The Master and His Pupil
There was once a very learned man in the north-country who knew all the languages under the sun and who was acquainted with all the mysteries of the world. He had one big book bound in black calf and clasped with iron and with iron corners and chained to a table on the floor. When he read this book, he unlocked it with an iron key. This famous book contained all the secrets of the spiritual world. It told how many angels there were in heaven and how they marched in their ranks and sang and what were their several functions, and what was the name of each great angel of might. And it told of the demons, how many of them there were and what were their several powers and their labours and their names and how they might be summoned and how tasks might be imposed on them and how they might be chained to be as slaves to man.
Now the master had a pupil who was a foolish lad, and he acted as servant to the great master. The boy was never allowed to look into the black book, hardly to enter the private room.
One day the master was out. The lad was very curious. So he hurried to the chamber where his master kept his wonderful apparatus for changing copper into gold and lead into silver. There was his magic mirror in which he could see all that was passing in the world. There also was the shell which when held to the ear whispered all the words that were spoken by anyone the master desired to know about. The lad tried in vain with the crucibles to turn copper and lead into gold and silver. He looked long and vainly into the mirror; smoke and clouds passed over it, but he saw nothing plain. And the shell produced to his ear only indistinct murmurings, like the breaking of distant seas on an unknown shore. “I can do nothing,” he said; “as I don’t know the right words to utter, and they are locked up in that magic book.”
He looked round, and, see! the book was not locked. The master had forgotten to lock it before he went out. The boy rushed to it and opened the volume. It was written with red and black ink, and much of it he could not understand. But he put his finger on a line and spelled it through.
At once the room was darkened, and the house trembled; a clap of thunder rolled through the passage and the old room, and there stood before him a horrible, horrible form, breathing fire, and with eyes like burning lamps. It was the demon, whom he had called up to serve him.
“Set me a task!” said he with a voice like the roaring of an iron furnace.
The boy only trembled, and his hair stood up.
“Set me a task, or I shall strangle you!”
But the lad could not speak. Then the evil spirit stepped towards him and putting forth his hands touched his throat. The fingers burned his flesh. “Set me a task!”
“Water that flower,” cried the boy in despair, pointing to a geranium which stood in a pot on the floor. Instantly, the spirit left the room, but in another instant he returned with a barrel on his back and poured its contents over the flower; and again and again he went and came and poured more and more water till the floor of the room was ankle-deep.
“Enough, enough!” gasped the lad, but the demon did not hear him. The lad didn’t know the words by which to send him away, and still he fetched water.
It rose to the boy’s knees and still more water was poured. It mounted to his waist, and the demon still kept on bringing barrels full. It rose to his armpits, and he scrambled to the table-top. And now the water in the room stood up to the window and washed against the glass and around his feet on the table. It still rose; it reached his breast. The poor boy cried, but all was useless. The evil spirit was pouring and pouring and pouring water. But the master remembered on his journey that he had not locked his book and therefore returned, and at the moment when the water was bubbling about the pupil’s chin, rushed into the room and spoke the words which cast the demon back into his fiery home.
Jack the Giant-Killer
When good King Arthur reigned, there lived a farmer who had one only son called Jack. He was brisk and very smart, so nobody or nothing could worst him.
In those days, the country was kept by a huge giant. He was eighteen feet in height and about three yards round the waist, of a fierce and grim countenance, the terror of all the neighbouring towns and villages. He lived in a cave in the midst of the Mount, and whenever he wanted food he would go and furnish himself with whatever came in his way. Everybody at his approach ran out of their houses while he seized on their cattle. The Giant could carry a dozen oxen on his back at a time, and as for their sheep and hogs, he would tie them round his waist. He had done this for many years, so that all the people were in despair.
One day, Jack came to the townhall when the magistrates were sitting in council about the Giant. He asked, “What reward will be given to the man who kills the Giant?” “The giant’s treasure,” they said, “will be the reward.” Jack said, “Then let me undertake it.”
So he got a horn, shovel, and axe, and went over to the Mount in the beginning of a dark winter’s evening, when he began to work. Before morning, he had dug a pit twenty-two feet deep and nearly as broad, covering it over with long sticks and straw. Then he strewed a little mould over it, so that it appeared like plain ground. Jack then sat on the opposite side of the pit, farthest from the Giant’s lodging, and just at the break of day, he put the horn to his mouth and blew very hard.
This noise roused the Giant, who rushed from his cave, crying, “Hey you, have you come here to disturb my rest? You shall pay dearly for this. I will have satisfaction! I will take you whole and broil you for breakfast.”
He had no sooner uttered this than he tumbled into the pit and made the very foundations of the Mount to shake. “Oh, Giant,” said Jack, “where are you now? I can’t believe your threatening words: what do you think now of broiling me for your breakfast? Will no other diet serve you but poor Jack?” Then he gave him a very weighty knock with his axe on the very crown of his head and killed him on the spot.
Jack then filled up the pit with earth and went to search the cave, where he found much treasure. So he became rich and happy even more.
The Golden Arm
Here was once a man who travelled the land all over in search of a wife. He saw young and old, rich and poor, pretty and plain, and could not meet with one to his mind. At last, he found a woman, young, fair, and rich, who possessed a right arm of solid gold. He married her at once and thought no man so fortunate as he was. They lived happily together, but though he wished people to think otherwise, he was fonder of the golden arm than of all his wife’s gifts besides.
