Books: The Lilac Fairy Book
A >>
Andrew Lang >> The Lilac Fairy Book
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19 |
20 |
21 This etext was scanned by jcbyers@capitalnet.com, typed and
proofread by L.M. Shaffer.
The Lilac Fairy Book
Edited by Andrew Lang
Preface
'What cases are you engaged in at present?' 'Are you stopping
many teeth just now?' 'What people have you converted lately?'
Do ladies put these questions to the men--lawyers, dentists,
clergymen, and so forth--who happen to sit next them at
dinner parties?
I do not know whether ladies thus indicate their interest in the
occupations of their casual neighbours at the hospitable board.
But if they do not know me, or do not know me well, they
generally ask 'Are you writing anything now?' (as if they should
ask a painter 'Are you painting anything now?' or a lawyer 'Have
you any cases at present?'). Sometimes they are more definite and
inquire 'What are you writing now?' as if I must be writing
something--which, indeed, is the case, though I dislike being
reminded of it. It is an awkward question, because the fair being
does not care a bawbee what I am writing; nor would she be much
enlightened if I replied 'Madam, I am engaged on a treatise
intended to prove that Normal is prior to Conceptional Totemism'-
-though that answer would be as true in fact as obscure in
significance. The best plan seems to be to answer that I have
entirely abandoned mere literature, and am contemplating a book
on 'The Causes of Early Blight in the Potato,' a melancholy
circumstance which threatens to deprive us of our chief esculent
root. The inquirer would never be undeceived. One nymph who, like
the rest, could not keep off the horrid topic of my occupation,
said 'You never write anything but fairy books, do you?' A French
gentleman, too, an educationist and expert in portraits of Queen
Mary, once sent me a newspaper article in which he had written
that I was exclusively devoted to the composition of fairy books,
and nothing else. He then came to England, visited me, and found
that I knew rather more about portraits of Queen Mary than he
did.
In truth I never did write any fairy books in my life, except
'Prince Prigio,' 'Prince Ricardo,' and 'Tales from a Fairy
Court'--that of the aforesaid Prigio. I take this opportunity of
recommending these fairy books--poor things, but my own--to
parents and guardians who may never have heard of them. They are
rich in romantic adventure, and the Princes always marry the
right Princesses and live happy ever afterwards; while the wicked
witches, stepmothers, tutors and governesses are never cruelly
punished, but retire to the country on ample pensions. I hate
cruelty: I never put a wicked stepmother in a barrel and send her
tobogganing down a hill. It is true that Prince Ricardo did kill
the Yellow Dwarf; but that was in fair fight, sword in hand, and
the dwarf, peace to his ashes! died in harness.
The object of these confessions is not only that of advertising
my own fairy books (which are not 'out of print'; if your
bookseller says so, the truth is not in him), but of giving
credit where credit is due. The fairy books have been almost
wholly the work of Mrs. Lang, who has translated and adapted them
from the French, German, Portuguese, Italian, Spanish, Catalan,
and other languages.
My part has been that of Adam, according to Mark Twain, in the
Garden of Eden. Eve worked, Adam superintended. I also
superintend. I find out where the stories are, and advise, and,
in short, superintend. I do not write the stories out of my own
head. The reputation of having written all the fairy books (an
European reputation in nurseries and the United States of
America) is 'the burden of an honour unto which I was not born.'
It weighs upon and is killing me, as the general fash of being
the wife of the Lord of Burleigh, Burleigh House by Stamford
Town, was too much for the village maiden espoused by that peer.
Nobody really wrote most of the stories. People told them in all
parts of the world long before Egyptian hieroglyphics or Cretan
signs or Cyprian syllabaries, or alphabets were invented. They
are older than reading and writing, and arose like wild flowers
before men had any education to quarrel over. The grannies told
them to the grandchildren, and when the grandchildren became
grannies they repeated the same old tales to the new generation.
Homer knew the stories and made up the 'Odyssey' out of half a
dozen of them. All the history of Greece till about 800 B.C. is a
string of the fairy tales, all about Theseus and Heracles and
Oedipus and Minos and Perseus is a Cabinet des F‚es, a collection
of fairy tales. Shakespeare took them and put bits of them into
'King Lear' and other plays; he could not have made them up
himself, great as he was. Let ladies and gentlemen think of this
when they sit down to write fairy tales, and have them nicely
typed, and send them to Messrs. Longman & Co. to be published.
They think that to write a new fairy tale is easy work. They are
mistaken: the thing is impossible. Nobody can write a new fairy
tale; you can only mix up and dress up the old, old stories, and
put the characters into new dresses, as Miss Thackeray did so
well in 'Five Old Friends.' If any big girl of fourteen reads
this preface, let her insist on being presented with 'Five Old
Friends.'
