Part 18

The wife she had got one new shoe, and she went stamping and sliding with it up against the stools and chairs, saying, “How untidy it is here! Everything is out of its place!”

Then they called out to their daughter to come down and put things to rights; but the daughter, she had got a new cap; so she put her head in at the door, and kept nodding and nodding, first to this side, and then to that.

“Well! for my part”, she said, “I can’t be everywhere at once.”

Aye! aye! that was a well-to-do household the wooer had come to.

THE COCK AND HEN

(In this tale the notes of the Cock and Hen must be imitated.)

_Hen_ —You promise me shoes year after year, year after year, and yet I get no shoes!

_Cock_ —You shall have them, never fear! Henny penny!

_Hen_ —I lay egg after egg, egg after egg, and yet I go about barefoot!

_Cock_ —Well, take your eggs, and be off to the tryst, and buy yourself shoes, and don’t go any longer barefoot!

THE MASTER-SMITH

Once on a time, in the days when our Lord and St Peter used to wander on earth, they came to a smith’s house. He had made a bargain with the Devil, that the fiend should have him after seven years, but during that time he was to be the master of all masters in his trade, and to this bargain both he and the Devil had signed their names. So he had stuck up in great letters over the door of his forge: _“Here dwells the Master over all Masters.”_

Now when our Lord passed by and saw that, he went in.

“Who are you?” he said to the Smith.

“Read what’s written over the door”, said the Smith; “but maybe you can’t read writing. If so, you must wait till some one comes to help you.”

Before our Lord had time to answer him, a man came with his horse, which he begged the Smith to shoe.

“Might I have leave to shoe it?” asked our Lord.

“You may try, if you like”, said the Smith; “you can’t do it so badly that I shall not be able to make it right again.”

So our Lord went out and took one leg off the horse, and laid it in the furnace, and made the shoe red-hot; after that, he turned up the ends of the shoe, and filed down the heads of the nails, and clenched the points; and then he put back the leg safe and sound on the horse again. And when he was done with that leg, he took the other fore-leg and did the same with it; and when he was done with that, he took the hind-legs—first, the off, and then the near leg, and laid them in the furnace, making the shoes red-hot, turning up the ends; filing the heads of the nails, and clenching the points; and after all was done, putting the legs on the horse again. All the while, the Smith stood by and looked on.

“You’re not so bad a smith after all”, said he.

“Oh, you think so, do you?” said our Lord.

A little while after came the Smith’s mother to the forge, and called him to come home and eat his dinner; she was an old, old woman with an ugly crook on her back, and wrinkles in her face, and it was as much as she could do to crawl along.

“Mark now, what you see”, said our Lord.

Then he took the woman and laid her in the furnace, and smithied a lovely young maiden out of her.

“Well”, said the Smith, “I say now, as I said before, you are not such a bad smith after all. There it stands over my door. _Here dwells the Master over all Masters_ ; but for all that, I say right out, one learns as long as one lives”; and with that he walked off to his house and ate his dinner.

So after dinner, just after he had got back to his forge, a man came riding up to have his horse shod.

“It shall be done in the twinkling of an eye”, said the Smith, “for I have just learnt a new way to shoe; and a very good way it is when the days are short.”

So he began to cut and hack till he had got all the horse’s legs off, for he said, I don’t know why one should go pottering backwards and forwards—first, with one leg, and then with another.

Then he laid the legs in the furnace, just as he had seen our Lord lay them, and threw on a great heap of coal, and made his mates work the bellows bravely; but it went as one might suppose it would go. The legs were burnt to ashes, and the Smith had to pay for the horse.

Well, he didn’t care much about that, but just then an old beggar-woman came along the road, and he thought to himself, “better luck next time”; so he took the old dame and laid her in the furnace, and though she begged and prayed hard for her life, it was no good.

“You’re so old, you don’t know what is good for you”, said the Smith; “now you shall be a lovely young maiden in half no time, and for all that, I’ll not charge you a penny for the job.”

But it went no better with the poor old woman than with the horse’s legs.

“That was ill done, and I say it”, said our Lord.

“Oh! for that matter”, said the Smith, “there’s not many who’ll ask after her, I’ll be bound; but it’s a shame of the Devil, if this is the way he holds to what is written up over the door.”

“If you might have three wishes from me”, said our Lord, “what would you wish for?”

