After a hard day's work chopping wood in the forest with my father, we got home, and then my father said, "Oh, no, I left my axe in the forest!" He asked my stepmother if she would send her daughter out. She hadn't worked all day in the cold and the heavy rain,...
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Kind Sister
I have learned that no matter what world you find yourself in, whether you are on earth or in the underworld, you must be kind. Not for your own sake, but for the sake of other creatures. Oh, do not think for a moment that one creature is lower than another. A cat is...
Mother Duck
Down by the edge of the canal, in a forest of great burdocks, I built my first nest and laid my first eggs. I laid six of them. Five were white and perfect, but the sixth was an ugly grey color. It puzzled me, that egg. How did it come to be so different from the...
Long-Bearded Man
The witch who cast a spell on me turned me into an old man with a long white beard. The spell would not break unless I met a girl who loved animals as much as she loved human beings. The witch was certain that I would never meet such a person. But there you are, sweet...
Prince Who Releases the Fish
Taking the chance that I might be able to cure my father's blindness, I gathered a crew and we set sail. The physician gave us a hundred days to catch the Golden-Headed Fish, and for a hundred days we caught nothing. On the eleventh hour of the hundredth day, I cast...
Ram Singh
I found the entrance to the old well, and I went down a flight of stairs that descended into darkness. They were broad, white slabs of alabaster, gleaming in the shadows. Even the sound of my bare feet on the stone echoed in that lonely place, and when one of my water...
Ciccu with his Figs
When I brought my basket of figs to the king, I rang the castle bell with a trembling heart. You see, I had given half my figs to an old man I met on the road. When he was finished helping himself, he covered the basket and told me not to be anxious. The basket would...
Footless Princess
When I became lost in the forest, I was seized by a giant. He cut off my feet and then he left me to bleed to death. I would have died there, but then my sister Kisa the Cat came along, and she returned my feet to me. In so doing, she performed an act of kindness that...
Pot of Pinks
When Felicia's parents died, her brother Bruno inherited the house and all its possessions except for a silver ring and myself, a humble pot of pink flowers. He wouldn't even share his food with Felicia. He ate an egg for supper and threw her the shell. “There, that...
Snow-White Rose Tree
I bear white roses. My sister, who grows beside me, bears red ones. We stand in a garden before a poor cottage where a widow lives with her two daughters. They are as old as we are, and one is named Snow-White, the other, Rose-Red. They are the sweetest and best...
Good King
My dogs were in hot pursuit of a white rabbit when all of a sudden, the rabbit turned around and leapt into my arms. "Why, bunny," I said, "As you have come to me for protection, I will see that nobody hurts you." I took it home to my palace where it was given a...
Lake
Listen to me. It's the Lake speaking. If you want to avoid being eaten by the Serpent King of this island, here's what you must do. Take off your clothes and spread them on the path that leads from the water to the lord's castle. It pleases the king to glide over...
Spinning Nun
When my mother died, she gave me an apple that would enable a woman to have a child. I kept it for a long time. Then, when the aging queen realized that she might never have an heir, I gave her the apple. After, I returned to the convent where I live. It is located...
Kind Ogre
I have a huge head and a wrinkled brow. My eyebrows meet, my eyes squint. I have a flat, broad nose and a great gash of a mouth from which hang two huge tusks. My skin is hairy, my arms are enormous, my legs are sharp as sword blades, and my feet are as flat as...
King Frost
Silent weeping. That's what caught my attention. Breath in the crisp air. Something to freeze. She was sitting by the fir-tree. Crisp, crackle! I lit beside her. "Do you know who I am?" "All hail to you, great king," said she. Her voice shivered. "Are you warm,...
Tree of Life
The ravens know where I am. The Sun and the Moon know where I am. But humans do not know where to look for me. Once a young man set off to find me so that he could bring one of my golden apples to the princess he loved. He wandered through three kingdoms, but he could...
Master of the Birds
The man asked me if I knew where to find the Blue Mountains. I didn't know where they were. I couldn't find them in any of my books. If the Blue Mountains existed, only the birds would know it. Since the man had traveled so far, and I had not seen a single man for...