Chapter VIII: Welsh-Gypsy Stories (2)

When he advanced nearer the tents, they all begun to know that he was the young Prince that had passed by that way many times before; and when Jubal went to change himself, he called most of them together in one tent, and tells them everything all about him, and tells them to be kind to him. And so they were, for there was nothing that he desired but what he had, the same as if he was in the palace with his father and mother. He was allowed to romp and play with the girls, but no further, though his princely manners and the chastity of the girls hindered all bad thoughts. Him having lessons on the Welsh harp when a boy by some Welsh harper belonging to the Woods or Roberts family, who were Welsh Gypsies of North Wales, made a little difference to his way of speaking to that of the London magpies, when they used to say, ‘Dorda! this young gentleman talks as if he was two hundred years old; we can’t understand him.’ They used to have a deal of fun with him at night-time, when telling his funny tales by the fire. Jubal, after he pulled off his hairy coat, was one of the smartest young men amongst them, and he stuck to be the young Prince’s closest companion. The young Prince was always very sociable and merry, only when he would think of his gold watch, the one as he had from the young Princess in that castle. The butcher allowed him to keep that for company, and did not like to take it from him, as it might come useful to him some time or another. And the poor fellow did not know where he lost it, being so much excited with everything.

He passed off many happy days with the Stanleys and Grays in Epping Forest. But one day him and poor Jubal was strolling through the trees, when they came to the very same spot where they first met, and, accidentally looking up, he could see his watch hanging up in the tree which he had to climb when he first seen poor Jubal coming to him in the form of a bear; and cries out, ‘Jubal, Jubal, I can see my watch up in that tree.’

‘Well! I am sure, how lucky!’ exclaimed poor Jubal, ‘shall I go and get it down?’

‘No, I’d rather go myself,’ said the young Prince.

Now when all this was going on, the young Princess whom he changed those things with in that castle, seeing that one of the King of England’s sons had been there by the changing of the watch, [130] and other things, got herself ready with a large army, and sailed off for England. She left her army a little out of the town, and she went with her guards straight up to the palace to see the King, and also demanded to see his sons, and brought a fine young boy with her about nine or ten months old. They had a long conversation together about different things. At last she demands one of the sons to come before her; and the oldest comes, when she asks him, ‘Have you ever been at the Castle of Melváles?’ and he answers ‘Yes.’ She throws down a pocket-handkerchief, bids him to walk over that without stumbling. He goes to walk over it, and no sooner he put his foot on it he fell down and broke his leg. He was taken off immediately and made a prisoner of by her own guards. The other was called upon, and was asked the same questions, and had to go through the same performance, and he also was made a prisoner of.

Now she says, ‘Have you not another son?’

When the King began to shiver and shake and knock his two knees together that he could scarcely stand upon his legs, and did not know what to say to her; he was so much frightened. At last a thought came to him to send for his head butcher, and inquired of him particularly, Did he behead his son, or is he alive?

‘He is saved, O King.’

‘Then bring him here immediately, or else I shall be done for.’

Two of the fastest horses they had were put in the carriage, to go and look for the poor Welsh-harping Prince. And when they got to the very same spot where they left him, that was the time when the Prince was up the tree, getting his watch down, and poor Jubal standing a distance off. They cried out to him, Did he see another young man in this wood? Jubal, seeing such a nice carriage, thought something, and did not like to say No, and said Yes, and pointed up the tree. And they told him to come down immediately, as there is a young lady in search of him with a young child.

‘Ha! ha! ha! Jubal, did you ever hear such a thing in all your life, my brother?’

‘Do you call him your brother?’

‘Well, he has been better to me than my brothers.’

‘Well, for his kindness he shall come to accompany you to the palace, and see how things will turn out.’

After they go to the palace, he has a good wash, and appears before the Princess, when she asks him, or puts the question to him, ‘Had he ever been at the Castle of Melváles?’ when he with a smile upon his face, and gives a graceful bow.

And says my lady, ‘Walk over that handkerchief without stumbling.’

He walks over it many times, and dances upon it, and nothing happened to him. She said, with a proud and smiling air, ‘That is the young man’; and out comes the exchanged things by both of them. Presently she orders a very large box to be brought in and to be opened, and out come some of the most costly uniforms that was ever wore on an emperor’s back; and when he dressed himself up, the King could scarcely look upon him from the dazzling of the gold and diamonds on his coat and other things. He orders his two brothers to be in confinement for a period of time; and before the Princess demands him to go with her to her own country, she pays a visit to the Gypsies’ camp, and she makes them some very handsome presents for being so kind to the young Prince. And she gives Jubal an invitation to go with them, which he accepts, also one of the girls for a nurse; wishes them a hearty farewell for a time, promising to see them again in some little time to come, by saying, ‘Cheer up, comrades, I’m a Rómani myself; I should like to see you in my country.’

They go back to the King and bids farewell, and tells him not to be so hasty another time to order people to beheaded [131] before having a proper cause for it. Off they go with all their army with them; but while the soldiers were striking their tents, he bethought himself of his Welsh harp, and had it sent for immediately to take with him in a beautiful wooden case. After they went over, they called to see each of those three brothers whom the Prince had to stay with when he was on his way to the Castle of Melváles; and I can assure you, when they all got together, they had a very merry time of it. The last time I seen him, I play upon the Prince’s harp; and he told me he should like to see me again in North Wales. Ha! ha! ha! I am glad that I have come to the finish. I ought to have a drop of Scotch ale for telling all those lies.

As I said in my notes to No. 54, Mr. Joseph Jacobs has also
reprinted this story, with alterations (e.g. of ‘head butcher’ to
‘headsman’), additions, and omissions of his own. Especially has he
deleted every mention of Gypsies, whilst leaving in references to
‘tents,’ ‘camp,’ etc., which thus appear rather à propos de bottes.
Such tampering with folk-tales reminds one somehow of your
‘restoring’ architect, called in about an old church. ‘Yes,’ he
pronounces, ‘that window is Late Perpendicular, so will have to
come out, and we’ll put in an Early English one according to the
original design.’ Not that he knows the original design, but he
pleases his dupes: some there be, however, that curse. But Grimm,
Mr. Jacobs pleads, rewrote his fairy-tales. Maybe He did, but every
folklorist is not a Grimm.

