Italian Folktales (78 page)

“At this stage, my son, the only thing left for you to do is take her swimming with you.”

So the king said to Temperino, “Come along, let's go swimming in the river.”

At the river, Temperino said, “Majesty, you get undressed first.” The king undressed and slipped into the water.

“Now you come in too!” he said to Temperino.

At that instant a great neighing was heard, and the filly came galloping up excited and foaming at the mouth. “My filly!” cried Temperino. “Wait, Majesty, I must go after my excited filly!” And she ran off.

She ran to the royal palace and said to the queen, “Majesty, the king is in the river without his clothes and some guards, not recognizing him, want to seize him. He sent me to fetch his scepter and his crown to identify him.”

The queen picked up scepter and crown and handed them to Temperino. When she had them, Temperino got on the filly and galloped away, singing:

 

“As a maiden I came, as a maiden I return,

So the scepter and the crown do I earn.”

 

She crossed river, mountain, forest, and arrived home, and her father won the bet.

 

(
Naples
)

 

125

There was once a wolf and a fox who called each other brother and sister, and made a pact to share everything they were each lucky enough to catch.

The wolf, going about sniffing the air, caught a whiff of sheep and said to the fox, “Sister, I'm going to take a look in these pastures to see if a flock is grazing there.”

He went, and landed right in the middle of a flock. He'd no sooner sunk his teeth into a lamb than he had to flee for his life, carrying the animal in his mouth; But he wasn't quick enough, and received a thrashing that put him in bed for a week.

“Since it cost me so many blows,” reasoned the wolf, “I shall keep this lamb all for myself.” He hung it up inside the fireplace hood and said nothing about it to the fox.

“How about those sheep? Did you catch them?” asked the fox.

“Sister, it's dangerous to go after them. Leave them alone, that's my advice.”

The fox, who didn't believe him, said to herself, “I'll fix you now!”

She had discovered a hiding place full of honey, which smugglers had buried. “Brother,” she said to the wolf, “I found a place full of honey, something too good to be true! One of these days we'll go and see it!”

She departed, instead, by herself, without a word to the wolf, found the honey, tasted it, and licked her lips. “Ah, what a delicious thing!”

Still aching from those blows, the wolf would ask her every time he met her, “Sister, when are we going to see that honey?”

“Oh! What do you expect from me, brother? I traveled quite a distance!”

“But, sister, where did you go to be away so long?”

“Brother,” replied the fox, “I was in a town called Taste-It.”

The next day the wolf had finished eating the lamb, and asked the fox, “Well, sister, shall we go?”

“Oh, dear, brother, it's so far away!”

“But you were gone a long time . . . Where did you go?”

“Brother, I'm exhausted. Just imagine, I went to a town called Pilfer-It.”

The poor wolf returned the day after. “Shall we go take a look, sister?”

And the fox finally said, “Tomorrow we will go.”

But no sooner had she left the wolf than she departed alone. She went straight to the hiding place and ate the rest of the honey. She was licking the bottom of the pot, when the smugglers arrived, but the fox ran away as fast as her legs would carry her.

The next day they set out, she and the wolf. “Brother, we have to go to a town quite far from here. If you want to come along, follow me. It's a town called Finish-It!” Still limping from all those blows, the wolf followed as best he could.

When they reached the top of a hill, the fox said, “Here we are in Finish-It. You go on ahead while I stay behind and watch, so no smugglers will come up and beat us.”

The poor wolf went, but the smugglers who had discovered their honey gone, were also keeping watch. The wolf got there, but all he found were potsherds smeared with honey. Hungry as he was, he began licking the potsherds, when all of a sudden the smugglers pounced on him and beat him black and blue.

From her lookout, the fox feasted her eyes on the dancing wolf. When he finally managed to flee and come back to her, groaning every step of the way, she said, “Goodness, brother, what happened?”

“Sister!” he moaned, “can't you see they've beaten me to death? Let's run away fast if we don't want to catch any more!”

“Run away? How can I ever, since I've turned my ankle? No, I can't run!”

So with the wolf all beat up and impatient to flee, and the fox pretending to limp, they headed home.

“Oh, brother,” groaned the fox, “how will I ever make it with this ankle? Carry me some way on your back.”

The wolf had no choice but to take her on his back. And thus they moved along, the hale fox astride the half-dead wolf, while she sang:

 

“Look, look, get a kick,

The dead one bears the quick!”

 

“Why are you singing that, sister?” asked the wolf.

“Why, brother, they are the words to the song I'm singing to cheer you along the way.”

They got home. So bruised was the wolf from all the blows, and so exhausted from lugging the fox on his back, that he fell lifeless to the ground and never revived. And that was how the fox got even with him for eating the lamb all by himself.

 

Cock-a-doodle-doo,

The wolf has left you.

 

(
Naples
)

126

In Maglie there was a mother and father who had one son, and this son was a devil if there ever was one. He was always pawning something or other, or else selling it outright. He stayed out all night and, in short, was a hard cross for the two old people to bear. One evening his mother said, “Husband, that boy will be the death of us. Let's make whatever sacrifice necessary and send him away from home.”

The next day his father bought him a horse, and borrowed one hundred ducats to give him. When the son came in at noon, his father said, “My son, you can't go on like this. Here are one hundred ducats and a horse. Get out and start earning your own living.”

