fire', said the
captain.

'Nay', said the king, 'it shall sleep up here, and it shall have
pillows and cushions to sleep on.' So a whole heap of pillows and
cushions was brought, and the captain had a bed in a side-room.

But at midnight the king came with a lamp in his hand and a big bunch
of keys, and carried off the white bear. He passed along gallery
after gallery, through doors and rooms, up-stairs and down-stairs,
till at last he came to a pier which ran out into the sea. Then the
king began to pull and haul at posts and pins, this one up and that
one down, till at last a little house floated up to the water's edge.
There he kept his daughter, for she was so dear to him that he had
hid her, so that no one could find her out. He left the white bear
outside while he went in and told her how it had danced and played
its pranks. She said she was afraid, and dared not look at it; but he
talked her over, saying there was no danger, if she only wouldn't
laugh. So they brought the bear in, and locked the door, and it
danced and played its tricks; but just when the fun was at its
height, the Princess's maid began to laugh. Then the lad flew at her
and tore her to bits, and the Princess began to cry and sob.

'Stuff and nonsense', cried the king; 'all this fuss about a maid!
I'll get you just as good a one again. But now I think the bear had
best stay here till morning, for I don't care to have to go and lead
it along all those galleries and stairs at this time of night.'

'Well!' said the Princess, 'if it sleeps here, I'm sure I won't.'

But just then the bear curled himself up and lay down by the stove;
and it was settled at last that the Princess should sleep there too,
with a light burning. But as soon as the king was well gone, the
white bear came and begged her to undo his collar. The Princess was
so scared she almost swooned away; but she felt about till she found
the collar, and she had scarce undone it before the bear pulled his
head off. Then she knew him again, and was so glad there was no end
to her joy, and she wanted to tell her father at once that her
deliverer was come. But the lad would not hear of it; he would earn
her once more, he said. So in the morning when they heard the king
rattling at the posts outside, the lad drew on the hide, and lay down
by the stove.

'Well, has it lain still?' the king asked.

'I should think so', said the Princess; 'it hasn't so much as turned
or stretched itself once.'

When they got up to the castle again, the captain took the bear and
led it away, and then the lad threw off the hide, and went to a
tailor and ordered clothes fit for a prince; and when they were
fitted on he went to the king, and said he wanted to find the
Princess.

'You're not the first who has wished the same thing', said the king,
'but they have all lost their lives; for if any one who tries can't
find her in four-and-twenty hours his life is forfeited.'

Yes; the lad knew all that. Still he wished to try, and if he
couldn't find her, 'twas his look-out. Now in the castle there was a
band that played sweet tunes, and there were fair maids to dance
with, and so the lad danced away. When twelve hours were gone, the
king said:

'I pity you with all my heart. You're so poor a hand at seeking; you
will surely lose your life.'

'Stuff!' said the lad; 'while there's life there's hope! So long as
there's breath in the body there's no fear; we have lots of time';
and so he went on dancing till there was only one hour left.

Then he said he would begin to search.

'It's no use now', said the king; 'time's up.'

'Light your lamp; out with your big bunch of keys', said the lad,
'and follow me whither I wish to go. There is still a whole hour
left.'

So the lad went the same way which the king had led him the night
before, and he bade the king unlock door after door till they came
down to the pier which ran out into the sea.

'It's all no use, I tell you', said the king; 'time's up, and this
will only lead you right out into the sea.'

'Still five minutes more', said the lad, as he pulled and pushed at
the posts and pins, and the house floated up.

'Now the time is up', bawled the king; 'come hither, headsman, and
take off his head.'

'Nay, nay!' said the lad; 'stop a bit, there are still three minutes!
Out with the key, and let me get into this house.'

But there stood the king and fumbled with his keys, to draw out the
time. At last he said he hadn't any key.

'Well, if you haven't, I _have_', said the lad, as he gave the
door such a kick that it flew to splinters inwards on the floor.

At the door the Princess met him, and told her father this was her
deliverer, on whom her heart was set. So she had him; and this was
how the beggar boy came to marry the king's daughter of Arabia.

WHY THE BEAR IS STUMPY-TAILED

One day the Bear met the Fox, who came slinking along with a string
of fish he had stolen.

'Whence did you get those from?' asked the Bear.

'Oh! my Lord Bruin, I've been out fishing and caught them', said the
Fox.

So the Bear had a mind to learn to fish too, and bade the Fox tell
him how he was to set about it.