After this, Mr. Jacobs remarks that ‘the tale is scarcely a good
example for Mr. Hindes Groome’s contention (in Transactions
Folk-Lore Congress) for the diffusion of all folk-tales by means of
gypsies as colporteurs. This is merely a matter of evidence, and of
evidence there is singularly little, though it is indeed curious
that one of Campbell’s best equipped informants should turn out to
be a Gypsy. Even this fact, however, is not too well
substantiated.’ As I have shown in my Introduction, I have never
made such a contention; there, too, I have told all I know about
Campbell’s informant—Mr. Jacobs, perhaps, may know more. But his
oracular judgment, that this story is a poor example for my (real)
contention, that is what staggers me, unbacked though it be by one
tittle of counter-evidence. The following is all I can adduce in
self-vindication.

My friend Mr. Sampson has got from Matthew Wood another Welsh-Gypsy
version, called ‘I Valín Kalo Pāni’ (The Bottle of Black Water).
‘This,’ he writes, ‘is a variant of your “King and his Three Sons,”
with which it agrees in most particulars, except of course Roberts’
own picturesque little touches, and that a bottle of black water
takes the place of the three golden apples.’ Then, what I did not,
could not know when I published In Gypsy Tents (1880), there is a
closely parallel non-Gypsy variant in Professor Theodor
Vernaleken’s In The Land of Marvels (Eng. trans. 1884), No. 52, pp.
304–9 and 360. It is called ‘The Accursed Garden,’ and comes from
St. Pölden in Lower Austria. Here is a summary:—

A king has three sons, the youngest the handsomest. He falls sick,
and learns he can only get better by eating a fruit from the
Accursed Garden. The brothers set out one after the other; the two
eldest lose all their money gaming in an inn, and are put in jail
(cf. No. 49, p. 184). The youngest son comes to a hermit’s in a
great forest, inquires the way to the Accursed Garden, and gets a
red ball, which, flung before him, will show the way. He next comes
to a black dog, and sleeps three nights with him, then to a red
dog, lastly to a white maiden. Before reaching the mountain on
whose top is the garden he ties his horse to a fig-tree. He has to
enter the garden at eleven, and leave before noon. In a castle in
the midst of the garden he finds a sleeping lady, writes down his
name and address, departs and is pursued by devouring beasts.
Returning to the white maiden, he is desired by her to divide a
grape into four parts, and to cast a part into each corner of her
dwelling. Immediately it became a splendid palace. The red and
black dogs are likewise changed into princes, and the hermit into a
king. The prince comes up as his brothers are going to be hanged,
buys them off, is robbed by them in the night of his fruit,
receiving in its stead a poisoned one, and then is thrown into a
valley. The late hermit discovers and revives him, but the king his
father, finding his fruit is poisoned, orders him to be shot. But
the servant spares him; and the young lady, arriving with a great
army, proclaims that if the prince who fetched the fruit be not
produced she will besiege the city. Then the servant tells how he
spared the prince, who is sought for and brought to the king. He
accurately describes the garden, and marries the princess.

This version is markedly inferior to our Welsh-Gypsy one; still, I
know in all folklore of few closer parallels. And the two versions
are separated by over four centuries and by more than a thousand
miles. The ball of yarn on p. 221 recurs in two other Welsh-Gypsy
stories, ‘The Black Dog of the Wild Forest’ (‘You follow this ball
of worsted. Now it will take you right straight to a river’) and
‘The Green Man of Noman’s Land’ (‘She ... gives him a ball of
thread to place between the horse’s ears’). In Dasent’s Norse tale
of ‘The Golden Palace that hung in the Air’ (Tales from the Fjeld,
p. 291) an old hag gives the hero ‘a grey ball of wool, which he
had only to roll on before him and he would come to whatever place
he wished.’ In Addy’s Household Tales, p. 50, there is a curious
but poorly told story from Wensley in Derbyshire, ‘The Little Red
Hairy Man,’ a variant of our ‘Mare’s Son’ (No. 20) and
‘Twopence-halfpenny’ (No. 58). Here the little man throws ‘a small
copper ball on the ground, and it rolled away, and Jack followed it
until it came to a castle made of copper, and flew against the
door.’ So with a silver ball and a silver castle, and a golden ball
and a golden castle. On which it is just worth remarking that
underground castles of copper, silver, and gold occur in No. 58, p.
245, in a story told to Campbell of Islay by a London Gypsy (Tales
of the West Highlands, iv. 143), and in Ralston’s The Norka, pp.
75–76. In Wratislaw’s Hungarian-Slovenish story of ‘The Three
Lemons,’ p. 63, [132] we find castles of lead, silver, and gold,
and at each the hero gets dumplings of the same metals, which he
afterwards throws before him, when they fix themselves on the glass
hill, and permit him to ascend (cf. too, our ‘Three Dragons,’ pp.
152–4; Irish folk-tale in Folk-lore Journal, i. 318; and Folk lore
for December 1890, p. 495). In Hahn’s ‘Filek-Zelebi’ (No. 73, ii.
69) the heroine has to follow three golden apples; and in ‘The
Wicked Queens’ (J. H. Knowles’s Folk-tales of Kashmir, p. 401) a
jogi gives a boy a pebble, telling him to ‘throw it on before and
to follow its leadings.’

The well-known Sleeping Beauty recurs in two other Gypsy
stories—the Moravian one of ‘The Princess and the Forester’s Son’
(p. 147), which offers marked analogies to John Roberts’s tale, and
that from the Bukowina, ‘The Winged Hero’ (pp. 100–104), which is
very Oriental in character. Whether she was ever familiar to
English or Scottish folklore I do not know; but Scott in chapter
xxvi. of The Antiquary alludes to her.

