The Turnip Princess and Other Newly Discovered Fairy Tales (Penguin Classics)

by Franz Xaver von Schonwerth

  “I have an idea,” Oferla said. “We’ll let the teacher know that the pork was stolen.” She turned to the pastor and added: “Then you can tell him that you’re planning a trip and are worried about leaving your valuables at home. After all, they might be stolen, like the pork. And so you’re hoping to leave some things with him. Then I’ll climb into the big trunk over there. We’ll put some bread in there so that I won’t get hungry, and then you can take the locked trunk, with me in it, over to the teacher. That’s how I’ll find out whether they’re cooking pork. You can pick me up in the evening—just tell him that you didn’t manage to get away.”

  The pastor found the idea appealing. He took out the trunk, and Oferla climbed into it, taking a couple of loaves of bread with her. The pastor then carried the trunk over to the teacher named Fink and asked if he would hold on to the chest full of valuable items. The teacher was happy to help out, and they put the trunk, with Oferla and her two loaves of bread in it, into a corner.

  At noon, the teacher’s children shouted: “Father, give us some of the pastor’s pork. We want more of it!”

  When Oferla heard those words, she could not keep quiet and shouted: “You’re the pork thief after all! Now that we know, we’ll have you locked up!”

  Everyone was terrified when they heard Oferla’s words. The teacher lifted the lid of the trunk and saw her in there. He was in such a panic that he strangled her to death and stuck some bread in her mouth. Then he shut the lid of the trunk. That evening the pastor returned and said that he wanted to bring the trunk back home. He had decided not to take the trip after all. The teacher helped him carry it home and went back to his house.

  When the pastor lifted the lid, what do you think he saw? The corpse of his mother! The cook shouted: “God has punished us! We were wrong to suspect the teacher, and now she’s suffocated. What are we going to do? People will think that we killed her for her money. We have to get her out of here! Run over to the teacher, and he can help us figure out what to do!” The teacher happened to be strolling by, just as if by chance. The pastor confessed everything and begged him to get rid of Oferla’s body so that no one would suspect him of anything. He gave him a reward of two hundred kreuzers.

  Fink took the money as well as the corpse, along with a pitcher that Oferla had used for beer. He went over to the inn, climbed the stairs, and leaned the corpse against the doorframe. Then he put the pitcher in Oferla’s hand, rang the bell, and hid.

  Every Sunday Oferla would go to the inn to buy beer. When the bell rang, the girl who worked at the inn opened the door and took the pitcher from Oferla as usual and went to fill it. When she turned around, the woman had fallen down the stairs. The girl wanted to help her get up, but then she realized that Oferla was dead and thought it was all her fault. “Run over to the teacher’s house,” the innkeeper said, “and confess everything to him! Let’s hope that he can come over and help us find a way out of this fix. If not, we’ll end up in jail. Tell him we’ll pay him three hundred kreuzers to help us out.”

  The girl went over to the teacher’s house and told him the whole story. He went over to the inn, collected his three hundred kreuzers, and told the innkeeper not to worry and that he should not say a word about what happened. The teacher would keep quiet too.

  A grumpy old farmer, whose harvest had been stolen more than once, lived in the neighborhood. The teacher carried Oferla’s corpse, along with her basket, to his field and put them down near a furrow, with Oferla bending down over the plants. When the farmer went out to work in the morning, he saw Oferla right there in his field next to her basket. He picked up a big stick, made his way over to the thief, and hit her as hard as she could until she fell over. “Oh my dear God,” he said. “What have I done? That’s just Oferla. She would never have stolen from me. She was probably just picking a few leaves for her pet rabbit. What should I do? If anyone finds out, I will end up in jail.”

  The farmer went over to talk with the teacher, spilled the beans, and promised to give him one hundred kreuzers if he could remove Oferla from his property. Then no one would suspect anything. The teacher took the hundred kreuzers, put the corpse into a sack, and carried it out into the woods that evening.