But the three hundred and sixty-five authors who try to write new
fairy tales are very tiresome. They always begin with a little
boy or girl who goes out and meets the fairies of polyanthuses
and gardenias and apple blossoms: 'Flowers and fruits, and other
winged things.' These fairies try to be funny, and fail; or they
try to preach, and succeed. Real fairies never preach or talk
slang. At the end, the little boy or girl wakes up and finds that
he has been dreaming.
Such are the new fairy stories. May we be preserved from all the
sort of them!
Our stories are almost all old, some from Ireland, before that
island was as celebrated for her wrongs as for her verdure; some
from Asia, made, I dare say, before the Aryan invasion; some from
Moydart, Knoydart, Morar and Ardnamurchan, where the sea streams
run like great clear rivers and the saw-edged hills are blue, and
men remember Prince Charlie. Some are from Portugal, where the
golden fruits grow in the Garden of the Hesperides; and some are
from wild Wales, and were told at Arthur's Court; and others come
from the firesides of the kinsmen of the Welsh, the Bretons.
There are also modern tales by a learned Scandinavian named
Topelius.
All the stories were translated or adapted by Mrs. Lang, except
'The Jogi's Punishment' and 'Moti,' done by Major Campbell out of
the Pushtoo language; 'How Brave Walter hunted Wolves,' which,
with 'Little Lasse' and 'The Raspberry Worm,' was done from
Topelius by Miss Harding; and 'The Sea King's Gift,' by Miss
Christie, from the same author.
It has been suggested to the Editor that children and parents and
guardians would like ' The Grey True Ghost-Story Book.' He knows
that the children would like it well, and he would gladly give it
to them; but about the taste of fond anxious mothers and kind
aunts he is not quite so certain. Before he was twelve the Editor
knew true ghost stories enough to fill a volume. They were a pure
joy till bedtime, but then, and later, were not wholly a source
of unmixed pleasure. At that time the Editor was not afraid of
the dark, for he thought, ' If a ghost is here, we can't see
him.' But when older and better informed persons said that ghosts
brought their own light with them (which is too true), then one's
emotions were such as parents do not desire the young to endure.
For this reason 'The Grey True Ghost-Story Book' is never likely
to be illustrated by Mr. Ford.
Contents
The Shifty Lad
The False Prince and the True
The Jogi's Punishment
The Heart of a Monkey
The Fairy Nurse
A Lost Paradise
How Brave Walter Hunted Wolves
The Ring of the Waterfalls
A French Puck
The Three Crowns
The Story of a Very Bad Boy
The Brown Bear of Norway
Little Lasse
'Moti'
The Enchanted Deer
A Fish Story
The Wonderful Tune
The Rich Brother and the Poor Brother
The One-Handed Girl
The Bones of Djulung
The Sea Ring's Gift
The Raspberry Worm
The Stones of Plouhinec
The Castle of Kerglas
The Battle of the Birds
The Lady of the Fountain
The Four Gifts
The Groac'h of the Isle of Lok
The Escape of the Mouse
The Believing. Husbands
The Hoodie-Crow
The Brownie of the Lake
The Winning of Olwen
The Shifty Lad
In the land of Erin there dwelt long ago a widow who had an only
son. He was a clever boy, so she saved up enough money to send
him to school, and, as soon as he was old enough, to apprentice
him to any trade that he would choose. But when the time came, he
said he would not be bound to any trade, and that he meant to be
a thief.
Now his mother was very sorrowful when she heard of this, but she
knew quite well that if she tried to stop his having his own way
he would only grow more determined to get it. So all the answer
she made was that the end of thieves was hanging at the bridge of
Dublin, and then she left him alone, hoping that when he was
older he might become more sensible.
One day she was going to church to hear a sermon from a great
preacher, and she begged the Shifty Lad, as the neighbours called
him from the tricks he played, to come with her. But he only
laughed and declared that he did not like sermons, adding:
'However, I will promise you this, that the first trade you hear
named after you come out from church shall be my trade for the
rest of my life.'
These words gave a little comfort to the poor woman, and her
heart was lighter than before as she bade him farewell.
When the Shifty Lad thought that the hour had nearly come for the
sermon to be over, he hid himself in some bushes in a little path
that led straight to his mother's house, and, as she passed
along, thinking of all the good things she had heard, a voice
shouted close to her ear 'Robbery! Robbery! Robbery!' The
suddenness of it made her jump. The naughty boy had managed to
change his voice, so that she did not know it for his, and he had
concealed himself so well that, though she peered about all round
her, she could see no one. As soon as she had turned the corner
the Shifty Lad came out, and by running very fast through the
wood he contrived to reach home before his mother, who found him
stretched out comfortably before the fire.