For the three helpful brothers, cf. F. A. Steel’s Wide-awake
Stories, p. 35–36; and for the prohibition not to look about
[behind], Maive Stokes’s Indian Fairy Tales, p. 140.

NO. 56.—THE FIVE TRADES

Once there were a sailor and other four men. One was a smith, and the other was a soldier and a tailor, and the last was an innkeeper. The sailor asked the smith to come upon the sea. The smith said, ‘No, I must go and do some work.’ ‘What is your work?’ ‘To heat iron,’ says the smith, ‘and make it into shoes for horses.’ The sailor asked the other three to come on board his ship. The soldier said he must go to make facings and marchings; and the tailor said, ‘I must go and make clothes to keep you warm.’ And the innkeeper said, ‘I am going to make beer to make you drunk, that you may all of you go to the devil.’ That’s all of that.

This little temperance apologue by a non-teetotaler is one of the
very few Gypsy stories with a moral.

NO. 57.—ASHYPELT

Once there was an old man and an old ’ooman livin’ in the Forest o’ Dean. They ’ad twelve sons, and there was one son called Ashypelt. He was the youngest son, and they didn’t never think but very little o’ Ashypelt, as ’ee was allus used to be i’ the esshole under the fire, an’ the brothers used to spit on ’im and laugh at ’im an’ make fun of ’im an’ that. He never spoke, didn’t Ashypelt, nor hear nuthin’. These eleven brothers—they was nearly allus felling timber and that—used to go, they used to go off tel Saturdays for a week. They used to do that very reglar, and were bringing a lot of money in for the old man and the old ’ooman.

So the old ’ooman sez one day, ‘Well, John, I sez, I think you an’ me ’as got enough money now to live on which will keep we all the days of our life. An’ we’ll tell ’em to-night’—it was on a Saturday, an’ they was comin’ home again, they was comin’ home with all the week’s wages—‘we’ll say to ’em as the pressgang ’as been after ’em, as they’ve got to ’ear as we’ve got eleven very fine sons, and they wants to make soldiers of ’em. So I’ll begin a-cryin’ when they comes ’ere to-night, and I’ll say to ’em, “O my very dear sons, the pressgang’s been after yous ’ere to-day. They want yous to go for soldiers, an’ the best you can do, my dear children”—the old ’ooman was cryin’ very much, makin’ herself so—“is to go to sleep in the barn.” An’ we’ll put ’em to sleep in the barn, an’ give ’em their week’s victuals with ’em’ (what they used to take reglar), sez the old ’ooman to the old man. ‘We can soon put Ashypelt out o’ the road.’ (He was listenin’ all the time, the poor Ashypelt, listenin’ wot the old ’ooman was sayin’.) ‘Soon as we’ve put the eleven sons in the barn we’ll set fire to ’em about twelve o’clock and burn ’em: that’s the best way to take it out of ’em. We’ll burn ’em,’ she sez.

Poor Ashypelt gets up out o’ the esshole—this was about the hour of eleven: they was sittin’ up till twelve to set the barn afire. He goes up to the barn, an’ ’ee throws ’is brothers up one after another neck and crop—an’ they was goin’ to kill ’im—an’ their week’s victuals.

‘Oo are you?’ they sez.

‘I am your brother Ashypelt,’ he sez, ‘I am your brother Ashypelt.’

So one looks at ’im, an’ another looks at ’im, to find a certain mark as they know to him. They went to kill poor Ashypelt for throwing them up.

He sez, ‘My father and mother is goin’ to set you afire, all the lot o’ you, that’s the reason they put you in the barn. An’ come with me up on that back edge, an’ you’ll see the barn goin’ afire directly,’ sez Ashypelt.

They sat on this high edge tel twelve o’clock come, an’ they was lookin’ out, an’ they seen the old ’ooman an’ the old man go with a lantern, an’ puttin’ a light to the barn an’ all the straw what was in it. So they thanked Ashypelt very much for savin’ their lives, but they didn’t injure their father or mother; but they all started to go on the road together. They comes to twelve cross-roads; an’ poor Ashypelt, never bein’ out o’ the esshole before, ’ee took very sleepy, through bein’ a very ’ot day.

So one brother sez to the other, ‘We’ll all take a road to ourselves. Each one will take a road, an’ in twelve months an’ a day we’ll all meet ’ere agen.’

So poor Ashypelt the sun overcame ’im, an’ ’im never bein’ out o’ the esshole, ’ee fell asleep; an’ each brother left a mark on the road which way they went, for ’im to go ’is road to ’imself. When poor Ashypelt wakened up, ’ee began lookin’ round ’im an’ rubbin’ ’is eyes. They left ’im a very old nasty lane to go up, an old nasty lane with the mud up to your knees. Poor Ashypelt bein’ very weak, he got fast several times goin’ up this old lane, an’ tumbled down in the mud; an’ the ’edges was growed very high with ’em so meetin’ together; and the briers was scratching poor Ashypelt’s eyes very near out, as ’ee was goin’ up this old lane. ’Ee travels on, over high dales an’ lofty mountains, where the cock never crowed and the divel never sounded ’is bugle horn. It’ll last tel to-morrow night, but I don’t mean to half tell you so long. [133] But poor Ashypelt got benighted up this old lane. ’Ee used to fall asleep, bein’ summer-time, an’ very early in the mornin’ come daylight ’ee wakens up, an’ ’ee kept on the same old lane all the way he was goin’. ’Ee travels on tel ’ee come to a castle an’ a new ’ouse, where there was a man, an’ ’ee axed this man could ’ee give ’im a job.

’Ee sez, ‘Yes, Ashypelt, I can give you a job,’ ’ee sez. ’Ee sez, ‘Wot can you do?’

