Italian Folktales (12 page)

“I wish to be shown all my treasures.”

So they took him up crystal stairs into crystal towers; they showed him crystal stables with crystal horses and arms and armor of solid crystal. Then they led. him into a crystal garden down avenues of crystal trees in which crystal birds sang, past flowerbeds where crystal flowers blossomed around crystal pools. The boy picked a small bunch of flowers and stuck the bouquet in his hat. When he brought the sheep home that night, the king's daughter was looking out the window and said, “May I have those flowers in your hat?”

“You certainly may,” said the shepherd. “They are crystal flowers culled from the crystal garden of my solid crystal castle.” He tossed her the bouquet, which she caught.

When he got back to the stone the next day, he crushed a second serpent head and found a silver key. He lifted the stone, slipped the silver key into the lock and entered a solid silver palace. Silver servants came running up saying, “Command, our lord!” They took him off to show him silver kitchens, where silver chickens roasted over silver fires, and silver gardens where silver peacocks spread their tails. The boy picked a little bunch of silver flowers and stuck them in his hat. That night he gave them to the king's daughter when she asked for them.

The third day, he crushed the third head and found a gold key. He slipped the key into the lock and entered a solid gold palace, where his servants were gold too, from wig to boots; the beds were gold, with gold sheets, pillows, and canopy; and in the aviaries fluttered hundreds of gold birds. In a garden of gold flowerbeds and fountains with gold sprays, he picked a small bunch of gold flowers to stick in his hat and gave them to the king's daughter that night.

Now the king announced a tournament, and the winner would have his daughter in marriage. The shepherd unlocked the door with the crystal key, entered the crystal palace and chose a crystal horse with crystal bridle and saddle, and thus rode to the tournament in crystal armor and carrying a crystal lance. He defeated all the other knights and fled without revealing who he was.

The next day he returned on a silver horse with trappings of silver, dressed in silver armor and carrying his silver lance and shield. He defeated everyone and fled, still unknown to all. The third day he returned on a gold horse, outfitted entirely in gold. He was victorious the third time as well, and the princess said, “I know who you are. You're the man who gave me flowers of crystal, silver, and gold, from the gardens of your castles of crystal, silver, and gold.”

So they got married, and the little shepherd became king.

 

And all were very happy and gay,

But to me who watched they gave no thought nor pay.

 

(
Monferrato
)

 

14

There was once a king who had three sons of marriageable age. In order to avoid any dispute over their choice of three brides, he said, “Aim as far as you can with the sling. There where the stone falls you will get your wife.”

The three sons picked up their slings and shot. The oldest boy sent his stone flying all the way to the roof of a bakery, so he got the baker girl. The second boy released his stone, which came down on the house of a weaver. The youngest son's stone landed in a ditch.

Immediately after the shots, each boy rushed off to his betrothed with a ring. The oldest brother was met by a lovely maiden as fresh as a newly baked cake, the middle brother by a fair girl with silky hair and skin, while the youngest, after looking and looking, saw nothing but a frog in that ditch.

They returned to the king to tell him about their betrothed. “Now,” said the king, “whoever has the best wife will inherit the kingdom. Here begin the tests.” He gave them each some hemp to be spun and returned within three days, to see which betrothed was the best spinner.

The sons went to their betrothed and urged them to spin their best. Highly embarrassed, the youngest boy took the hemp to the rim of the ditch and called:

“Frog, frog!”

“Who calls?”

“Your love who loves you not.”

“If you love me not, never mind. Later you shall, when a fine figure I cut.”

The frog jumped out of the water onto a leaf. The king's son gave her the hemp, telling her he'd pick up the spun thread three days later.

Three days later the older brothers anxiously hastened to the baker girl and the weaver girl to pick up their spun hemp. The baker girl produced a beautiful piece of work; the weaver girl, who was an expert at this sort of thing, had spun hers to look like silk. But how did the youngest son fare? He went to the ditch and called:

“Frog, frog!”

“Who calls?”

“Your love who loves you not.”

“If you love me not, never mind. Later you shall, when a fine figure I cut.”

She jumped onto a leaf holding a walnut in her mouth. He was somewhat embarrassed to give his father a walnut while his brothers brought spun hemp. He nevertheless took heart and presented the king with the walnut The king, who had already scrutinized the handiwork of the baker and the weaver girls, cracked open the walnut as the older brothers looked on, snickering. Out came cloth as fine as gossamer that continued to unroll until the throne room was covered with it. “But there's no end to this cloth!” exclaimed the king. No sooner were the words out of his mouth than the cloth came to an end.

But the father refused to accept the idea of a frog becoming queen. His favorite hunting bitch had just had three puppies, which he gave the three sons. “Take them to your betrothed and go back for them a month later. The one who's taken the best care of her dog will become the queen.”

A month later, the baker girl's dog had turned into a big, fat mastiff, having got all the bread he could eat. The weaver's dog, not nearly so well supplied, was now a half-starved hound. The youngest son came in with a small box. The king opened it and out jumped a tiny, beribboned poodle, impeccably groomed and perfumed, that stood on its hind legs and marched and counted.

“No doubt about it,” said the king, “my youngest son will be king, and the frog will be queen.”

The wedding of all three brothers was set for the same day. The older brothers went for their brides in garlanded carriages drawn by four horses, and the brides climbed in, decked with feathers and jewels.