At last she died. The husband put on black clothes and pulled the longest face at the funeral. But in the middle of the night, he dug up the body and cut off the golden arm. He hurried home to hide his treasure and thought no one would know.
The following night, he put the golden arm under his pillow and was just falling asleep when the ghost of his dead wife glided into the room. Stalking up to the bedside, it drew the curtain and looked at him reproachfully. Pretending not to be afraid, he spoke to the ghost, and said, “What have you done with your red cheeks?”
“All withered and wasted away,” replied the ghost in a hollow tone.
“What have you done with your red rosy lips?”
“All withered and wasted away.”
“What have you done with your golden hair?”
“All withered and wasted away.”
“What have you done with your Golden Arm?”
“You have it!”
The Rose-Tree
There was once upon a time a good man who had two children: a girl by a first wife and a boy by the second. The girl was as white as milk, and her lips were like cherries. Her hair was like golden silk, and it hung to the ground. Her brother loved her dearly, but her wicked stepmother hated her. “Child,” said the stepmother one day, “go to the grocer’s shop and buy me a pound of candles.” She gave her the money, and the little girl went, bought the candles and started on her return. But there was a stile on her way. How to cross it? She put down the candles while she got over the stile. Suddenly a dog came and ran off with the candles.
The girl went back to the grocer’s, and the grocer gave her a second bunch. She came to the stile, set down the candles and began to climb it over. Again came the dog and ran off with the candles.
The girl went again to the grocer’s, and the grocer gave her a third bunch. But the same thing happened! The big dog came again and ran off with the candles as usual.
Then the girl came to her stepmother crying, because she had spent all the money and had lost three bunches of candles.
The stepmother was angry, but she pretended not to mind the loss. She said to the child, “Come, lay your head on my lap that I may comb your hair.” So the little girl laid her head in the woman’s lap, who proceeded to comb the yellow hair. And when she combed, the hair fell over her knees and rolled right down to the ground.
Then the stepmother hated her more for the beauty of her hair, so she said to her, “I cannot part your hair on my knee; fetch a billet of wood.” So she fetched it. Then said the stepmother, “I cannot part your hair with a comb; fetch me an axe.” So she fetched it.
“Now,” said the wicked woman, “lay your head down on the billet while I part your hair.”
Well! she laid down her little golden head without fear, and whist! down came the axe, and it was off. So the mother wiped the axe and laughed.
Then she took the heart and liver of the little girl, and she stewed them and brought them into the house for supper. The husband tasted them and shook his head. He said they tasted very strangely. She gave some to the little boy, but he would not eat. She tried to force him, but he refused, ran out into the garden, took up his little sister, put her in a box and buried the box under a rose-tree; and every day he went to the tree and wept till his tears ran down on the box.
One day the rose-tree flowered. It was spring, and there among the flowers was a white bird. The bird sang, and sang and sang like an angel out of heaven. Then it flew away. It went to a cobbler’s shop and perched itself on a tree nearby, and thus it sang,
“My wicked mother slew me,
My dear father ate me,
My little brother whom I love
Sits below, and I sing above
Stick, stock, stone dead.”
“Sing again that beautiful song,” asked the shoemaker.
“Please give me those little red shoes that you are making.”
The cobbler gave the shoes, and the bird sang the song, then flew to a tree in front of a watchmaker’s and sang:
“My wicked mother slew me,
My dear father ate me,
My little brother whom I love
Sits below, and I sing above
Stick, stock, stone dead.”
“Oh, a beautiful song! Sing it again, sweet bird,” asked the watchmaker.
“Please give me that gold watch and chain in your hand.” The watchmaker gave the watch and chain. The bird took it in one foot, the shoes in the other, and repeated the song. Then the bird flew away to where three millers were picking a millstone. The bird perched on a tree and sang:
“My wicked mother slew me,
My dear father ate me,
My little brother whom I love
Sits below, and I sing above
Stick!”
Then one of the men put down his tool and looked up from his work,
“Stock!”
Then the second miller’s man laid aside his tool and looked up,
“Stone!”
Then the third miller’s man laid down his tool and looked up,
“Dead!”
Then all three cried out with one voice: “Oh, what a beautiful song! Sing it, sweet bird, again.”
“Please put the millstone round my neck,” said the bird. The men did what the bird wanted, and away to the tree it flew with the millstone round its neck, the red shoes in one foot, and the gold watch and chain in the other. It sang the song and then flew home. It rattled the millstone against the eaves of the house, and the stepmother said, “It thunders.” Then the little boy ran out to see the thunder, and down dropped the red shoes at his feet.
It rattled the millstone against the eaves of the house once more, and the stepmother said again: “It thunders.” Then the father ran out, and down fell the chain about his neck.
Father and son came in, laughing and saying, “See, what fine things the thunder has brought us!” Then the bird rattled the millstone against the eaves of the house a third time, and the stepmother said, “It thunders again, perhaps the thunder has brought something for me,” and she ran out. But alas! When she stepped outside the door, the millstone fell down on her head, and so she died.
