mud/content/library/grimm/094_the_peasants_wise_daughter.txt

The Peasant’s Wise Daughter

There was once a poor peasant who had no land, but only a small house,
and one daughter. Then said the daughter, “We ought to ask our lord the
King for a bit of newly-cleared land.” When the King heard of their
poverty, he presented them with a piece of land, which she and her
father dug up, and intended to sow with a little corn and grain of that
kind. When they had dug nearly the whole of the field, they found in
the earth a mortar made of pure gold. “Listen,” said the father to the
girl, “as our lord the King has been so gracious and presented us with
the field, we ought to give him this mortar in return for it.” The
daughter, however, would not consent to this, and said, “Father, if we
have the mortar without having the pestle as well, we shall have to get
the pestle, so you had much better say nothing about it.” He would,
however, not obey her, but took the mortar and carried it to the King,
said that he had found it in the cleared land, and asked if he would
accept it as a present. The King took the mortar, and asked if he had
found nothing besides that? “No,” answered the countryman. Then the
King said that he must now bring him the pestle. The peasant said they
had not found that, but he might just as well have spoken to the wind;
he was put in prison, and was to stay there until he produced the
pestle. The servants had daily to carry him bread and water, which is
what people get in prison, and they heard how the man cried out
continually, “Ah! if I had but listened to my daughter! Alas, alas, if
I had but listened to my daughter!” and would neither eat nor drink. So
he commanded the servants to bring the prisoner before him, and then
the King asked the peasant why he was always crying, “Ah! if I had but
listened to my daughter!” and what it was that his daughter had said.
“She told me that I ought not to take the mortar to you, for I should
have to produce the pestle as well.” “If you have a daughter who is as
wise as that, let her come here.” She was therefore obliged to appear
before the King, who asked her if she really was so wise, and said he
would set her a riddle, and if she could guess that, he would marry
her. She at once said yes, she would guess it. Then said the King,
“Come to me not clothed, not naked, not riding, not walking, not in the
road, and not out of the road, and if thou canst do that I will marry
thee.” So she went away, put off everything she had on, and then she
was not clothed, and took a great fishing net, and seated herself in it
and wrapped it entirely round and round her, so that she was not naked,
and she hired an ass, and tied the fisherman’s net to its tail, so that
it was forced to drag her along, and that was neither riding nor
walking. The ass had also to drag her in the ruts, so that she only
touched the ground with her great toe, and that was neither being in
the road nor out of the road. And when she arrived in that fashion, the
King said she had guessed the riddle and fulfilled all the conditions.
Then he ordered her father to be released from the prison, took her to
wife, and gave into her care all the royal possessions.

Now when some years had passed, the King was once drawing up his troops
on parade, when it happened that some peasants who had been selling
wood stopped with their waggons before the palace; some of them had
oxen yoked to them, and some horses. There was one peasant who had
three horses, one of which was delivered of a young foal, and it ran
away and lay down between two oxen which were in front of the waggon.
When the peasants came together, they began to dispute, to beat each
other and make a disturbance, and the peasant with the oxen wanted to
keep the foal, and said one of the oxen had given birth to it, and the
other said his horse had had it, and that it was his. The quarrel came
before the King, and he give the verdict that the foal should stay
where it had been found, and so the peasant with the oxen, to whom it
did not belong, got it. Then the other went away, and wept and lamented
over his foal. Now he had heard how gracious his lady the Queen was
because she herself had sprung from poor peasant folks, so he went to
her and begged her to see if she could not help him to get his foal
back again. Said she, “Yes, I will tell you what to do, if thou wilt
promise me not to betray me. Early to-morrow morning, when the King
parades the guard, place thyself there in the middle of the road by
which he must pass, take a great fishing-net and pretend to be fishing;
go on fishing, too, and empty out the net as if thou hadst got it full”
and then she told him also what he was to say if he was questioned by
the King. The next day, therefore, the peasant stood there, and fished
on dry ground. When the King passed by, and saw that, he sent his
messenger to ask what the stupid man was about? He answered, “I am
fishing.” The messenger asked how he could fish when there was no water
there? The peasant said, “It is as easy for me to fish on dry land as
it is for an ox to have a foal.” The messenger went back and took the
answer to the King, who ordered the peasant to be brought to him and
told him that this was not his own idea, and he wanted to know whose it
was? The peasant must confess this at once. The peasant, however, would
not do so, and said always, God forbid he should! the idea was his own.
They laid him, however, on a heap of straw, and beat him and tormented
him so long that at last he admitted that he had got the idea from the
Queen.

When the King reached home again, he said to his wife, “Why hast thou
behaved so falsely to me? I will not have thee any longer for a wife;
thy time is up, go back to the place from whence thou camest to thy
peasant’s hut.” One favour, however, he granted her; she might take
with her the one thing that was dearest and best in her eyes; and thus
was she dismissed. She said, “Yes, my dear husband, if you command
this, I will do it,” and she embraced him and kissed him, and said she
would take leave of him. Then she ordered a powerful sleeping draught
to be brought, to drink farewell to him; the King took a long draught,
but she took only a little. He soon fell into a deep sleep, and when
she perceived that, she called a servant and took a fair white linen
cloth and wrapped the King in it, and the servant was forced to carry
him into a carriage that stood before the door, and she drove with him
to her own little house. She laid him in her own little bed, and he
slept one day and one night without awakening, and when he awoke he
looked round and said, “Good God! where am I?” He called his
attendants, but none of them were there. At length his wife came to his
bedside and said, “My dear lord and King, you told me I might bring
away with me from the palace that which was dearest and most precious
in my eyes I have nothing more precious and dear than yourself, so I
have brought you with me.” Tears rose to the King’s eyes and he said,
“Dear wife, thou shalt be mine and I will be thine,” and he took her
back with him to the royal palace and was married again to her, and at
the present time they are very likely still living.