'Well, have you got any news to tell me?' asked he.
'No, nothing; for I left the church at once, and did not stop to
speak to anyone.'
'Oh, then no one has mentioned a trade to you?' he said in tones
of disappointment.
'Ye--es,' she replied slowly. 'At least, as I walked down the
path a voice cried out "Robbery! Robbery! Robbery!" but that was
all.'
'And quite enough too,' answered the boy. 'What did I tell you?
That is going to be my trade.'
'Then your end will be hanging at the bridge of Dublin,' said
she. But there was no sleep for her that night, for she lay in
the dark thinking about her son.
'If he is to be a thief at all, he had better be a good one. And
who is there that can teach him?' the mother asked herself. But
an idea came to her, and she arose early, before the sun was up,
and set off for the home of the Black Rogue, or Gallows Bird, who
was such a wonderful thief that, though all had been robbed by
him, no one could catch him.
'Good-morning to you,' said the woman as she reached the place
where the Black Gallows Bird lived when he was not away on his
business. 'My son has a fancy to learn your trade. Will you be
kind enough to teach him?'
'If he is clever, I don't mind trying,' answered the Black
Gallows Bird; 'and, of course, if ANY one can turn him into a
first-rate thief, it is I. But if he is stupid, it is of no use
at all; I can't bear stupid people.'
'No, he isn't stupid,' said the woman with a sigh. 'So to-night,
after dark, I will send him to you.'
The Shifty Lad jumped for joy when his mother told him where she
had been.
'I will become the best thief in all Erin!' he cried, and paid no
heed when his mother shook her head and murmured something about
'the bridge of Dublin.'
Every evening after dark the Shifty Lad went to the home of the
Black Gallows Bird, and many were the new tricks he learned. By-
and-by he was allowed to go out with the Bird and watch him at
work, and at last there came a day when his master though that he
had grown clever enough to help in a big robbery.
'There is a rich farmer up there on the hill, who has just sold
all his fat cattle for much money and has bought some lean ones
which will cost him little. Now it happens that, while he has
received the money for the fat cattle, he has not yet paid the
price of the thin ones, which he has in the cowhouse. To-morrow
he will go to the market with the money in his hand, so to-night
we must get at the chest. When all is quiet we will hide in the
loft.'
There was no moon, and it was the night of Hallowe'en, and
everyone was burning nuts and catching apples in a tub of water
with their hands tied, and playing all sorts of other games, till
the Shifty Lad grew quite tired of waiting for them to get to
bed. The Black Gallows Bird, who was more accustomed to the
business, tucked himself up on the hay and went to sleep, telling
the boy to wake him when the merry-makers had departed. But the
Shifty Lad, who could keep still no longer, crept down to the
cowshed and loosened the heads of the cattle which were tied, and
they began to kick each other and bellow, and made such a noise
that the company in the farmhouse ran out to tie them up again.
Then the Shifty Lad entered the room and picked up a big handful
of nuts, and returned to the loft, where the Black Rogue was
still sleeping. At first the Shifty Lad shut his eyes too, but
very soon he sat up, and taking a big needle and thread from his
pocket, he sewed the hem of the Black Gallows Bird's coat to a
heavy piece of bullock's hide that was hanging at his back.
By this time the cattle were all tied up again, but as the people
could not find their nuts they sat round the fire and began to
tell stories.
'I will crack a nut,' said the Shifty Lad.
'You shall not,' cried the Black Gallows Bird; 'they will hear
you.'
'I don't care,' answered the Shifty Lad. 'I never spend
Hallowe'en yet without cracking a nut'; and he cracked one.
'Some one is cracking nuts up there,' said one of the merry-
makers in the farmhouse. 'Come quickly, and we will see who it
is.'
He spoke loudly, and the Black Gallows Bird heard, and ran out of
the loft, dragging the big leather hide after him which the
Shifty Lad had sewed to his coat.
'He is stealing my hide!' shouted the farmer, and they all darted
after him; but he was too swift for them, and at last he managed
to tear the hide from his coat, and then he flew like a hare till
he reached his old hiding-place. But all this took a long time,
and meanwhile the Shifty Lad got down from the loft, and searched
the house till he found the chest with the gold and silver in it,
concealed behind a load of straw and covered with loaves of bread
and a great cheese. The Shifty Lad slung the money bags round his
shoulders and took the bread and the cheese under his arm, then
set out quietly for the Black Rogue's house.