Ashypelt sez, ‘I can do everythink as you try to put me to.’

‘Well, Ashypelt,’ ’ee sez, ‘I’ll give you fifty pounds to sleep into the castle all night, an’ a good suit o’ clo’es.’

‘Oh! yes,’ ’ee sez; ‘I’ll sleep there,’ ’ee sed.

So ’ee sez to Ashypelt, ’ee sez, ‘You shall have a good bag o’ nuts to crack an’ plenty o’ ’bacca to smoke, an’ a good fire to sit by,’ ’ee sez.

But ’ee allowed him no can o’ beer to drink, plenty o’ water, so as he wouldn’t get trussicated. An’ ’appen about eleven o’clock at night ’ee sez, ‘Now Ashypelt, it is about the time you’ve got to come in along o’ me.’

So ’ee takes Ashypelt with ’im about eleven o’clock to this castle. ’Ee opens the door, an’ ’ee sez, ‘There you are, go an’ take your seat, an’ sit down.’ ’Ee sez ‘Here is your bag o’ nuts, an’ plenty o’ ’bacca to smoke.’

So just now Ashypelt was sittin’ down, an’ just about the hour o’ twelve ’ee could ’ear a lot o’ noise about the room. ’Ee looks around behind ’im at the door, an’ ’ee sees a man naked.

So ’ee sez, ‘Come up to the fire an’ warm you. You looks very cold.’

It was a sperrit, you see. ’Ee wouldn’t come up to the fire, so Ashypelt went an’ fetched im. Ashypelt sez, ‘Will you ’ave a smoke?’ ’ee sez, an’ ’ee takes an’ ’ee fills ’im a new pipe. ’Ee sez, ‘Will you crack some nuts?’

So ’ee smoked all poor Ashypelt’s ’bacca, an’ cracked all ’is nuts, an’ poor Ashypelt ’ad none. But ’ee sez, ‘You are a very greedy fellow indeed, I must say,’ ’ee sed, ‘after a man bringing you up to warm you at the fire, an’ taking everythink off ’im.’

Just about the hour o’ two o’clock away goes this man from ’im. So therefore Ashypelt sits contented down afore the fire to hisself.

So next mornin’ the master sez to ’im at the hour o’ six o’clock, ‘Are you alive, Ashypelt?’

‘Oh! yes,’ ’ee sez to ’im, ‘I am alive, sir. An’ there came a very rude man ’ere last night, an’ took all my ’bacca, an’ cracked all my nuts off me,’ ’ee sez, ‘for the kindness I done for ’im. ’Ee was naked, an’ I axed ’im to ’ave a warm.’

‘Well,’ ’ee sez to Ashypelt, ‘come along an’ ’ave some breakfast, Ashypelt.’ An’ ’ee takes ’im to the new ’ouse from the castle, to ’ave some breakfast. ‘Would you wish to stop another night, Ashypelt?’ ’ee sez, ‘an’ I’ll give you another fifty pounds.’

‘Oh! yes,’ sez Ashypelt, ‘’im never seein’ anythin’, an’ never knowin’ wot sperrits or ghostses was, ’im bein’ allus in the esshole.’

So all day Ashypelt went up an’ down the garden, an’ learnin’ ’ow to dig in the garden an’ one thing or another, tel eleven o’clock came again the next night.

‘Well, come, Ashypelt, my lad,’ ’ee sed, ‘it’s time for you to go back to your room agen now.’

So the next night ’ee gave ’im very near ’alf a pound o’ ’bacca to smoke an’ a bigger bag o’ nuts. So about the hour o’ twelve o’clock ’ee turns round to the door again, an’ there was five or six of these ghostses came in to ’im this time an’ sperrits. So there was one stood up in the corner in ’is skeleton. There was five more runnin’ up and down the room pitity-pat, pitity-pat.

‘Come up to the fire,’ Ashypelt sez, ‘an’ warm yous. Yous looks very cold all runnin’ about naked,’ ’ee sed. ’Ee sez, ‘There’s some ’bacca there an’ some pipes. ’Ave a smoke apiece.’

So this poor fellow stood up in the corner.

‘You come ’ere,’ sed Ashypelt; ‘you looks very cold, you’re nuthin’ but bones.’

But ’ee gave Ashypelt no answer. So Ashypelt comes up to ’im, to pull ’im out up to the fire, an’ ’ee ’appened to give ’im a bit of a touch round the neck—somewhere under the jaw, I think it was—as ’ee wouldn’t come for ’im. This fellow tumbled all into pieces, in small bits o’ pieces about ’alf an inch, tumbled all into pieces when Ashypelt ’it ’im.

‘Now, Ashypelt,’ sez one of ’em, ‘if you don’t put that fellow up agen as you fun’ ’im, we’ll devour you alive.’

Poor Ashypelt got fixing one little bone on top of another, an’ one little bone on top of another, but ’ee got tumblin’ them down as quick as ’ee was fixing them very near. Well, ’ee fixed an’ fixed at last tel it come very near one o’clock that ’ee was bein’ with ’im, but ’ee got ’em together agen. So away they all goes just about two o’clock an’ leaves ’im; an’ when ’ee come to look for the ’bacca, every morsel ’ad gone, ’ee never ’ad one pipeful.

‘Well,’ ’ee sez, ‘they’re a greedy lot o’ fellows, them is,’ ’ee sez. ‘They served me worse agen to-night,’ ’ee sez. So ’ee comes an’ sits ’imself down completely by ’is own fire agen.

Next morning at the hour o’ six o’clock the master comes for ’im agen. ‘Are you alive, Ashypelt?’ ’ee sez.

‘Oh! yes,’ ’ee sez, ‘I’m alive.’

He sez, ‘Did you ’ear anythin’ last night?’

‘Yes,’ sez Ashypelt, ‘there come a lot o’ greedy fellows ’ere, an’ smoked all my ’bacca an’ cracked all my nuts off me.’

