Basque Legends; With an Essay on the Basque Language

On the morrow Petit Yorge went off at eight o’clock to the Tartaro. He said to him that the serpent had still three heads to be cut off, and that he had still need of all his help. The Tartaro said to him,

“Keep quiet, keep quiet; you will conquer him.”

He gives him a new dress, finer than the others, a more spirited horse, a terrible dog,[26 - The three days’ fight, and the dog, appear in Campbell’s “Tale of the Sea-Maiden,” Vol. I., pp. 77–79.] a sword, and a bottle of good scented water.[27 - The Basque word usually means “Eau de Cologne.”] He said to him,

“The serpent will say to you, ‘Ah! if I had a spark between my head and my tail, how I would burn you and your lady, and your horse and your dog.’ And you, you will say to him then, ‘I, if I had the good-scented water to smell, I would cut off a head from thee, the horse another, and the dog another.’ You will give this bottle to the young lady, who will place it in her bosom, and, at the very moment you shall say that, she must throw some in your face, and on the horse and on the dog as well.”

He goes off then without fear, because the Tartaro had given him this assurance. He comes then to the carriage. The young lady says to him,

“Where are you going? The serpent will be here directly. It is enough if he eats me.”

He says to her, “Open the door.”

She tells him that it is impossible; that there are twenty-one doors. This young man touches them with his sword, and they open of themselves. This young man says to her, giving her the bottle,

“When the serpent shall say, ‘If I had a spark between my head and my tail, I would burn you,’ I shall say to him, ‘If I had a drop of the good-scented water under my nose;’ you will take the bottle, and throw some over me in a moment.”

He then makes her look into his ear, and, while she is looking, he cuts off twenty-one pieces from her twenty-one dresses that she was wearing. At the same moment comes the serpent, saying, with joy,

“Instead of one, I shall have four to eat.”

The young man said to him,

“And you shall not touch one of us, at any rate.”

He leaps on his spirited horse, and they fight more fiercely than ever. The horse leaped as high as a house, and the serpent, in a rage, says to him,

“If I had a spark of fire between my tail and my head, I would burn you and your lady, and this horse and this terrible dog.”

The young man says,

“I, if I had the good-scented water under my nose, I would cut off one of your heads, and the horse another, and the dog another.”

As he said that, the young lady jumps up, opens the bottle, and very cleverly throws the water just where it was wanted. The young man cuts off a head with his sword, his horse another, and the dog another; and thus they make an end of the serpent. This young man takes the seven tongues with him, and throws away the heads. Judge of the joy of this young lady. She wanted to go straight to her father with her preserver (she says), that her father must thank him too; that he owes his daughter to him. But the young man says to her that it is altogether impossible for him; that he must go and meet his cousin at Rome; that they have made a vow, and that, on their return, all three will come to her father’s house.

The young lady is vexed, but she goes off without losing time to tell her father what has happened. The father is very glad that the serpent was utterly destroyed; and he proclaims in all the country that he who has killed the serpent should come forward with the proofs of it.

The young lady goes again with the dinner to the gardener. He says to her,

“I told you true, then, that you would not be eaten? Something has, then, killed the serpent?”

She relates to him what had taken place.

But, lo! some days afterwards there appeared a black charcoal-burner, who said that he had killed the serpent, and was come to claim the reward. When the young lady saw the charcoal-burner, she said immediately, that most certainly it was not he; that it was a fine gentleman, on horseback, and not a pest of a man like him. The charcoal-burner shows the heads of the serpent; and the king says that, in truth, this must be the man. The king had only one word to say, she must marry him. The young lady says, she will not at all; and the father began to compel her, (saying) that no other man came forward. But, as the daughter would not consent, to make a delay, the king proclaims in all the country, that he who killed the serpent would be capable of doing something else, too, and that, on such a day, all the young men should assemble, that he would hang a diamond ring from a bell, and that whosoever riding under it should pierce the ring with his sword, should certainly have his daughter.[28 - This is a much better game than the ordinary one of tilting at a ring with a lance, and is a much more severe test of horsemanship. The ring, an ordinary lady’s ring, is suspended by a thread from a cross-bar, at such a height that a man can just reach it by standing in his stirrups. Whoever, starting from a given point, can put a porcupine’s quill, or a small reed, through the ring, and thus carry it off at a hand-gallop, becomes possessor of the ring. We have seen this game played at Monte Video, in South America; and even the Gauchos considered it a test of good horsemanship. Formerly, it seems, the ring was suspended from the tongue of a bell, which would be set ringing when the ring was carried away. The sword, of course, was the finest rapier.]

