Segnius Irritant: or Eight Primitive Folk-lore Stories/Golden Locks
Golden Locks.
There was a king and he was so clever that he even understood what all living creatures said to one another. And hear how he taught himself. A certain old grandmother came to him, brought him a snake in a basket, and says that he is to have it cooked; when he eats it he will understand everything that any creature in the air, on the ground, or in the water says. The idea of knowing something no one else knew pleased the king; he paid the grandmother handsomely, and at once bade his servant prepare this fish for him for dinner. “But mind,” he says, “you don’t even touch it with your tongue; verily, if you do you shall pay for it with your head.”
George, this servant, wondered why the king so strictly forbade it. “Never in my life have I seen such a fish,” he says to himself. “It looks just like a snake; and what sort of a cook must he be not to try what he is cooking?” When it was baked he took a morsel on his tongue and tasted it. At that moment he heard something buzz past his ears: “Us a bit too! Us a bit too!” George looks round to see what it is, but there is nothing but a few flies flying about in the kitchen. Then, again, outside on the street he hears someone exclaim sibilantly: “Whither away? whither away?” and a tiny little voice answer: “To the miller’s barley! to the miller’s barley!“ George peeps out of the window and sees a goose girl with a flock of geese. “Ah!” he says, “that’s the sort of fish it is!” Now he knew what it was. Yet again he stuffed a small piece into his mouth and then took the snake to the king as though nothing had happened.
After dinner the king ordered George to saddle the horses, for he wished to take a ride, and George was to accompany him. The king rode before, and George after him. As they were riding over a green meadow (George’s horse frisked and whinnied. “Ho! ho! ho! brother, I feel so light I should like to jump over the mountains.” “Oh! as for that,” says the other, “I should like to jump about too, but on me sits an old man; were I to jump about, he would fall to the ground like a bladder and break his neck.” “Let him break it! What of that?” said George’s horse; “instead of an old man you will then carry a young one.” George laughed heartily to himself at this conversation, but only silently that the king might not know it. But the king also understood very well what the two horses had been saying to one another, looked round and seeing that George was laughing, inquires: “What art thou laughing at?” “Nothing, your Serene Highness; it was only that something occurred to me,” said George in excuse. But the old king now had him in suspicion, and did not much trust the horses either, faced about, and so home again.
When they rode into the castle the king bade George pour him out a glass of wine. “But with thy head shalt thou answer for it if thou fillest not brimful or over-pourest.” George took the vessel with the wine and pours. At that moment two small birds flew in by the window; one was chasing the other, and the other that took flight had three golden hairs in its beak. “Give me them,” says the one, “they’re mine, indeed they are!” “I won’t, they’re mine! As if I didn’t pick them up!” “As if I wasn’t the one to see how they fell, when the golden-haired maiden combed herself! Give me two, at any rate.” “Not a single one, I tell you.” Here this other little bird hies after him and has caught hold of these golden hairs. After tussling for them in the air, each was left with one golden hair in its beak, and the third fell upon the ground and just rang out like a harp-string. At that moment George looked round at them and over-poured. “Thy life is forfeit to me,” exclaimed the king, “but I wish to treat thee graciously, on condition that thou obtainest for me this golden-haired maiden and bringest her to me as my bride.”
What had George to do? If he wanted to preserve his life he must hie after the maiden, although he didn’t the least know where to look for her. He saddled his horse and rode hither and thither. He rode to a black wood, and here under the wood by the roadside burnt a bush; shepherds had kindled it. Under the bush was an ant-hill; the sparks were falling upon it, and the ants with their little white eggs were running hither and thither. Oh! help, George, help!” they cried piteously; “we are burning, and our young too in their little eggs.” Down from his horse in a minute was George, grasped the bush, and quenched the fire. “When thou shalt have need of us, think of us, and we also will help thee.”
After this he rode through the same wood and came to a tall pine. On the top of the pine was a nest of young ravens, and down on the ground were two young ravens piping and lamenting: “Father and mother have flown away and left us to feed ourselves, and we poor fledglings do not yet know how to fly. Oh! help, George, help! fill our maws, for really we are dying of hunger.” George did not reflect long; leapt from his horse and thrust his sword into its side that the young ravens might have something to devour. “When thou shalt have need of us,” they croaked gaily, “think of us and we will help thee, too.”