So ’ee sez, ‘Come on down, Ashypelt, an’ ’ave your breakfast.’ ’Ee takes ’im to the new ’ouse to ’ave ’is breakfast. But after ’ee’d ’ad ’is breakfast, ‘Now, Ashypelt,’ ’ee sez, ‘I will give you another fifty to stop another night.’

Well, poor Ashypelt, never ’avin’ no money, ’ee sed, Yes, ’ee would do it. Well, ’ee took ’im, as usual, up an’ down the garden agen next day with ’im, taking ’im up an’ down the garden tel eleven o’clock come the next night.

‘So now, Ashypelt, my boy, it’s time for me to take you up to your room,’ ’ee sez. ‘I’ll give you a little extra ’bacca to-night. I’ll give you a pound, an’ a bigger bag o’ nuts—altogether it might be a gohanna [guano] bag o’ nuts—an’ a pound o’ ’bacca.’

So ’ee fastened ’em into the room before Ashypelt comes, an’ ’ee leaves ’im sittin’ ’down comfortable to ’isself ’avin’ a bit o’ a smoke o’ ’is ’bacca. But ’ee ’eard one o’ the terriblest noises ’ee ever ’eard in ’is life shoutin’ blue wilful murders, but ’ee couldn’t see nuthin’. This was at the hour o’ twelve. Bangin’ one of ’is doors wide open, in comes a man to ’im with ’is throat cut from ’ere to there. Ashypelt axed ’im to come an’ ’ave a pipe o’ ’bacca, an’ to ’ave a warm. Well, poor Ashypelt never seein’ nuthin’, ’ee wasn’t frightened a bit.

So the man sez to ’im, ‘Now, Ashypelt, my boy, I see you are not frightened. Come with me, an’ I’ll show you where I lies. My brother ’as killed me—it’s my brother what gives you this money to stop ’ere. You come with me, Ashypelt, down these steps.’

He took ’im down steps, down steps, down steps. Ashypelt axed ’im ’ow much further ’ee ’ad to go, an’ it ’ad been very dark goin’ down these steps. Ashypelt couldn’t see ’is way, but when ’ee got to the bottom there was a very fine light.

‘Now, Ashypelt,’ ’ee sez, ‘come with me,’ ’ee sez. ‘I’m that man as you struck in the room an’ knocked all to pieces. Now, Ashypelt, I’ll make you a gentleman for life if you’ll do one thing for me. Come along o’ me,’ ’ee sez to Ashypelt. Then ’ee sez, ‘Lift up that flag,’ ’ee sez.

‘No, sir,’ sez Ashypelt, ‘I can’t lift it up,’ ’ee sez to ’im; ‘but lift it you.’

‘Put your ’and down to it, an’ try to lift it up,’ ’ee sed.

Ashypelt done what ’ee told ’im, puttin’ ’is ’and down to lift the flag, an’ he draws the flag up. What was under that but a big pot o’ gold spade-ace guineas an’ that.

So ’ee sez, ‘Come along o’ me, Ashypelt,’ ’ee sez, ‘on further,’ ’ee sez. ’Ee sez, ‘Rise that flag up, Ashypelt.’

Ashypelt doin’ so, ’ee told ’im to rise one flag up, ’ee sez, ‘Rise the other one, Ashypelt, next to it.’

Ashypelt rises the other one, an’ there this ’ere skeleton was lyin’ in the coffin. That’s where ’ee was buried; ’is brother buried ’im there into the coffin. This was the older brother tel what the one was that was alive, that was dead. But they got fallin’ out which would ’ave the castle. The next brother killed the old one, an’ buried ’im there.

‘Now,’ sez this man with his throat cut from ’ere to there, ‘Ashypelt, I want you to do me a favourite, an’,’ ’ee sez, ‘you’ll never be troubled no more. You can sleep in that room all your lifetime,’ ’ee sez, ‘nuthin’ will ever trouble you no more. Now, in the mornin’,’ ’ee sez, ‘when my brother comes for you, ’ee ’ll ax you what sort o’ night’s rest you ’ad. So you say, “All right, only they smoked all my ’bacca an’ cracked all my nuts agen.” An’ the first town you get to, Ashypelt, an’ you leaves here, you make a report as ’ee’s killed ’is own brother; an’ when they calls for witnesses, Ashypelt, I’ll repear into the hall with my throat cut from ’ere to there. You can come back, Ashypelt, an’ take the castle, ’cause there’s nobody takes the castle barrin’ me an’ my brother.’

So Ashypelt goes to the next town as ’ee could meet with, an’ ’ee goes an’ makes a ’larm to a magistrate; an’ the magistrate sent some pleecemen with ’im, back to fetch this gentleman, an’ Ashypelt goes with ’em.

‘Hello!’ sez ’ee to Ashypelt, ‘what brings you back ’ere?’ ’ee sed.

So the pleeceman got close to this man. ‘For you,’ ’ee sez, an’ catches ’out of ’im, ‘They are come back for you, for killin’ yourn brother,’ takin’ ’im off back to the town agen, an’ Ashypelt along with ’im, takin’ ’im an’ tryin’ ’im. When they were tryin’ ’im, at the hour o’ twelve the magistrate cries out for witnesses, an’ the man repears with ’is throat cut from ’ere to there, just as they cried out for witnesses. ’Is brother got life—twenty years; an’ ’ee died shortly after ’ee got life. ’Ee broke ’is ’eart.

Well, Ashypelt goes back to the castle an’ lives there, an’ got a servant or two with ’im into the castle. One day ’ee bethought ’isself about ’is brothers where ’ee ’ad to meet them. ’Ee gets a pair of ’orses and a carriage, an’ ’ee buys eleven suits o’ clo’es, thinkin’ upon ’is poor brothers. So ’ee drives ahead until ’ee comes to these twelve roads, where ’ee ’ad to meet ’em twelve months an’ a day. So ’ee was drivin’ up to these ’ere twelve roads, an’ there they was all lyin’ down.

