On my fifteenth birthday, the king and the queen were not at home. They had left me in the castle, quite alone! I ran round to look into all sorts of places that had been forbidden to me.

I looked into bed-chambers and rooms. I peered into closets and under staircases. Then I came to an old tower. I climbed the narrow winding-case to the top where I found a little door with a rusty key in the lock. I turned the key, and the door sprang open.

In the room sat a little old woman busily doing something that involved a wheel and a pointy thing that was spinning around. I had never seen such an object before, and I wanted to touch it, to feel the point on it.

”What is it that thing that is rattling around so merrily?” I asked.

She put it into my hand, and right away it stuck my finger and drew blood. I fell backwards onto the bed, overcome by sleep. I remember nothing after, only a wash of dreams.

Briar Rose in the Tower in Briar Rose, Grimms. Illustration by Charles Robinson.