After this George had to go forward on foot. He went a long, long way through the wood, and when at last he emerged from the wood he saw a sea extending far and wide before him. On the shore at the edge of the sea two fishermen were disputing together. They had caught a large golden fish in a net, and each one wished to keep it all to himself. “Mine is the net, therefore mine the fish!” And the other replied: “Little would thy net have availed thee, if it had not been for my boat and my aid.” “The next time we catch such another it shall be thine.” Not so; wait thou for the next one and just give me that!” “I will arrange your differences,” says George. “Sell me this fish; I will pay you well, and the money you can divide between you half and half.” And so he gave them for it all the money he had from the king for his journey; he left himself nothing. The fishermen were glad to have sold it so well, and George let the fish go again into the sea. It splashed merrily out into the water, plunged, and then, not far from the shore, stuck out its head just once. “When you shall have need of me in your turn, George, remember me and I will serve you!” And after this it was lost to sight. “Where goest thou?” asked the fishermen of George. “I go in behalf of my master, the old king, for a bride, for a golden-haired maiden, and I don’t the least know where to look for her.” “Oh! about her we can well inform thee; it is Golden Locks, the royal daughter, of the castle of crystal yonder on that island. Every day in the morning, when it dawns, she combs her golden tresses; the glitter from them flashes over sea and sky. If thou wishest, we will ourselves ferry thee across to this island, because thou hast so well arranged our differences. But take care thou choosest the right maiden; there are twelve of them, all the king’s daughters, but only one has golden hair.”
When George was at the island he went into the castle of crystal to request the king to give his golden-haired daughter in marriage to his lord the king. “I will give her,” said the king, “but thou must deserve her; thou must during three days accomplish three tasks which I shall impose on you, each day one. Meanwhile, thou must wait until to-morrow.” The next day early, says the king to him: “My Golden Locks had a string of precious pearls; the string snapped, and the pearls were scattered in the long grass upon the green meadow. All these pearls must thou collect, and not a single one must be missing.” George went to this meadow; it extended far and wide; he knelt down in the grass and began to search. “Oh! if my little ants were here, they could help me.” Why, here we are to help thee!” said the ants; where they came, there they came, but around him they just swarmed. “What wantest thou?” “I have to collect pearls on this meadow, and I don’t see a single one.” “Just wait a little bit, we will collect them for thee.” And it was not long before they had brought him out of the grass a small heap of pearls; he had nothing to do but thread them on the string. And after this, when he was just meaning to tie up the string, yet one other little ant hobbled to him; it was crippled, its foot having been burnt when there was the fire at their ant-heap, and it cried out: “Stop, George! don’t tie it up yet, I am bringing just one other little pearl.”
When George brought these pearls to the king, and the king had counted them over, not a single one was missing. “Well hast thou performed thy task,” he says; “to-morrow I will give thee something else to do.” George came early, and the king said to him: “My Golden Locks bathed in the sea and lost there a golden ring; this thou must find and bring.” George went to the sea and walked sadly along the shore; the sea was clear, but so deep that he could not even see to the bottom, and however was he to pick out a ring at the bottom? “Oh! if my golden fish were here, she could help me.” That very instant something flashed in the sea, and from the depths on to the surface floated the golden fish. “Why, here I am to help thee. What needest thou?” “I have to find a golden ring, and I do not even see to the bottom.” “Only just now I met a pike,[1] he wore a gold ring on his fin. Just wait a little bit and I will bring it to you.” And in no long time she returned from the depths of the sea and brought with her the pike, finger-ring and all.