‘Hello! my men,’ ’ee sez, ‘what are you men all lyin’ down for?’ (Ashypelt bein’ dressed up, lookin’ gentleman, they didn’t know ’im.)

‘We’re waitin’ for a brother of ours by the name o’ Ashypelt,’ they sed.

‘Would you know ’im if you would see ’im?’ ’ee sed.

‘Oh! yes, we would know ’im very well. Twelve months an’ a day we ’ad to meet on these roads.’

So ’ee sez to ’em, ‘I’m your brother Ashypelt,’ ’ee sed to the one.

So they looks at ’im.

‘If you’re our brother Ashypelt, show your arm; you ’ave a mark on it what we know to.’

So they looks at this mark.

‘Oh! it is my brother Ashypelt,’ they sez, blessin’ ’im an’ kissin’ ’im an’ slobberin’, an’ so on.

So ’ee gives ’em a suit o’ clo’es apiece, these eleven brothers, to put on.

‘Now,’ ’ee sez, ‘I think we’ll go back an’ see the old ’ooman an’ the old man, how they are gettin’ on, from ’ere,’ sez Ashypelt to ’is brothers. ‘An’ when we get nigh ’ome, you eleven brothers stop behind, an’ I’ll drive up to the little farm, an’ ax the old lady what came of her eleven sons what she ’ad.’

So poor Ashypelt drives up to the ’ouse.

‘Hello! my old lady,’ ’ee sez, ‘what’s come of all the eleven sons as you ’ad?’

‘Oh!’ sez ’er, ‘they all went off for soldiers.’

So ’ee calls ’is eleven brothers up, an’ ’ee sez, ‘Didn’t you try to burn my eleven brothers in that barn,’ ’ee sez, ‘when you set the barn alight, an’ told ’em as the pressgang o’ soldiers was after ’em?’

So she sez, ‘No—true—no,’ she sed.

I tell you, sir, they give me a shilling for telling you that lie.

The name Ashypelt (Scottish Ashypet, Irish Ashiepelt, etc.; cf.
Engl. Dialect Dict., pp. 80, 81) must be of Teutonic origin—akin to
the familiar High German Aschenbrödel (‘Cinderella’) and the Norse
Askepot (‘Boots’). The form coming nearest to it is also the oldest
known to me: the mystic, Johann Tauler (c. 1300–61), says, in the
Medulla Animæ, ‘I thy stable-boy and poor Aschenbaltz.’ See Grimm’s
Household Tales, i. 366–7. In another story told by Cornelius
Price, ‘The Black Dog of the Wild Forest,’ the hero is hidden by an
old witch in the ash-hole under the fire. In the Polish-Gypsy tale
of ‘A Foolish Brother and a Wonderful Bush’ (No. 45), that brother
crouches over his stove; in Dasent’s Tales from the Norse, Boots
sits all his life in the ashes (pp. 90, 232, 382); in Ralston’s
story ‘Ivan Popyalof’ (p. 66), from the Chernigof government, the
third brother, a simpleton, ‘for twelve whole years lay among the
ashes from the stove, but then he arose and shook himself, so that
six poods of ashes fell off from him’; and in Léger’s Bohemian
story (Contes Slaves, p. 130) of ‘La Montre Enchantée,’ which is a
variant of our No. 54, the third brother, a fool, does nothing but
begrime himself with the cinders from the stove. The idea, then,
extends beyond the Teutonic area; but how the name Ashypelt has
found its way to South Wales is past my telling.

Compare Grimm’s No. 4 (i. 11), ‘The Story of the Youth who went
forth to learn what Fear was,’ with the variants on pp. 342–347;
also a fragment from Calver, Derbyshire, ‘The Boy who Feared
Nothing,’ in Addy’s Household Tales. From a London tinker Campbell
of Islay got a story of a cutler and a tinker who ‘travel together,
and sleep in an empty haunted house for a reward. They are beset by
ghosts and spirits of murdered ladies and gentlemen, and the
inferior, the tinker, shows most courage, and is the hero. “He went
into the cellar to draw beer, and there he found a little chap
a-sittin’ on a barrel with a red cap on ’is ’ed; and sez he, sez
he, ‘Buzz.’ ‘Wot’s Buzz?’ sez the tinker. ‘Never you mind wot’s
buzz,’ sez he. ‘That’s mine; don’t you go for to touch it,’” etc.,
etc., etc.’ (Tales of the West Highlands, vol. i. p. xlvii.). And
in vol. ii. p. 276, Campbell gives a Gaelic story, ‘The Tale of the
Soldier’ (our No. 74), which was told by a tinker.

NO. 58.—TWOPENCE-HALFPENNY

There were three brothers. The three were going on the road to seek for work. Night came upon them. They knew not where to go to get lodgings: it was night. They were travelling through a wood on an old road. They saw a small light, and they came to a cottage. They were hungry and tired. The door was open. They saw a table with food upon it.

Said the eldest brother, ‘Go you in.’

‘I am not going in; go in yourself.’

‘Not I, indeed.’

‘You are two fools,’ said Jack. And in he went, and sat down at the table, and ate his bellyful. The other two watched him. They were afraid to enter the house. At last the other two went in, and sat down and ate.

Now a little old woman comes. Said the old woman, ‘I have seen no man here for many years. Whence came ye hither?’

‘We are seeking for work.’

‘I will find work for you to-morrow.’

They went to bed. Up they rose in the morning. And there was a great pot on the fire, and porridge and milk. That was the food they ate. Now the old woman tells the eldest brother to go into the barn to get the tools, and to go into the wood to fell the trees. He took off his coat. There he is doing the work. There came an old dwarf, and asked him who told him to fell the wood. He could not see this little man, so small was he. He looked under his feet; he saw him in the stubble. The old dwarf hit him and beat him, until he bled, and there he left him. Now the maid comes with his dinner. The girl went home and told the two other brothers to come and carry him home and put him to bed.