“Only try me”, said the Smith, “and you’ll soon know.”

So our Lord gave him three wishes.

“Well”, said the Smith, “first and foremost, I wish that any one whom I ask to climb up into the pear-tree that stands outside by the wall of my forge, may stay sitting there till I ask him to come down again. The second wish I wish is, that any one whom I ask to sit down in my easy chair which stands inside the workshop yonder, may stay sitting there till I ask him to get up. Last of all, I wish that any one whom I ask to creep into the steel purse which I have in my pocket, may stay in it till I give him leave to creep out again.”

“You have wished as a wicked man”, said St Peter; “first and foremost, you should have wished for God’s grace and goodwill.”

“I durstn’t look so high as that”, said the Smith; and after that our Lord and St Peter bade him “good-bye”, and went on their way.

Well, the years went on and on, and when the time was up, the Devil came to fetch the Smith, as it was written in their bargain.

“Are you ready?” he said, as he stuck his nose in at the door of the forge.

“Oh”, said the Smith, “I must just hammer the head of this tenpenny nail first; meantime, you can just climb up into the pear-tree, and pluck yourself a pear to gnaw at; you must be, both hungry and thirsty after your journey.”

So the Devil thanked him for his kind offer, and climbed up into the pear-tree.

“Very good”, said the Smith; “but now, on thinking the matter over, I find I shall never be able to have done hammering the head of this nail till four years are out at least, this iron is so plaguey hard; down you can’t come in all that time, but may sit up there and rest your bones.”

When the Devil heard this, he begged and prayed till his voice was as thin as a silver penny that he might have leave to come down; but there was no help for it. There he was, and there he must stay. At last he had to give his word of honour not to come again till the four years were out, which the Smith had spoken of, and then the Smith said, “Very well, now you may come down.”

So when the time was up, the Devil came again to fetch the Smith.

“You’re ready now, of course”, said he; “you’ve had time enough to hammer the head of that nail, I should think.”

“Yes, the head is right enough now”, said the Smith; “but still you have come a little tiny bit too soon, for I haven’t quite done sharpening the point; such plaguey hard iron I never hammered in all my born days. So while I work at the point, you may just as well sit down in my easy chair and rest yourself; I’ll be bound you’re weary after coming so far.”

“Thank you kindly”, said the Devil, and down he plumped into the easy chair; but just as he had made himself comfortable, the Smith said, on second thoughts, he found he couldn’t get the point sharp till four years were out. First of all, the Devil begged so prettily to be let out of the chair, and afterwards, waxing wroth, he began to threaten and scold; but the Smith kept on, all the while excusing himself, and saying it was all the iron’s fault, it was so plaguy hard, and telling the Devil he was not so badly off to have to sit quietly in an easy chair, and that he would let him out to the minute when the four years were over. Well, at last there was no help for it, and the Devil had to give his word of honour not to fetch the Smith till the four years were out; and then the Smith said:

“Well now, you may get up and be off about your business”, and away went the Devil as fast as he could lay legs to the ground.

When the four years were over, the Devil came again to fetch the Smith, and he called out, as he stuck his nose in at the door of the forge:

“Now, I know you must be ready.”

“Ready, aye, ready”, answered the Smith; “we can go now as soon as you please; but hark ye, there is one thing I have stood here and thought, and thought, I would ask you to tell me. Is it true what people say, that the Devil can make himself as small as he pleases?”

“God knows, it is the very truth”, said the Devil.

“Oh!” said the Smith; “it _is_ true, is it? then I wish you would just be so good as to creep into this steel purse of mine, and see whether it is sound at the bottom, for to tell you the truth, I’m afraid my travelling money will drop out.”

“With all my heart”, said the Devil, who made himself small in a trice, and crept into the purse; but he was scarce in when the Smith snapped to the clasp.

“Yes”, called out the Devil inside the purse; “it’s right and tight everywhere.”

“Very good”, said the Smith; “I’m glad to hear you say so, but ‘more haste the worse speed’, says the old saw, and ‘forewarned is forearmed’, says another; so I’ll just weld these links a little together, just for safety’s sake”; and with that he laid the purse in the furnace, and made it red-hot.

“AU! AU!” screamed the Devil, “are you mad? don’t you know I’m inside the purse?”