  Now it was completely dark, and the teacher heard some noise. It turned out that three brothers were there, all robbers, and they were returning from a job with three sacks of smoked meat. The teacher hid behind a tree, and when they passed by, he shouted: “Stop right there, you scoundrels!” The thieves were terrified, dropped their sacks, and ran off. The teacher replaced one of the sacks with the one containing the dead woman and returned home. He now had six hundred kreuzers and a sack filled with meat and could live high on the hog.

  When the thieves returned, they found their sacks, picked them up, and returned home. Their mother emptied the sacks and took out the meat. When she opened the third one and pulled out Oferla’s hair, she said: “Looks like you brought home some flax.”

  “Oh, no,” they said. “It’s just meat.” She turned the sack inside out, and to her surprise the corpse of an old woman fell to the ground. They buried her as quickly as possible and no one was the wiser. Then they devoured with gusto the meat they had stolen.

  PART VI

  TALES ABOUT NATURE

  SIR WIND AND HIS WIFE

  The wind and his wife were both present at the creation of the world. The two were overweight, and on top of that, Sir Wind had a long beard that wrapped around his body three times. Still, both were able to pass easily through a mere crack in a wall, or any opening at all, for that matter.

  There once lived a count who detested the wind and was forever speaking ill of it. One day he was passing through the forest on his lands when he met a woman of some heft. The count asked: “Who are you, where are you from, where are you heading, and why are you so fat?”

  The woman replied: “I am known as Madame Wind, and I know that you don’t like me.”

  “Where is your husband?” the nobleman asked.

  “You will see him in a moment!” she replied. And Madame Wind began to blow and carried the count to a glass mountain, where she set him down to wait. Then she slipped into a crack in the mountain. Before long a man of huge girth appeared. His beard was wrapped three times around his gigantic body. “You may have guessed that I’m Sir Wind, the man you’ve scorned for so long.” And he beat the count with a whip. All at once the count turned to stone, and although he had become a statue, he could still see and hear everything that was going on in the glass mountain. Every day more people were turned to stone, and he learned, to his dismay, that in ten years all the nobles would be roasted and the common folk would be boiled.

  Two years went by, and the count was aching to see his faithful wife. He was sure that she would be able to free him. Before long, a strange bird appeared, one he had never before seen. It landed on his head and dropped a ring—his wife’s wedding ring—along with a little note, to the ground. Just then, the count returned to his human form. He read the note, and it instructed him to follow the bird wherever it might fly.

  The bird flew straight ahead, and the count followed it. He reached a castle that was in flames. The bird flew right into the fire, but the count did not dare follow and stayed outside. After a while a prince in full regalia came out of the castle, took the count by the hand, and led him through the flames into a splendid hall filled with statues. The bird said: “I lifted the curse that had you under the spell of the wind. Otherwise you would have suffered the fate of all those statues made of stone, still waiting at the glass mountain. I was also turned to stone, but the flames liberated me. Take a look at this figure made of stone.” And the bird pointed to a statue. “He was once a king, and now the bird that is the spirit of water will free him.” As soon as he spoke those words, another bird flew into the hall with a little note in its beak and landed on the statue’s head. Suddenly the statue came to life: It was the kin
g. On the note were written words declaring that each of the three—the count, the prince, and the king—could make a wish that would correspond to the size of the pieces in which they tore the note. The count wanted to be as fat as possible, the prince as wide as possible, and the king as tall as possible, so tall that he would be able to touch the stars.

  The prince, who had the sharpest vision, led the trio out of the castle by way of an underground tunnel. Scores of armed figures were lined up at the glass castle, with Sir Wind right up front, and his wife holding up the rear. When the prince looked up, he saw legions of armed birds in the sky. The king made himself as tall as he could, and as soon as he pulled the birds down to earth, the other two slew them.