'Here you are at last, you villain!' cried his master in great
wrath. 'But I will be revenged on you.'
'It is all right,' replied the Shifty Lad calmly. 'I have brought
what you wanted'; and he laid the things he was carrying down on
the ground.
'Ah! you are the better thief,' said the Black Rogue's wife; and
the Black Rogue added:
'Yes, it is you who are the clever boy'; and they divided the
spoil and the Black Gallows Bird had one half and the Shifty Lad
the other half.
A few weeks after that the Black Gallows Bird had news of a
wedding that was to be held near the town; and the bridegroom had
many friends and everybody sent him a present. Now a rich farmer
who lived up near the moor thought that nothing was so useful to
a young couple when they first began to keep house as a fine fat
sheep, so he bade his shepherd go off to the mountain where the
flock were feeding, and bring him back the best he could find.
And the shepherd chose out the largest and fattest of the sheep
and the one with the whitest fleece; then he tied its feet
together and put it across his shoulder, for he had a long way to
go.
That day, the Shifty Lad happened to be wandering over the moor,
when he saw the man with the sheep on his shoulder walking along
the road which led past the Black Rogue's house. The sheep was
heavy and the man was in no hurry, so he came slowly and the boy
knew that he himself could easily get back to his master before
the shepherd was even in sight.
'I will wager,' he cried, as he pushed quickly through the bushes
which hid the cabin--'I will wager that I will steal the sheep
from the man that is coming before he passes here.'
'Will you indeed?' said the Gallows Bird. 'I will wager you a
hundred silver pieces that you can do nothing of the sort.'
'Well, I will try it, anyway,' replied the boy, and disappeared
in the bushes. He ran fast till he entered a wood through which
the shepherd must go, and then he stopped, and taking off one of
his shoes smeared it with mud and set it in the path. When this
was done he slipped behind a rock and waited.
Very soon the man came up, and seeing the shoe lying there, he
stooped and looked at it.
'It is a good shoe,' he said to himself, 'but very dirty. Still,
if I had the fellow, I would be at the trouble of cleaning it';
so he threw the shoe down again and went on.
The Shifty Lad smiled as he heard him, and, picking up the shoe,
he crept round by a short way and laid the other shoe on the
path. A few minutes after the shepherd arrived, and beheld the
second shoe lying on the path.
'Why, that is the fellow of the dirty shoe!' he exclaimed when he
saw it. 'I will go back and pick up the other one, and then I
shall have a pair of good shoes,' and he put the sheep on the
grass and returned to fetch the shoe. Then the Shifty Lad put on
his shoes, and, picking up the sheep, carried it home. And the
Black Rogue paid him the hundred marks of his wager.
When the shepherd reached the farmhouse that night he told his
tale to his master, who scolded him for being stupid and
careless, and bade him go the next day to the mountain and fetch
him a kid, and he would send that as a wedding gift. But the
Shifty Lad was on the look-out, and hid himself in the wood, and
the moment the man drew near with the kid on his shoulders began
to bleat like a sheep, and no one, not even the sheep's own
mother, could have told the difference.
'Why, it must have got its feet loose, and have strayed after
all,' thought the man; and he put the kid on the grass and
hurried off in the direction of the bleating. Then the boy ran
back and picked up the kid, and took it to the Black Gallows
Bird.
The shepherd could hardly believe his eyes when he returned from
seeking the sheep and found that the kid had vanished. He was
afraid to go home and tell the same tale that he had told
yesterday; so he searched the wood through and through till night
was nearly come. Then he felt that there was no help for it, and
he must go home and confess to his master.
Of course, the farmer was very angry at this second misfortune;
but this time he told him to drive one of the big bulls from the
mountain, and warned him that if he lost THAT he would lose his
place also. Again the Shifty Lad, who was on the watch, perceived
him pass by, and when he saw the man returning with the great
bull he cried to the Black Rogue:
'Be quick and come into the wood, and we will try to get the bull
also.'
'But how can we do that?' asked the Black Rogue.
'Oh, quite easily! You hide yourself out there and baa like a
sheep, and I will go in the other direction and bleat like a kid.
It will be all right, I assure you.'
The shepherd was walking slowly, driving the bull before him,
when he suddenly heard a loud baa amongst the bushes far away on
one side of the path, and a feeble bleat answering it from the
other side.
'Why, it must be the sheep and the kid that I lost,' said he.
'Yes, surely it must'; and tying the bull hastily to a tree, he
went off after the sheep and the kid, and searched the wood till
he was tired. Of course by the time he came back the two thieves
had driven the bull home and killed him for meat, so the man was
obliged to go to his master and confess that he had been tricked
again.