From all sides arrive the young men. Our Petit Yorge goes off to the Tartaro, and tells him what has happened, and that he has again need of him. The Tartaro gives him a handsome horse, a superb dress, and a splendid sword. Equipped thus, Petit Yorge goes with the others. He gets ready. The young lady recognizes him immediately, and says so to her father. He has the good luck to carry off the ring on his sword; but he does not stop at all, but goes off galloping as hard as his horse can go. The king and his daughter were in a balcony, looking on at all these gentlemen. They saw that he still went on. The young lady says to her father:

“Papa, call him!”

The father says to her, in an angry tone,

“He is going off, because apparently he has no desire to have you.” And he hurls his lance at him. It strikes him on the leg. He still rides on. You can well imagine what chagrin for the young lady.

The next day she goes with the gardener’s dinner. She sees him with his leg bandaged. She asks him what it is.

The young lady begins to suspect something, and goes to tell to her father how the gardener had his leg tied up, and that he must go and ask him what is the matter. That he had told her that it was nothing.

The king did not want to go, (and said) that she must get it out of the gardener; but to please his daughter, he says he will go there. He goes then, and asks him, “What is the matter?” He tells him that a blackthorn has run into him. The king gets angry, and says “that there is not a blackthorn in all his garden, and that he is telling him a lie.”

The daughter says to him,

“Tell him to show it us.”

He shows it to them, and they are astonished to see that the lance is still there. The king did not know what to think of it all. This gardener has deceived him, and he must give him his daughter. But Petit Yorge, uncovering his bosom, shows the “fleur-de-lis” there. The king did not know what to say; but the daughter said to him,

“This is my preserver, and I will marry no one else than him.”

Petit Yorge asks the king to send for five dressmakers, the best in the town, and five butchers. The king sends for them.

Petit Yorge asks the dressmakers if they have ever made any new dresses which had a piece out; and on the dressmakers saying “No,” he counts out the pieces and gives them to the dressmakers, asking if it was like that that they had given the dresses to the princess. They say, “Certainly not.”

He goes, then, to the butchers, and asks them, if they have ever killed animals without tongues? They say, “No!” He tells them, then, to look in the heads of the serpent. They see that the tongues are not there, and then he takes out the tongues he has.

The king, having seen all that, has nothing more to say. He gives him his daughter. Petit Yorge says to him, that he must invite his father to the wedding, but on the part of the young lady’s father; and that they must serve him up at dinner a sheep’s heart, half cooked, and without salt. They make a great feast, and place this heart before this father. They make him carve it himself, and he is very indignant at that. The son then says to him:

“I expected that;” and he adds, “Ah! my poor father, have you forgotten how you said that you wished to eat the heart, half cooked, and without salt, of him who let the Tartaro go? That is not my heart, but a sheep’s heart. I have done this to recall to your memory what you said, and to make you recognize me.”

They embrace each other, and tell each other all their news, and what services the Tartaro had done him. The father returned happy to his house, and Petit Yorge lived very happily with his young lady at the king’s house; and they wanted nothing, because they had always the Tartaro at their service.

Laurentine.

In a variation of the above tale, from the narration of Mariño Amyot, of St. Jean Pied de Port, the young prince, as a herdsman, kills with a hammer successively three Tartaros who play at cards with him; he then finds in their house all their riches and horses, barrels full of gold and silver, etc., and also three “olano,” which is described as an animal who serves the Tartaro, like a dog, but much larger and more terrible, but also more intelligent and able to do any message. He kills the serpent with the aid of the “olanos,” and the princess helps by striking the serpent’s tail with a sword,[29 - One of those present here interrupted the reciter—“What did she hit the serpent on the tail for?” “Why, to kill him, of course,” was the reply; “ask Mr. Webster if serpents are not killed by hitting them on the tail?”] instead of sprinkling the “sweet-scented water.” The “olano” then steals dishes off the king’s table for the prince. The charcoal-burner comes; but at last the prince shows the tongues and pieces of dress, and all ends happily, except for the charcoal-burner, who is placed on the top of seven barrels of powder, and fire is applied beneath, and then nobody sees him any more.

The commencement of the next is so different that we give it at length.

The Seven-Headed Serpent

Like many others in the world, there was a mother with her three sons. The eldest said to her that he wished to go from country to country, until he should find a situation as servant, and that she should give him a cake.

He sets out. While he is going through a forest he meets an old woman, who asks him for a morsel of his cake.[30 - I have a dim recollection of having read something very similar to this either in a Slavonic or a Dalmatian tale.] He says to her, “No!” that he would prefer to throw it into the muddy clay. And the lad asks her if she knows of a servant’s place. She says, “No.” He goes on from forest to forest, until the night overtakes him. There comes to him a bear. He says to him,

“Ant of the earth! who has given you permission to come here?”

“Who should give it me? I have taken it myself.”

And the bear devours him.

The second son asks his mother to give him a cake, for he wishes to go as a servant, like his brother. She gives him one, and he goes away like his brother. He meets an old woman, who says to him,