The king applauded George for having so well accomplished his task; and after this, next morning, imposed the third. If thou wouldst have me give my Golden Locks to thy king as a bride, thou must bring her dead and living water, for she will have need of it.” George, not knowing where to turn for this water, went haphazard hither and thither, where his feet carried him, until he came to a black wood. “Oh! if my ravens were here, perhaps they could help me!” Here something rustled above his head, and where they came, there they came—two young ravens: “Why, here we are to help thee. What wouldst thou?” I have to bring dead and living water, and I do not know where to look for it.” “Just wait a little bit, we will bring it thee.” And after a short time each brought George a gourd full of water; in one gourd was dead water, in the other was living water. George was glad to have succeeded so well, and hastened to the castle. At the outskirts of the wood he saw stretched from pine to pine a spider’s web, in the middle of the spider’s web sat a big spider sucking a dead fly. George took the gourd with the dead water, spattered the spider with it, and the spider rolled to the ground like a ripe cherry. It was dead. After this he spattered the fly with the living water from the other gourd, and the fly began to stretch itself, scraped itself clean from the spider’s web, and hi! away into the air. “Lucky for thee, George, that thou hast resurrected me,” it buzzed past his ear, for without me thou hadst scarcely guessed which of the twelve is Golden Locks.”
When the king saw that George had also discovered the third thing, he said that he would give him his golden-haired daughter. “But,” says he, “thou must select her thyself.” Hereupon, he led him into a large hall; there in the middle was a round table, and round the table sat twelve beautiful maidens, one just like the other; but each had on her head a long whimple falling to the ground, white as snow, so that it was impossible to see what sort of hair each had. “Look, there are my daughters,” says the king. “If thou guessest which of them is Golden Locks, thou hast won her, and canst take her away with thee; but if thou dost not hit upon her, she is not decreed to thee; thou must go away without her.” George was in the greatest perplexity, he did not know how to begin. At that moment something whispered in his ear: “Buzz! buzz! walk round the table. I’ll tell thee which it is.” It was the fly that George had brought to life again with the living water. “It isn’t that girl—nor that one either—nor that—here, this is Golden Locks.” “Give me this daughter!” exclaimed George, “her I have deserved for my master.” “Thou hast guessed,” said the king, and the maiden also at once rose from the table, threw off the whimple, and her golden hair rolled in rich masses from her head to the ground, and all about her was as bright as when in the morning the sunrise [lit.: the little sun] emerges, so that George’s two poor eyes quite ached again.
After this the king gave his daughter an escort for her journey, as was right and proper, and George led her to his master to be the old king’s bride. The old king’s two eyes sparkled, and he skipped about with delight when he saw Golden Locks, and he gave orders at once that preparations for the wedding should be made. “I meant, indeed, to have had thee hanged for thy disobedience, that the young ravens might feast off thee,” he says to George; ' but since thou hast served me so well, I will only have thy head cut off with an axe, and then I will have thee respectably buried.” When they had executed George, Golden Locks begged the old king to make her a present of his dead servant, and the old king could not refuse his golden-haired bride anything. After this she fastened George’s head to his body, sprinkled him with the dead water, and body and head grew together, so that not the least trace of the wound remained; then she sprinkled him with the living water, and George got up again as if he had been born anew, fresh as a stag, and with youth just beaming from his face. “Oh! how sound I have slept,” says George, and rubbed his eyes. “Ay, verily thou hast slept sound,” said Golden Locks; “and if it had not been for me, for ever and ever thou wouldst never have awoke again.” When the old king saw that George had come to life again, and that he was younger and more beautiful than before, he also would gladly have been rejuvenated in the same way. He at once ordered them to decapitate him also, and then sprinkle him with the water. They cut off his head and sprinkled and sprinkled with the living water till all the water was sprinkled away; but the head would on no conditions attach itself to the body again; only afterwards did they begin sprinkling it with the dead water, and in a moment it grew fast to the body; but the king was again dead because they had now no living water to resurrect him with. And because a kingdom without a king cannot exist, and they had no one so clever as to understand all living creatures in the way that George did, they made George king and Golden Locks queen.
NOTE.