“Very well,” replied the son, “I'll go to Naples.” He set out, riding this way and that and, in the middle of a field, spotted a man on all fours. “Handsome youth,” called the boy from Maglie, “what are you doing there? What is your name?”

“Lightning.”

“And your last name?”

“Streak.”

“Why that name?”

“Because my specialty is chasing hares.” He'd no sooner spoke than one darted by. In four bounds, he caught it.

“Not bad! I have an idea,” said the boy from Maglie. “Come along with me to Naples. I have a hundred ducats.” Lightning didn't have to be begged, and the two of them departed, one on horseback and the other on foot.

Soon they met another. “And what is
your
name?”

“Blindstraight.”

“What kind of a name is that?” The words weren't out of his mouth before a flock of crows flew overhead, pursued by a falcon. “Let's see what you can do.”

“I shall put out the left eye of the falcon and bring him down.” With that he drew his bow, and the bird dropped to the ground with an arrow in his left eye.

“What do you say, friend, to coming along with us?”

“Certainly I'll come. Let's be off.”

They reached Brindisi. In port a hundred stevedores were working, but there was one in particular who bore a heavier burden than a mule, as though it were nothing at all.

“Look at that!” exclaimed all three travelers. “Let's ask him his name.”

“What's your name?” asked the youth from Maglie.

“Strongback.”

“Well, guess what: we want you to come along with us. I have one hundred ducats and enough to eat for us all. When I run out of food and money, then you will all provide for me.”

Imagine the dismay of the other stevedores over the departure of Strongback, who was such a help to them all! They began crying, “We'll give you another four pence, we'll give you another four pence, if you stay with us!”

“No, no!” said Strongback. “Leisure is better—eating, drinking, and going for a stroll.”

All four of them moved onward, stopped off at a tavern where they ate like pigs and drank all the wine they could hold. Then they were again on their way. They'd not gone five or six miles before they ran into a youth with his ear to the ground.

“What are you doing down there? What's your name?”

“Rabbitears,” he replied. “I hear all the conversations in the world, be they kings', ministers', or lovers'.”

“Let's see if you're telling the truth,” said the youth from Maglie. “Cock your ears and listen to what they're saying in Maglie, in that house in front of the column.”

“Just a minute,” he replied. He put his ear to the ground. “I hear two old people talking by the fireside, and the old woman says to the old man: ‘Thank God you went into debt, husband. It was worth it to get that devil out of our house and have a little peace at last.'”

“You've not made that up,” said the youth from Maglie. “Only my mother and father could say those things.”

They resumed their journey and came to a place where many bricklayers were working and sweating under a hot morning sun.

“How do you poor souls manage to work at this hour?”

“How do we manage it? We have somebody who cools us off.” They looked and saw a youth fanning the workers with his breath. “Puffffffffff. Pufffffffffff.”

“What's your name?” they asked him.

“Puffarello,” he replied. “I can imitate all the winds. Fooooooooooo! That's the north wind. Pooooooooooo! That's the southeast wind. Fffffffffff! That's the east wind.” And he went on imitating winds, blowing with all his might. “If you order a hurricane, I can even produce a hurricane.” He blew, and trees began crashing to the ground and rocks flying through the air with all the fury of the gods.

“That will do!” they told him, and he calmed down.

“Friend,” said the youth from Maglie, “I have one hundred ducats. Will you come along with me?”

“Let's go,” he answered. They made a rollicking band all together. Telling one tall tale after another, they came to Naples. The first thing they did was go and eat, naturally. Next they went to a barber, then dressed up and went for a stroll, to lord it over everybody. In three days' time, the hundred ducats were running low, and the youth from Maglie said, “Friends, the air of Naples doesn't suit me. Let's go off to Paris, which is better.”

After a long distance they arrived in Paris. On the city gate was written:

 

The man who defeats the king's daughter in a foot-race

Will have her as his wife.

But whoever loses, loses his life.

 

The youth from Maglie said, “Lightning, here's where you come into the picture.” He went up to the royal palace and spoke to a steward. “Sir, I am traveling for my own pleasure. This morning as I entered the city I read the challenge issued by the king's daughter, and I want to try my luck.”

“My son,” replied the steward, “just between the two of us, she is a madwoman. She does not wish to get married, and is constantly thinking up all these tricks to send many, many fine men to their death. It grieves me to see you join them.”

“Nonsense! Go and tell her to pick the day; I am ready any time.” Everything was set for Sunday. The youth from Maglie went to tell his companions. “Guess what! The big day is Sunday!” They went off to the inn to eat a hearty meal and plan what to do. Lightning Streak said, “You know what you should do? Send me to her Saturday evening with a note saying you have a fever and can't race, but that you're sending me to run in your place. If I win, she'll still marry you. If I lose, you're still under the obligation of going to your death.”

That's what they did, and Sunday morning the people lined both sides of the street that had been swept free of every speck of dust. At the appointed hour, out came the princess dressed as a ballerina and took her place beside Lightning Streak. Everyone looked on, wide-eyed. The signal sounded, and the princess was off like a hare. But in four bounds Lightning Streak passed and left her one hundred feet behind. Just imagine the applause and cheers! Everyone shouted, “Hurrah, Italian youth! She's finally met her match, that madwoman! That will sober her!”