Czech Folk Tales

“You must take this ring to the Princess Anne, master,” said he.

“So I will,” said the goldsmith; “but what is your price for it?”

“A thousand pounds,” said he.

“If that’s so, I won’t go. They would put me in jail.”

“Be easy,” said Anthony, “nothing will happen to you.”

So the goldsmith went to the palace, and sent in a message that his assistant had made a ring for the Princess Anne. She sent a message that she had not ordered a ring, but she would look at it. As soon as she saw it, she asked: “How much do you want for this?” He replied that he was almost afraid to say that it was worth a thousand pounds.

“Oh! it is worth much more than that,” she said, and she paid the sum at once.

The goldsmith returned home and told his wife what he had got for the ring. She wondered what sort of person their new assistant was. The master brought the money to him, but the assistant would not accept it.

“You can keep the money for yourself,” he said, “and I have just finished the ring for the Princess Antonia. You will have to go to the palace again with this.”

This time the master-goldsmith was ready enough to go. “How much am I to ask for this ring?” he said.

“Ask two thousand pounds.”

So he was brought to the princess, and he told her that his apprentice had made a ring for her. She answered that she had not ordered a ring. “However, show it to me.”

As soon as she glanced at it, she said: “How much do you want for this?”

“Two thousand pounds.”

“Oh! it’s worth much more than that,” she said.

So she paid down the money and told the master-goldsmith to fetch his assistant to her. As soon as the master came home, he told his wife everything. She was still more astonished.

“O Lord!” she said, “I cannot understand it at all.”

The master told Anthony that the princess bade him come and see her.

“She can come to me,” was his reply.

When the princess heard that, she lost no time, but took some royal garments for him, and drove to Anthony’s house in the royal coach. She went straight to him and said, “I am come to bring you home with me, Anthony.”

She bade him put on the royal robe she had brought with her for him, and they drove together to the palace, and their marriage was celebrated not long after.

The two officers thought the king would banish them or inflict some punishment upon them, but he pardoned them and gave them sufficient money to live at the court. Anthony himself did not care for royalty. He and his wife arranged that they would return to the place where he had first found the princesses. So they departed for that land, but a storm drove them on shore near to the place where he had met the old crone. She gave him welcome.

“So you are back again,” she said.

They explained to her that what they wished was to go back to that palace beneath the fountain.

“Well,” she said, “I will show you the way to the other world, and I will let you down the well.”

They came to the opening, and Anthony was about to enter the well, but the old hag begged him to wait with her and let the princess go on before.

So the princess was let down to the bottom of the well, and then the crone said: “I won’t let you follow her unless you first cut off my head.”

“This is a strange way to repay the good you have done me,” said Anthony.

“Well, unless you promise this you will never see your princess again.”

So he had to promise, and with that she waved her wand and a road appeared, which led them straight to the princess. Then Anthony struck off the crone’s head, and they found themselves amid crowds of farmers who were ploughing and soldiers standing at attention, and one and all welcoming their new lords. For this land was an enchanted land, and the old crone was a witch.

THE TWIN BROTHERS

Once there was a princess, and she was under a curse and enchantment, so that she had to spend her life in the shape of a fish. One day a woman happened to be working in the meadow by the river, and she saw a flock of birds flying above the river and talking to the fish. The woman wondered what it was that was there, so she went to the waterside and looked in. All she saw was a fish swimming about. So she said: “I should like to eat you, fish. I feel sure you would do me good.”

Now, when she said that, the fish answered: “You could save me. You will have twin sons, although you have never had any children before.”

The woman said that, if she could help her in that, there was nothing the fish could ask that she would not do to deliver her.

The fish answered: “Catch me and take me to your field. There you must bury me and plant a rose-tree over me. When the roses first come into bloom you will bear twin sons. After three years, dig in the place where you buried me and you will find two swords, and these you must keep. Your mare will have two foals and your bitch will have two pups, and each of your twins will have a sword, a horse, and a dog. Those swords will have the virtue that they will help your sons to victory over everybody. I shall be delivered as soon as my body has rotted.”

When the twin sons grew up they were very clever, and so they said: “We must try our luck in the world. We are bold enough. One of us will go to the East and one to the West. Each of us must look at his sword every morning to see if the other needs his help. For the sword will begin to rust as soon as one of us is in peril.”

So they cast lots which way they should go, and each of them took his sword, his horse, and his dog, and away they went.

The first rode through deep forests, and he met a fierce dragon and a lion; so he attacked the dragon, which had nine heads. The lion stayed quiet while the knight attacked the dragon, and at last he succeeded in cutting one of the dragon’s heads off. He felt tired then, and the lion took his place; then the knight cut two more heads off the dragon. And so it went on till he had all the heads cut off. Then he cut out the tongues from all the nine heads and kept them, and so went forward on his adventurous journey.

Now, it chanced that there were some woodcutters in these forests, and one of them collected all the dragon’s heads, having come across them by chance. That dragon used to come to the town and devour one person every visit. This time the lot had fallen upon the princess, and so she was to be devoured by the dragon. So the town was all hung with black cloth. The woodcutter knew all about this, so he went with the heads to the town to sue for the princess, for it had been proclaimed that whoever killed the dragon should be her husband. When the princess saw that such a low-born man was to be her husband she was taken aback, and tried by all the means in her power to delay the wedding.

The knight happened to come to the town just then, and he saw a good inn, so he rode up to it. The innkeeper came at once to ask what he could do for him. Now, there were other guests there, and it was a busy place. The guests were all talking of the one matter: when the princess was going to marry the man who had killed the dragon. The wedding ought to have been long ago, but the bride and her parents kept putting it off. The knight listened to all this talk, and then he asked:

“Are you sure that it was that woodcutter who killed the dragon?”

They answered that it certainly was, for the heads were preserved in the palace.

The knight said nothing, but when he thought the proper time had come he rode to the palace. The princess saw him from the window, and she wondered who it might be. He was ushered in, and he went straight to the princess and told her everything. He asked her whether he might attend the wedding.

She answered: “I am not at all pleased with my marriage. I would much rather marry you, sir.”

He asked her why.

“If he killed the dragon he must be a great man.”

“He is such a low-born man,” said she, “that it is not likely that he killed the dragon.”

“I should like to see him,” said he.

So they brought the woodcutter before him, and the knight asked to see the heads. So they brought the heads. He looked at the heads and said:

“There are no tongues in these heads. Where are the tongues?”