In the preceding story we have a transitional form to the various Lorelys. Didos, and luckless heroines turned into birds by a pin stuck into their brains, of which European folk-lore is full. Perhaps of all these stories the most instructive is the Servian legend of the Miraculous Hair. The poverty-stricken hero is warned in a vision that he will find under his bed-pillow an apple, a kerchief and a mirror. He is to follow a certain river to its source, where, on a crag, he will find a beautiful maiden seated with a work-frame in front of her, on which she is embroidering patterns with the sunbeams. He is not to reply to her questions or he will be instantly changed into a fish or a snake; but when she asks him to search her head for lice he is to do so; he will there find a blood-red hair, which he is to pluck out, and run away. He does all this; the maiden pursues him; he throws away the apple, then the kerchief, then the mirror; never having seen a mirror before, the Servian Lorely spends so much time coquetting with her own image in it that the man outstrips her, sells the hair to the Sultan, and makes his fortune. Just as the Servian legend of the radiant, amber-clear maiden the boy beholds under the bark of the fir-tree is due to the trementina spruce forest, 80 the plica polonica may have something to do with this form of the Lorely legend, which, as we shall find in the note to the Three Citrons, belongs to the last week of the annual myth epic, which consisted of one year, three months and a week; but the remarkable part of it is that this comparatively modern form of the legend, setting aside certain Christian embellishments, is certainly as old as Virgil’s Zineid, the death of Dido in the fourth book being imitated from it. Being a specialised form of legends which are variants, certainly, and most likely primitive forms of early Vedic myths, it must have drifted south from East-Central Europe. Virgil therefore took the particulars of Dido’s death from the myth: the myth was not developed from the poem. Likely enough, the two Venetian writers, Livy and Catullus, amused themselves by making collections of the folk-lore stories of their province, and thus they became popularised amongst literary Romans. Much more ancient, therefore, must be the more generalised legends like the Three Golden Hairs of Grandfather Know-All, in which woodcutters, carvers, or gamekeepers represent seed-time and the waning autumn sun, and are variants, perhaps prototypes, of the Vedic demigorgon Tvashtar—represented, like his Latin counterpart, Vulcan, as lame and impotent. If the Virgilian legend, then, was borrowed from the Servian one, and this was a development of still more ancient myths coeval with Vedic ones and perhaps anterior, it is evident that the legend of the impotent Bethlehem carpenter, whose virgin wife is impregnated, like Tvashtar’s daughter, by a health-bearing wind, could not have given rise to them, but was itself merely a still later development of them. Christians, therefore, who affirm, by their religious and domestic practices at the end of the year, the historic truth of this Bethlehem fairy story, this last wreckage of the primitive annual-solar myth, act unwisely, for it is never wise to maintain by word or act that something is an historical fact when it is really the remains of a primitive allegory.
Tvashtar, the autumn woodcutter-god, and Indra, the storm-god, are closely connected together in the Vedic legends. According to one of the legends, Indra was thrown into a well, where he fought a dragon and let loose the autumn floods; and in this legend Gubernatis suspects the legend of the first, that is to say, of the Old Testament Joseph thrown into the well by his brethren. Now, in another form of the legend, Indra, in the form of an ant, stings the serpent, which, distracted by the pain, allows the escape of the autumn floods. In the limping little ant which rolls up the last pearl, therefore, it is possible that we have, in an exceedingly abridged form, the limping carpenter, Tvashtar, the limping blacksmith, Vulcan, the limping Asmodeus of the Genovese-Slovenian “We Three Brothers.”
We have seen that the black sea of these stories must have been a fresh water lake because there were pike in it; the golden fish was therefore most likely a golden carp. When the Polish story of Hloupy Piecuch reached Venice, the wonder-working pike was exchanged for an eel, another proof that the stories drifted from Central Europe to Venice and not the other way, for there are plenty of eels both in the Central European lakes and in the lagoons, but no pike in the lagoons. The more primitive character of the Polish variant of the story also appears from Piecuch’s fondness for kvas and redcaps, the former symbolising the torpid cold, the latter the red sun of winter. When, by the help of the pike, he wins his princess, these eccentricities cease, and he becomes a commonplace human being. In the Venice variant, El Mezo (the Half), a pregnant woman, having eaten all the parsley in a witch’s garden, is made to promise to give the witch half the child when it is seven years old. The other half has much the same adventures as Piecuch, and when he marries his princess the two halves come together again and form “un belissimo zovine.”
- ↑ Hence we may infer that the black sea of these stories was a fresh water lake.