'Oh! it's an easy craft for you', answered the Fox, 'and soon learnt.
You've only got to go upon the ice, and cut a hole and stick your
tail down into it; and so you must go on holding it there as long as
you can. You're not to mind if your tail smarts a little; that's when
the fish bite. The longer you hold it there the more fish you'll get;
and then all at once out with it, with a cross pull sideways, and
with a strong pull too.'

Yes; the Bear did as the Fox had said, and held his tail a long, long
time down in the hole, till it was fast frozen in. Then he pulled it
out with a cross pull, and it snapped short off. That's why Bruin
goes about with a stumpy tail this very day.

NOT A PIN TO CHOOSE BETWEEN THEM

Once on a time there was a man, and he had a wife. Now this couple
wanted to sow their fields, but they had neither seed-corn nor money
to buy it with. But they had a cow, and the man was to drive it into
town and sell it, to get money to buy corn for seed. But when it came
to the pinch, the wife dared not let her husband start for fear he
should spend the money in drink, so she set off herself with the cow,
and took besides a hen with her.

Close by the town she met a butcher, who asked:

'Will you sell that cow, Goody?'

'Yes, that I will', she answered.

'Well, what do you want for her?'

'Oh! I must have five shillings for the cow, but you shall have the
hen for ten pounds.'

'Very good!' said the man; 'I don't want the hen, and you'll soon get
it off your hands in the town, but I'll give you five shillings for
the cow.'

Well, she sold her cow for five shillings, but there was no one in
the town who would give ten pounds for a lean tough old hen, so she
went back to the butcher, and said:

'Do all I can, I can't get rid of this hen, master! you must take it
too, as you took the cow.'

'Well', said the butcher, 'come along and we'll see about it.' Then
he treated her both with meat and drink, and gave her so much brandy
that she lost her head, and didn't know what she was about, and fell
fast asleep. But while she slept, the butcher took and dipped her
into a tar-barrel, and then laid her down on a heap of feathers; and
when she woke up, she was feathered all over, and began to wonder
what had befallen her.

'Is it me, or is it not me? No, it can never be me; it must be some
great strange bird. But what shall I do to find out whether it is me
or not. Oh! I know how I shall be able to tell whether it is me; if
the calves come and lick me, and our dog Tray doesn't bark at me when
I get home, then it must be me, and no one else.'

Now, Tray, her dog, had scarce set his eyes on the strange monster
which came through the gate, than he set up such a barking, one would
have thought all the rogues and robbers in the world were in the
yard.

'Ah, deary me', said she, 'I thought so; it can't be me surely.' So
she went to the straw-yard, and the calves wouldn't lick her, when
they snuffed in the strong smell of tar. 'No, no!' she said, 'it
can't be me; it must be some strange outlandish bird.'

So she crept up on the roof of the safe and began to flap her arms,
as if they had been wings, and was just going to fly off.

When her husband saw all this, out he came with his rifle, and began
to take aim at her.

'Oh!' cried his wife, 'don't shoot, don't shoot! it is only me.'

'If it's you', said her husband, 'don't stand up there like a goat on
a house-top, but come down and let me hear what you have to say for
yourself.'

So she crawled down again, but she hadn't a shilling to shew, for the
crown she had got from the butcher she had thrown away in her
drunkenness. When her husband heard her story, he said, 'You're only
twice as silly as you were before', and he got so angry that he made
up his mind to go away from her altogether, and never to come back
till he had found three other Goodies as silly as his own.

So he toddled off, and when he had walked a little way he saw a
Goody, who was running in and out of a newly-built wooden cottage
with an empty sieve, and every time she ran in, she threw her apron
over the sieve just as if she had something in it, and when she got
in she turned it upside down on the floor.

'Why, Goody!' he asked, 'what are you doing?'

'Oh', she answered, 'I'm only carrying in a little sun; but I don't
know how it is, when I'm outside, I have the sun in my sieve, but
when I get inside, somehow or other I've thrown it away. But in my
old cottage I had plenty of sun, though I never carried in the least
bit. I only wish I knew some one who would bring the sun inside; I'd
give him three hundred dollars and welcome.'

'Have you got an axe?' asked the man. 'If you have, I'll soon bring
the sun inside.'

So he got an axe and cut windows in the cottage, for the carpenters
had forgotten them; then the sun shone in, and he got his three
hundred dollars.

'That was one of them', said the man to himself, as he went on his
way.