In the morning the second brother goes to the wood. The eldest brother told him it was a little man who beat him, and the second brother laughed at him. He went off now down to the woods. Here is something that asks him who told him to fell the trees. He looked around him; he could see nothing. At last he saw him in the stubble. ‘Be off,’ said he. The little stranger knocked him to pieces. The little maid came down to him with his dinner, and went home and told the two brothers to come and carry him home. The two brothers went down and brought him home.

Jack laughed at them: ‘I am going down to-morrow myself.’

In the morning he went down to the wood. Here he is felling the trees. He heard something. He looked beneath his feet. He saw the little man in the stubble. Jack kicked him.

‘You had better keep quiet,’ said the little man.

The dwarf hit him. Down went Jack, and the dwarf half-killed him. There was Jack lying there now. The maid came with his dinner. Home went the maid, and told the two brothers to come and carry him home.

‘No,’ said Jack, ‘leave me here and go.’

The two brothers went home. Jack was watching him, and the little man crept under a great stone. Up got Jack now, and home he went, and told his two brothers to go into the stable and get out four horses. They took a strong rope, and the three went with the horses and fastened the rope round the stone. They took the horses, and pulled it up, and found a well there.

‘Go you down,’ said one.

‘Not I,’ said the other; ‘I am not going down.’

‘I will go down,’ says Jack. ‘Fasten this rope and let me down, and when you hear me say “Pull up,” pull me up; and when I say “Let go,” let me go.’

Now the two brothers fastened him and let him down. Down he went a very little way. The little man beat him. ‘Pull me up.’ He goes down again. He forgets the word: ‘Let me down.’ He came into a beautiful country, and there he saw the old dwarf. The old dwarf spoke to him: ‘Since you have come into this country, Jack, I will tell you something now.’ The old man tells Jack what he is to do. ‘You will find three castles. In the first one lives a giant with two heads, and,’ said the old dwarf, ‘you must fight him. Take the old rusty sword. I will be there with you.’

‘I am afraid of him.’

‘Go on, and have no fear. I will be there with you.’

Here is Jack at the castle now. He knocked at the door. The servant-maid came, and he asked for her master.

‘He is at home. Do you wish to see him?’

‘Yes,’ said Jack, ‘I want to fight with him.’

The maid went and told him to come out.

‘Are you wanting something to eat?’

‘No,’ said Jack, ‘come out, and I will fight with you.’

‘Come here and choose your sword.’ (Jack chose the old rusty sword.) ‘Why do you take that old rusty sword? Take a bright one.’

‘Not I. This one will do for me.’

The twain went out before the door. Off went one head.

‘Spare my life, Jack. I will give you all my money.’

‘No.’

He struck off the other head; he killed him. (Now this was the Copper Castle: so they called it.)

Now Jack goes on to the next, the Silver Castle. A giant with three heads lived there. Jack chose the rusty sword, and struck two heads off.

‘Don’t kill me, Jack; let me live. I will give you the keys of my castle.’

‘Not I,’ said Jack; and off went the other head.

Now Jack goes on to the next, the Golden Castle. And there was a giant with four heads.

‘Have you come here to fight with me?’

‘Yes,’ says Jack.

The giant told him to choose a sword, and he chose the old rusty sword; and out they went Jack struck off three heads.

‘Don’t kill me, Jack. I will give you my keys.’

‘Yes, I will,’ said Jack; and off went the other head.

Now all the castles, and the money and the three fair ladies in the three castles, were his. Off Jack goes now and the lady with him. He goes back to the Silver Castle, and takes that lady. He goes to the Copper Castle, and takes that lady. And the four went on and came to the place where Jack descended. The old dwarf was there waiting for him. Jack sent the three ladies up to his brothers. Now the old dwarf wanted meat. Jack went back to the castle, and cooked some meat for him. The old dwarf carried Jack up a bit; the old dwarf stopped; he wanted meat. Jack gave him meat. He went up a bit further; he stopped; he wanted meat. Jack gave him meat. He went up a bit higher. He wanted meat. Jack had none. Now he was a very little way from the surface. He knew not what to do. He drew his knife from his pocket, and cut a little meat off his leg, and gave it to the old dwarf. Up went Jack.

Two of the ladies and his two brothers had gone off. And the eldest brother had taken the fairest lady; and the second brother had taken the other lady; and they had left the ugly lady for Jack. Jack asked her where they had gone. The lady told him; and he hastened after them. He caught them by the church: they were going to be married. The fairest lady looked back, and saw Jack.

‘That one’s mine,’ said Jack.

Jack took and married her. He left the other lady for his eldest brother to marry. There was only the second brother now, and he took the ugly lady. There are the three brothers and the three ladies.

Now they want to go down to the three castles. Jack told the old dwarf to carry them down.

‘I will carry you down; you must give me food as I come down.’

‘Yes,’ said Jack, ‘I will give you plenty of food.’

‘I will take you down.’

He carried them all down. And the old dwarf went along with Jack. Jack put one brother and one lady in the Copper Castle, and the other brother in the Silver Castle; and Jack went to the Golden Castle. And Jack kept the old dwarf all his days. The old dwarf died, and at last Jack grew old himself.

There! you’ve done me.

A most interesting variant of our No. 20, the Bukowina-Gypsy story
of ‘Mare’s Son,’ and so of Grimm’s ‘Strong Hans’ and Cosquin’s
‘Jean de l’Ours.’ In one respect it is more perfect than ‘Mare’s
Son,’ that during the upward flight the hero cuts a piece out of
his leg, which piece by rights the dwarf should have kept and
restored (cf. p. 79). It is, however, contrary to every canon of
the story-teller’s art for the dwarf to prove helpful to the hero;
and the brother’s treachery, in cutting the rope, is omitted. For
the castles of copper, silver, and gold see pp. 233–4. One is left
rather sorry for the ugly lady.