  Sir Wind left the glass mountain with his army and began menacing his three adversaries. Once the clock struck eleven, he would have power over them. The count made himself as fat as possible, opened his mouth wide, and Sir Wind and Madame Wind moved in. “Close your mouth!” the prince shouted, and the count swallowed them both up. They landed in his stomach, which began to ache painfully. The count spit the heavy weight of the two into the sea, and Sir Wind and Madame Wind sank deep down into the waters.

  Ever since then the seas have been restless, and the wind blows from the direction of the ocean.

  THE ICE GIANTS

  Once there was a woman with three daughters, and they had nothing to eat. The woman left home and was planning to end her misery by drowning herself. But a voice called out to her: “Stop what you’re doing and go over to the mountains. Your luck will turn!” The message was repeated twice, and so the good woman walked toward the mountains.

  Once she had made her way across the mountains, she saw a man standing at the door of his house. She asked for alms and received them, along with the promise that her misery would be at an end once she returned home. As she made her way back, night fell, and she lost her way. In the morning, she discovered that she was near a body of water that had frozen, a sea of ice. Three giants were gathered there, wearing hats made of gold and playing with golden apples. All at once a blast of cold air sent the protective hats in the direction of the woman, and all three hats landed at her feet. The giants offered her their golden apples in return for the hats, for they were not able to leave the frozen expanse and go on land. The woman was more than happy to oblige, and she returned home with three golden apples. She sold the apples along with the silver leaves on their stems, but she kept the stems themselves. If she wanted to make a wish, all she had to do was knock three times with the stem, and any wish would be granted.

  The woman grew rich and lived in peace, until her daughters came of age and were ready to marry. She left home in search of the man who had given her the alms. She offered him her eldest daughter in marriage, along with one of the stems from the apples as a dowry. One stem was not enough for the man, and so she returned home to fetch a second one. Once again she passed the sea of ice. The three giants were waiting for her. They wanted her daughters to become their wives, and they offered seven golden apples in the bargain. The woman found this offer much more appealing than the exchange with the man. She traveled with her daughters to the giants. The giants welcomed them into their underground palaces, and they all lived happily together. The children all became, like their fathers, ice giants.

  WHY SNOW IS WHITE

  After God had finished creating the meadows and giving plants and flowers all their beautiful colors, he turned to the snow on the ground and said: “You can choose whatever color you want. You end up covering everything up anyway.”

  The snow looked at the grass and said: “Give me your green color!” It went to the roses, to the violets, and to the sunflowers, for it was vain and wanted to have a beautiful skirt. But the grass and the flowers made fun of the snow and gave it the cold shoulder.

  The snow turned to the flowers known as snowdrops and said in despair: “If no one is willing to give me a color, then I will be like the moon—always upset that no one can see it.”

  The little flower replied: “If you like my shabby little coat, you can have it.” The snow took it, and from then on it was always white, and it became the enemy of all other flowers.

  THE SUN TAKES AN OATH

  The Sun and the Moon are man and wife. When they married, the Moon, who had a reputation for being cold and dull, was not passionate enough for his ardent wife. He liked to take naps.

  The exasperated Sun proposed a wager: “Whoever wakes up first will have the right to shine during the day, and the lazy one will have the night. If we both wake up at the same time, we can shine next to each other in the skies.” The naive Moon had a good laugh. He agreed to the deal because he was convinced that he could not possibly lose. With a smile on his face, he fell asleep. And from that day on, he kept his smile.

  The Sun was so upset that she could not sleep for long. By two in the morning she was already awake and lighting up the world, and then she woke up the frosty Moon. She boasted about her victory and reminded him that, as his punishment, the two would never be able to spend a night together again. That’s why she had proposed the wager, and she strengthened the result with a vow that she was bound to the terms and would not back down. Since then the Moon shines at night, and the Sun by day.