After a while he passed by a house, out of which came an awful
screaming and bellowing; so he turned in and saw a Goody, who was
hard at work banging her husband across the head with a beetle, and
over his head she had drawn a shirt without any slit for the neck.

'Why, Goody!' he asked, 'will you beat your husband to death?'

'No', she said, 'I only must have a hole in this shirt for his neck
to come through.'

All the while the husband kept on screaming and calling out:

'Heaven help and comfort all who try on new shirts. If anyone would
teach my Goody another way of making a slit for the neck in my new
shirts, I'd give him three hundred dollars down and welcome.'

'I'll do it in the twinkling of an eye', said the man, 'if you'll
only give me a pair of scissors.'

So he got a pair of scissors, and snipped a hole in the neck, and
went off with his three hundred dollars.

'That was another of them', he said to himself, as he walked along.

Last of all, he came to a farm, where he made up his mind to rest a
bit. So when he went in, the mistress asked him:

'Whence do you come, master?'

'Oh!' said he, 'I come from Paradise Place', for that was the name of
his farm.

'From Paradise Place!' she cried, 'you don't say so! Why, then, you
must know my second husband Peter, who is dead and gone, God rest his
soul.'

For you must know this Goody had been married three times, and as her
first and last husbands had been bad, she had made up her mind that
the second only was gone to heaven.

'Oh yes', said the man; 'I know him very well.'

'Well', asked the Goody, 'how do things go with him, poor dear soul?'

'Only middling', was the answer; 'he goes about begging from house to
house, and has neither food nor a rag to his back. As for money, he
hasn't a sixpence to bless himself with.'

'Mercy on me', cried out the Goody; 'he never ought to go about such
a figure when he left so much behind him. Why, there's a whole
cupboard full of old clothes up-stairs which belonged to him, besides
a great chest full of money yonder. Now, if you will take them with
you, you shall have a horse and cart to carry them. As for the horse,
he can keep it, and sit on the cart, and drive about from house to
house, and then he needn't trudge on foot.'

So the man got a whole cart-load of clothes, and a chest full of
shining dollars, and as much meat and drink as he would; and when he
had got all he wanted, he jumped into the cart and drove off.

'That was the third', he said to himself, as he went along. Now this
Goody's third husband was a little way off in a field ploughing, and
when he saw a strange man driving off from the farm with his horse
and cart, he went home and asked his wife who that was that had just
started with the black horse.

'Oh, do you mean him?' said the Goody; 'why, that was a man from
Paradise, who said that Peter, my dear second husband, who is dead
and gone, is in a sad plight, and that he goes from house to house
begging, and has neither clothes nor money; so I just sent him all
those old clothes he left behind him, and the old money box with the
dollars in it.' The man saw how the land lay in a trice, so he
saddled his horse and rode off from the farm at full gallop. It
wasn't long before he was close behind the man who sat and drove the
cart; but when the latter saw this he drove the cart into a thicket
by the side of the road, pulled out a handful of hair from the
horse's tail, jumped up on a little rise in the wood, where he tied
the hair fast to a birch, and then lay down under it, and began to
peer and stare up at the sky.

'Well, well, if I ever!' he said, as Peter the third came riding up.
'No! I never saw the like of this in all my born days!'

Then Peter stood and looked at him for some time, wondering what had
come over him; but at last he asked:

'What do you lie there staring at?'

'No', kept on the man, 'I never did see anything like it!--here is a
man going straight up to heaven on a black horse, and here you see
his horse's tail still hanging in this birch; and yonder up in the
sky you see the black horse.'

Peter looked first at the man, and then at the sky, and said:

'I see nothing but the horse hair in the birch; that's all I see!'

'Of course you can't where you stand', said the man; 'but just come
and lie down here, and stare straight up, and mind you don't take
your eyes off the sky; and then you shall see what you shall see.'

But while Peter the third lay and stared up at the sky till his eyes
filled with tears, the man from Paradise Place took his horse and
jumped on its back and rode off both with it and the cart and horse.

When the hoofs thundered along the road, Peter the third jumped up;
but he was so taken aback when he found the man had gone off with his
horse that he hadn't the sense to run after him till it was too late.

He was rather down in the mouth when he got home to his Goody; but
when she asked him what he had done with the horse, he said,

'I gave it to the man too for Peter the second, for I thought it
wasn't right he should sit in a cart, and scramble about from house
to house; so now he can sell the cart and buy himself a coach to
drive about in.'

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