“Yes, I do!” said the Smith; “but I can’t help you, for another old saw says, ‘one must strike while the iron is hot’”; and as he said this, he took up his sledge-hammer, laid the purse on the anvil, and let fly at it as hard as he could.

“AU! AU! AU!” bellowed the Devil, inside the purse. “Dear friend, do let me out, and I’ll never come near you again.”

“Very well!” said the Smith; “now, I think, the links are pretty well welded, and you may come out”; so he unclasped the purse, and away went the Devil in such a hurry that he didn’t once look behind him.

Now, some time after, it came across the Smith’s mind that he had done a silly thing in making the Devil his enemy, for, he said to himself:

“If, as is like enough, they won’t have me in the kingdom of Heaven, I shall be in danger of being houseless, since I’ve fallen out with him who rules over Hell.”

So he made up his mind it would be best to try to get either into Hell or Heaven, and to try at once, rather than to put it off any longer, so that he might know how things really stood. Then he threw his sledge-hammer over his shoulder and set off; and when he had gone a good bit of the way, he came to a place where two roads met, and where the path to the kingdom of Heaven parts from the path that leads to Hell, and here he overtook a tailor, who was pelting along with his goose in his hand.

“Good day”, said the Smith; “whither are you off to?”

“To the kingdom of Heaven”, said the Tailor, “if I can only get into it”—“but whither are you going yourself?”

“Oh, our ways don’t run together”, said the Smith; “for I have made up my mind to try first in Hell, as the Devil and I know something of one another, from old times.”

So they bade one another “Good-bye”, and each went his way; but the Smith was a stout, strong man, and got over the ground far faster than the tailor, and so it wasn’t long before he stood at the gates of Hell. Then he called the watch, and bade him go and tell the Devil there was some one outside who wished to speak a word with him.

“Go out”, said the Devil to the watch, “and ask him who he is?” So that when the watch came and told him that, the Smith answered:

“Go and greet the Devil in my name, and say it is the Smith who owns the purse he wots of; and beg him prettily to let me in at once, for I worked at my forge till noon, and I have had a long walk since.”

But when the Devil heard who it was, he charged the watch to go back and lock up all the nine locks on the gates of Hell.

“And, besides”, he said, “you may as well put on a padlock, for if he only once gets in, he’ll turn Hell topsy-turvy!”

“Well!” said the Smith to himself, when he saw them busy bolting up the gates, “there’s no lodging to be got here, that’s plain; so I may as well try my luck in the kingdom of Heaven”; and with that he turned round and went back till he reached the cross-roads, and then he went along the path the tailor had taken. And now, as he was cross at having gone backwards and forwards so far for no good, he strode along with all his might, and reached the gate of Heaven just as St Peter was opening it a very little, just enough to let the half-starved tailor slip in. The Smith was still six or seven strides off the gate, so he thought to himself, “Now there’s no time to be lost”; and, grasping his sledge-hammer, he hurled it into the opening of the door just as the tailor slunk in; and if the Smith didn’t get in then, when the door was ajar, why I don’t know what has become of him.

THE TWO STEP-SISTERS

Once on a time there was a couple, and each of them had a daughter by a former marriage. The woman’s daughter was dull and lazy, and could never turn her hand to anything, and the man’s daughter was brisk and ready; but somehow or other she could never do anything to her stepmother’s liking, and both the woman and her daughter would have been glad to be rid of her.

So it fell one day the two girls were to go out and spin by the side of the well, and the woman’s daughter had flax to spin, but the man’s daughter got nothing to spin but bristles.

“I don’t know how it is”, said the woman’s daughter, “you’re always so quick and sharp, but still I’m not afraid to spin a match with you.”

Well, they agreed that she whose thread first snapped, should go down the well. So they span away; but just as they were hard at it, the man’s daughter’s thread broke, and she had to go down the well. But when she got to the bottom she saw far and wide around her a fair green mead, and she hadn’t hurt herself at all.

So she walked on a bit, till she came to a hedge which she had to cross.

“Ah! don’t tread hard on me, pray don’t, and I’ll help you another time, that I will”, said the Hedge.

Then the lassie made herself as light as she could, and trode so carefully she scarce touched a twig.

So she went on a bit further, till she came to a brindled cow, which walked there with a milking-pail on her horns. ’Twas a large pretty cow, and her udder was so full and round.