After this the Black Rogue and the Shifty Lad grew bolder and
bolder, and stole great quantities of cattle and sold them and
grew quite rich. One day they were returning from the market with
a large sum of money in their pockets when they passed a gallows
erected on the top of a hill.
'Let us stop and look at that gallows,' exclaimed the Shifty Lad.
'I have never seen one so close before. Yet some say that it is
the end of all thieves.'
There was no one in sight, and they carefully examined every part
of it.
'I wonder how it feels to be hanged,' said the Shifty Lad. 'I
should like to know, in case they ever catch me. I'll try first,
and then you can do so.'
As he spoke he fastened the loose cord about his neck, and when
it was quite secure he told the Black Rogue to take the other end
of the rope and draw him up from the ground.
'When I am tired of it I will shake my legs, and then you must
let me down,' said he.
The Black Rogue drew up the rope, but in half a minute the Shifty
Lad's legs began to shake, and he quickly let it down again.
'You can't imagine what a funny feeling hanging gives you,'
murmured the Shifty Lad, who looked rather purple in the face and
spoke in an odd voice. 'I don't think you have every tried it, or
you wouldn't have let me go up first. Why, it is the pleasantest
thing I have ever done. I was shaking my legs from sheer delight,
and if you had been there you would have shaken your legs too.'
'Well, let me try, if it is so nice,' answered the Black Rogue.
'But be sure you tie the knot securely, for I don't want to fall
down and break my neck.'
'Oh, I will see to that!' replied the Shifty Lad. 'When you are
tired, just whistle, and I'll let you down.'
So the Black Rogue was drawn up, and as soon as he was as high as
the rope would allow him to go the Shifty Lad called to him:
'Don't forest to whistle when you want to come down; but if you
are enjoying yourself as I did, shake your legs.'
And in a moment the Black Rogue's legs began to shake and to
kick, and the Shifty Lad stood below, watching him and laughing
heartily.
'Oh, how funny you are! If you could only see yourself! Oh, you
ARE funny! But when you have had enough, whistle and you shall be
let down'; and he rocked again with laughter.
But no whistle came, and soon the legs ceased to shake and to
kick, for the Black Gallows Bird was dead, as the Shifty Lad
intended he should be.
Then he went home to the Black Rogue's wife, and told her that
her husband was dead, and that he was ready to marry her if she
liked. But the woman had been fond of the Black Rogue, thief
though he was, and she shrank from the Shifty Lad in horror, and
set the people after him, and he had to fly to another part of
the country where none knew of his doings.
Perhaps if the Shifty Lad's mother knew anything of this, she
may have thought that by this time her son might be tired of
stealing, and ready to try some honest trade. But in reality he
loved the tricks and danger, and life would have seemed very dull
without them. So he went on just as before, and made friends whom
he taught to be as wicked as himself, till they took to robbing
the king's storehouses, and by the advice of the Wise Man the
king sent out soldiers to catch the band of thieves.
For a long while they tried in vain to lay hands on them. The
Shifty Lad was too clever for them all, and if they laid traps he
laid better ones. At last one night he stole upon some soldiers
while they were asleep in a barn and killed them, and persuaded
the villagers that if THEY did not kill the other soldiers before
morning they would certainly be killed themselves. Thus it
happened that when the sun rose not a single soldier was alive in
the village.
Of course this news soon reached the king's ears, and he was very
angry, and summoned the Wise Man to take counsel with him. And
this was the counsel of the Wise Man--that he should invite all
the people in the countryside to a ball, and among them the bold
and impudent thief would be sure to come, and would be sure to
ask the king's daughter to dance with him.
'Your counsel is good,' said the king, who made his feast and
prepared for his ball; and all the people of the countryside were
present, and the Shifty Lad came with them.
When everyone had eaten and drunk as much as they wanted they
went into the ballroom. There was a great throng, and while they
were pressing through the doorway the Wise Man, who had a bottle
of black ointment hidden in his robes, placed a tiny dot on the
cheek of the Shifty Lad near his ear. The Shifty Lad felt
nothing, but as he approached the king's daughter to ask her to
be his partner he caught sight of the black dot in a silver
mirror. Instantly he guessed who had put it there and why, but he
said nothing, and danced so beautifully that the princess was
quite delighted with him. At the end of the dance he bowed low to
his partner and left her, to mingle with the crowd that was
filling the doorway. As he passed the Wise Man he contrived not
only to steal the bottle but to place two black dots on his face,
and one on the faces of twenty other men. Then he slipped the
bottle back in the Wise Man's robe.
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
19 |
20 |
21