The youngest boy went to the ditch, where the frog awaited him in a carriage fashioned out of a fig leaf and drawn by four snails. They set out. He walked ahead while the snails followed, pulling the fig leaf with the frog upon it. Every now and then he stopped for them to catch up with him, and once he even fell asleep. When he awakened, a gold carriage had pulled up beside him. It was drawn by two white horses, and inside on velvet upholstery, sat a maiden as dazzling as the sun and dressed in an emerald-green gown.

“Who are you?” asked the youngest son.

“I am the frog.”

He couldn't believe it, so the maiden opened a jewel case containing the fig leaf, the frog skin, and four snail shells. “I was a princess turned into a frog, and the only chance I had of getting my human form back was for a king's son to agree to marry me the way I was.”

The king was overjoyed and told his two older sons, who were consumed with envy, that whoever picked the wrong wife was unworthy of the crown. So the youngest boy and his bride became king and queen.

 

(
Monferrato
)

15

Once upon a time there was a merchant who was supposed to go away on business, but he was afraid to leave his daughter at home by herself, as a certain king had designs on her.

“Dear daughter,” he said, “I'm leaving, but you must promise not to stick your head out the door or let anyone in until I get back.”

Now that very morning the daughter had seen a handsome parrot in the tree outside her window. He was a well-bred parrot, and the maiden had delighted in talking with him.

“Father,” she replied, “it just breaks my heart to have to stay home all by myself. Couldn't I at least have a parrot to keep me company?”

The merchant, who lived only for his daughter, went out at once to get her a parrot. He found an old man who sold him one for a song. He took the bird to his daughter, and after much last-minute advice to her, he set out on his trip.

No sooner was the merchant out of sight than the king began devising a way to join the maiden. He enlisted an old woman in his scheme and sent her to the girl with a letter.

In the meantime the maiden got into conversation with the parrot. “Talk to me, parrot.”

“I will tell you a good story. Once upon a time there was a king who had a daughter. She was an only child, with no brothers or sisters, nor did she have any playmates. So they made her a doll the same size as herself, with a face and clothes exactly like her own. Everywhere she went the doll went too, and no one could tell them apart. One day as king, daughter, and doll drove through the woods in their carriage, they were attacked by enemies who killed the king and carried off his daughter, leaving the doll behind in the abandoned carriage. The maiden screamed and cried so, the enemies let her go, and she wandered off into the woods by herself. She eventually reached the court of a certain queen and became a servant. She was such a clever girl that the queen liked her better all the time. The other servants grew jealous and plotted her downfall. ‘You are aware, of course,' they said, ‘that the queen likes you very much and tells you everything. But there's one thing which we know and you don't She had a son who died.' At that, the maiden went to the queen and asked, ‘Majesty, is it true you had a son who died?' Upon hearing those words, the queen almost fainted. Heaven help anyone who recalled that fact! The penalty for mentioning that dead son was no less than death. The maiden too was condemned to die, but the queen took pity on her and had her shut up in a dungeon instead. There the girl gave way to despair, refusing all food and passing her nights weeping. At midnight, as she sat there weeping, she heard the door bolts slide back, and in walked five men: four of them were sorcerers and the fifth was the queen's son, their prisoner, whom they were taking out for exercise.”

At that moment, the parrot was interrupted by a servant bearing a letter for the merchant's daughter. It was from the king, who had finally managed to get it to her. But the girl was eager to hear what happened next in the tale, which had reached the most exciting part, so she said, “I will receive no letters until my father returns. Parrot, go on with your story.”

The servant took the letter away, and the parrot continued. “In the morning the jailers noticed the prisoner had not eaten a thing and they told the queen. The queen sent for her, and the maiden told her that her son was alive and in the dungeon a prisoner of four sorcerers, who took him out every night at midnight for exercise. The queen dispatched twelve soldiers armed with crowbars, who killed the sorcerers and freed her son. Then she gave him as a husband to the maiden who had saved him.”

The servant knocked again, insisting that the young lady read the king's letter. “Very well. Now that the story is over, I can read the letter,” said the merchant's daughter.

“But it's not finished yet, there's still some more to come,” the parrot hastened to say. “Just listen to this: the maiden was not interested in marrying the queen's son. She settled for a purse of money and a man's outfit and moved on to another city. The son of this city's king was ill, and no doctor knew how to cure him. From midnight to dawn he raved like one possessed. The maiden showed up in man's attire, claiming to be a foreign doctor and asking to be left with the youth for one night. The first thing she did was look under the bed and find a trapdoor. She opened it and went down into a long corridor, at the end of which a lamp was burning.”

At that moment the servant knocked and announced there was an old woman to see the young lady, whose aunt she claimed to be. (It was not an aunt, but the old woman sent by the king.) But the merchant's daughter was dying to know the outcome of the tale, so she said she was receiving no one. “Go on, parrot, go on with your story.”

Thus the parrot continued. “The maiden walked down to that light and found an old woman boiling the heart of the king's son in a kettle, in revenge for the king's execution of her son. The maiden removed the heart from the kettle, carried it back to the king's son to eat, and he got well. The king said, ‘I promised half of my kingdom to the doctor who cured my son. Since you are a woman, you will marry my son and become queen.'”

“It's a fine story,” said the merchant's daughter. “Now that it's over, I can receive that woman who claims to be my aunt.”

“But it's not quite over,” said the parrot. “There's still some more to come. Just listen to this. The maiden in doctor's disguise also refused to marry that king's son and was off to another city whose king's son was under a spell and speechless. She hid under his bed; at midnight, she saw two witches coming through the window and remove a pebble from the young man's mouth, whereupon he could speak. Before leaving, they replaced the pebble, and he was again mute.”