“Ah! be so good as to milk me, pray”, said the Cow; “I’m so full of milk. Drink as much as you please, and throw the rest over my hoofs, and see if I don’t help you some day.”

So the man’s daughter did as the cow begged. As soon as she touched the teats, the milk spouted out into the pail. Then she drank till her thirst was slaked; and the rest she threw over the cow’s hoofs, and the milking-pail she hung on her horns again.

So when she had gone a bit further, a big wether met her, which had such thick long wool, it hung down and draggled after him on the ground, and on one of his horns hung a great pair of shears.

“Ah, please clip off my wool”, said the Sheep, “for here I go about with all this wool, and catch up everything I meet, and besides, it’s so warm, I’m almost choked. Take as much of the fleece as you please, and twist the rest round my neck, and see if I don’t help you some day.”

Yes! she was willing enough, and the sheep lay down of himself on her lap, and kept quite still, and she clipped him so neatly, there wasn’t a scratch on his skin. Then she took as much of the wool as she chose, and the rest she twisted round the neck of the sheep.

A little further on, she came to an apple tree, which was loaded with apples; all its branches were bowed to the ground, and leaning against the stem was a slender pole.

“Ah! do be so good as to pluck my apples off me”, said the Tree, “so that my branches may straighten themselves again, for it’s bad work to stand so crooked; but when you beat them down, don’t strike me too hard. Then eat as many as you please, lay the rest round my root, and see if I don’t help you some day or other.”

Yes, she plucked all she could reach with her hands, and then she took the pole and knocked down the rest, and afterwards she ate her fill, and the rest she laid neatly round the root.

So she walked on a long, long way, and then she came to a great farm-house, where an old hag of the Trolls lived with her daughter. There she turned in to ask if she could get a place.

“Oh!” said the old hag; “it’s no use your trying. We’ve had ever so many maids, but none of them was worth her salt.”

But she begged so prettily that they would just take her on trial, that at last they let her stay. So the old hag gave her a sieve, and bade her go and fetch water in it. She thought it strange to fetch water in a sieve, but still she went, and when she came to the well, the little birds began to sing,

Daub in clay, Stuff in straw! Daub in clay, Stuff in straw.

Yes, she did so, and found she could carry water in a sieve well enough; but when she got home with the water, and the old witch saw the sieve, she cried out:

“THIS YOU HAVEN’T SUCKED OUT OF YOUR OWN BREAST.”

So the old witch said, now she might go into the byre to pitch out dung and milk kine; but when she got there, she found a pitchfork so long and heavy, she couldn’t stir it, much less work with it. She didn’t know at all what to do, or what to make of it; but the little birds sang again that she should take the broom-stick and toss out a little with that, and all the rest of the dung would fly after it. So she did that, and as soon as ever she began with the broom-stick, the byre was as clean as if it had been swept and washed.

Now she had to milk the kine, but they were so restless that they kicked and frisked; there was no getting near them to milk them.

But the little birds sang outside:

A little drop, a tiny sup, For the little birds to drink it up.

Yes, she did that; she just milked a tiny drop, ’twas as much as she could, for the little birds outside; and then all the cows stood still and let her milk them. They neither kicked nor frisked; they didn’t even lift a leg.

So when the old witch saw her coming in with the milk, she cried out:

“THIS YOU HAVEN’T SUCKED OUT OF YOUR OWN BREAST. BUT NOW JUST TAKE THIS BLACK WOOL AND WASH IT WHITE.”

This the lassie was at her wits’ end to know how to do, for she had never seen or heard of any one who could wash black wool white. Still she said nothing, but took the wool and went down with it to the well. There the little birds sang again and told her to take the wool and dip it into the great butt that stood there; and she did so, and out it came as white as snow.

“Well! I never!” said the old witch, when she came in with the wool, “it’s no good keeping you. You can do everything, and at last you’ll be the plague of my life. We’d best part, so take your wages and be off.”

Then the old hag drew out three caskets, one red, one green, and one blue, and of these the lassie was to choose one as wages for her service. Now she didn’t know at all which to choose, but the little birds sang:

Don’t take the red, don’t take the green, But take the blue, where may be seen Three little crosses all in a row; We saw the marks, and so we know.

So she took the blue casket, as the birds sang.