NO. 59.—THE OLD SMITH [134]

An old smith lived on a hill with his wife and mother-in-law. He could only make ploughshares. A boy comes, and wants his horse shod. The smith could not do it. The boy cuts the horse’s legs off, stops the blood, and puts the legs on the fire, beats them on the anvil, and replaces them on the horse. He gives the smith a guinea, and goes away. The smith tries this with his mother-in-law’s horse, but bungles it: the horse bleeds to death, and its legs are burnt to ashes. The boy comes again with two old women. ‘I want you to make them young again.’ The smith couldn’t. The boy puts them on the fire, beats them on the anvil, and rejuvenates them. The smith tries it with his wife and mother-in-law, but burns them to ashes. He leaves his forge, and sets off in the snow and wind. The barefooted boy follows him. The smith wants to send him off. The boy tells him of a sick king in the next town, whom they will cure, the boy acting as the smith’s servant. The butler admits them, and gives them plenty to eat and drink. The smith forgets all about the sick king, but the boy reminds him. They go up. The boy asks for a knife, pot, water, and spoon. He cuts the king’s head off, and spits on his hand to stop the blood. He puts the head in the pot, boils it, lifts it out with the golden spoon, and replaces it on the king, who is cured. The king gives them a sack of gold. They take the road again.

‘All I want,’ says Barefoot, ‘is a pair of shoes.’

‘I’ve little enough for myself,’ says the smith.

The boy leaves him, and the smith goes on alone. Hearing of another sick king, he goes to cure him, but takes too much to drink, and boils his head all to ribbons, and lets him bleed to death. A knock comes to the door. The smith, frightened, refuses admittance.

‘Won’t you open to little Barefoot?’

The boy enters, and with much difficulty gets the head on again. The king is cured, and gives them two sacks of gold. The boy asks for shoes and gets them. The boy tells the smith of a gentleman who has a wizard, [135] whom none can beat: ‘Let’s go there. Three sacks of gold to any one who beats him.’ They enter. There was a bellows. The wizard blows, and blows up half the sea; the boy blows up a fish that drinks up all the wizard’s water. The wizard blows up corn as it were rain; the boy blows up birds that eat the corn. The wizard blows up hundreds of rabbits; the boy blows up greyhounds that catch the rabbits. So they win the three sacks of gold. The smith hardly knows what to do with all his money. He builds a village and three taverns, and spends his time loafing round. An old woman comes and begs a night’s lodging. He gives it her. She gives him three wishes. He wishes that whoever takes his hammer in his hand can’t put it down again, that whoever sits on his chair can’t get up again, and that whoever gets in his pocket can’t get out again. One day, when money had run low, a man comes to the smith and asks will he sell himself. The smith sells himself for a bag of gold, the time to be up in five years. After five years the man returns. The smith gives him his hammer to hold, and goes off to his tavern. From inn to inn the man follows him, and, finding him in the third inn, gives him five more years’ freedom. The same thing happens with the chair; and the smith gets five more years from the old man (now called Beng, devil). The third time the devil finds the smith in one of his taverns. The smith explains that he has called for drinks, and asks the devil to change himself into a sovereign in his (the smith’s) pocket to pay for them. The devil does so. The smith returns home, and goes to bed. At night he hears a great uproar in his trousers’ pocket, gets up, puts them on the anvil, and hammers. The devil promises never to meddle with him in future if he will release him. The smith lets him go. Afterwards the smith dies, and goes to the devil’s door and knocks. An imp of Satan comes out.

‘Tell your father the smith is here.’

The little devil went and told his father.

‘He will kill us all,’ said the devil, ‘if we let him in. Here, take this wisp of straw, and light him upstairs to God.’

The little devil did so. The smith went to heaven. There he sat and played the harp. And there we shall all see him one day unless we go to the devil instead.

Cf. Ralston’s ‘The Smith and the Demon,’ p. 57, and ‘The Pope with
the Greedy Eyes,’ p. 351; Dasent’s ‘The Master-Smith’ (Tales from
the Norse, p. 106); Clouston, ii. 409; a curious Nigger version
from Virginia, ‘De New Han’,’ plainly derived from a European
source, which I published in the Athenæum for 20th August 1887, p.
215, and give here as an appendix; Reinhold Köhler’s essay, ‘Sanct
Petrus, der Himmelspförtner’ (Aufsätze über Märchen und
Volkslieder, pp. 48–78); ‘L’Anneau de Bronze’ in Carnoy and
Nicolaides’ Traditions Populaires de l’Asie Mineure, p. 62; and
Grimm’s ‘Brother Lustig,’ No. 81 (i. 312, 440). With the last
compare this sketch of a story, which M. Paul Bataillard got from
Catalonian Gypsies encamped near Paris in 1869, and which very
closely resembles one of the Cento Novelle Antiche, summarised by
Crane (Italian Popular Tales, p. 360).

St. Peter travels with Christ as his servant, and they are often hard put to it for a livelihood. Christ sends St. Peter to find a sheep, and, bidding him cook it, goes to heal a sick person, who rewards him richly. Peter eats the sheep’s liver and kidneys, and Christ, when he comes back, asks where the liver and kidneys are, ‘for Jesus, who is God, knows everything.’ Peter replying that the sheep had none, at the end of their meal Christ divides into three heaps the large sum received from the farmer whom he has healed. ‘For whom are these three heaps?’ asks Peter. ‘The two first for each of us,’ Christ answers, ‘and the third for him who ate the liver and kidneys.’ ‘That was me,’ says Peter. ‘Very well,’ Christ answers, ‘take my share as well. I return to my own.’ And then it is that Christ takes the cross, etc. ‘You see,’ the narrator ended, ‘that it was God Jesus who at the beginning of the world founded all the estates of men—first doctors, for he healed for money—and who taught the Gypsies to beg and to go barefoot, whilst St. Peter instructed them how to deceive their like.’