  After a while, the Sun began to regret the vow she had taken in anger, for she was in love with the Moon. And the Moon likewise felt drawn to his wife and had imagined the entire wager a mere joke. His iciness had been playful rather than serious. Now the two were hoping to reunite. They started moving closer to each other, and from time to time, they met, at moments that we call solar eclipses. But then they began to quarrel again, each blaming the other for their separation. They were unable to smooth over their differences.

  The time remaining for a reconciliation began to run out, and soon the Sun had to begin her journey, as she had sworn she would do. She was red-hot with rage as she went her way. If they had not fought again, they would be together now. A long time passed before her anger died down. During one period of complete darkness, they must have met again.

  And so the Sun always appears in a state of heated, passionate resentment. But sometimes, when she is moving along, she sees how wrong she was and weeps bloody tears and goes down in fiery flames.

  The Moon is equally sad and distressed that he cannot meet the Sun. For that reason he keeps shrinking until all that is left of him is a small crescent. He then begins to grow with the hope of meeting the Sun again, but once he is restored to full size, he realizes that he must be wrong and begins to wane once again. He has become melancholy from his unhappiness in love. And that’s why his light is so dim and soft. It’s also why unhappy lovers send their laments up to the Moon.

  THE SUN’S SHADOW

  After the Sun and the Moon were created, Death ruled the world. Once the two celestial bodies grew up, they drove Death underground and into a corner, and it, in turn, killed off everything created by the Sun and Moon.

  The three began quarreling so violently that all things created nearly perished in a flood.

  The Titans decided to hold a meeting and sat down on some stone benches they had gathered together in the mountains. They were unable to come to any decisions, until a white weasel crawled out from a crevice and began licking their eyes. They decided to take the side of Death. Death refused to give them the final word on the matter, for as a man he was able to rule over the Sun in any case, since she was a woman. Quarrels broke out again, but with such passion that the Titans tore all of Death’s clothes from his stout body. The Sun took pity on Death and threw a dark cape over him so that he could cover himself and hide from the Titans.

  Since that day, Death wears a cape from the Sun, and the Sun throws dark shadows.

  WHAT THE MOON TRIED TO WEAR

  One evening the Moon was traveling alongside a tailor on a cold winter night. Every once in a while the Moon chatted with the tailor and said: “I’m so cold that my he
art is about to break into pieces.”

  The tailor laughed and said: “I don’t feel a thing, because my fur coat is protecting me. Have one made up for you!”

  “I’ve been dying to do just that,” the Moon replied. “And I’ll give you a huge reward if you can manage to have one made for me.”

  A few days went by, and the tailor appeared with a coat for the Moon to try on. It was just a bit too small and the Moon said: “I can’t wear it unless you let it out.” The tailor left and returned a week later, but this time the Moon could not even manage to slip on the coat. The tailor was furious and said: “I’ve never seen anyone as fat as you are.” The tailor took the coat back, and he let it out even more. He returned to the Moon and said: “Here’s your coat, and it is going to fit you perfectly!” The Moon put on the coat, but now it was way too large. The tailor threw a fit, took the coat, and tossed it to the ground, right at the Moon’s feet. “Go find yourself a tailor up in heaven!” he said, and then he disappeared.

  THE SINGING TREE

  A carefree young tailor was making his way through the woods one day when he heard a sweet melody in the air. He had to search for a long time before he tracked the sound to a tree growing on a patch of green grass. Fascinated and unable to stop himself, he took a needle from his pocket and poked it into the trunk of the tree. He was determined to figure out how music could come from that tree. Presto! The needle turned into a key lodged right in the bark. The tree opened up like a door, swallowed the tailor, and pushed him right down its gullet.

  The tailor was out cold for a while. When he came to his senses, he was lying in a room filled with thousands of sharp needles glittering like frost and crystal. He rolled himself into a ball to keep from getting scratched or stabbed. He was about to burst into tears when it suddenly occurred to him to take his scissors and make a hole in the wall. He slipped through the wall and reached another opening in the tree, and there he found thousands of scissors, making a din, dancing up and down.