One day, in the dead of winter, I set forth to another village, but I was caught in a blizzard and lost my way. I found shelter behind a thick juniper tree and pulled my sheepskin coat around me. I tried to sleep, and I had just drifted off when I felt a tapping on my...
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Witch in a Golden Cloak
I'm a famous witch. I live on an island in the center of a large lake. A golden lantern hangs outside my door, but no one comes here. I hear only the sweet tinkling bells on the golden horns of my goat who is feeding nearby. I am sitting by the fire, wrapped in a...
Doorkeeper
You will find me behind a rock door under the ridge of the giant's mountain. If you knock on my rocky wall, I will come out with sparks flying from my eyes and nose. I guard the tax the giant collects from the little people. Ask for no more than you can carry. If you...
Scoffing Brother
My father draws back the curtain to show us my brother's wife, and I cannot contain my laughter when I see, not a woman, but a cat, primly sitting on a crystal chair. Haha! Then, with the softest paw, she touches the crystal and it shivers into a thousand splinters....
Ali Baba’s Wife
When my husband came home, his asses were not just carrying fagots. They were laden down with bags of gold! Ali Baba came in and he poured the gold all over the floor. "Let me be the first to measure it!" I cried. I ran to my brother's wife for a scale. What a fool I...
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...
Dame Fortune
Fortunatus hardly remembers having fortune. His father squandered it before he was ten. At sixteen, he went off to find his own fortune. He found work as a page for the Earl of Flanders, and before you knew it, he had won the heart of the Earl's daughter. They were...
Lizard Fairy Godmother
I am interested in how good things—a comfortable home, physical beauty and riches, for example—influence human beings. Must they always corrupt the heart? To find out the answer to my question, I shall conduct a little experiment. The peasant Masaniello has twelve...
Aladdin’s Mother
My son has become so idle! If only his father were alive to give him some manly discipline! Instead, Aladdin has come home with a magic lamp and a genie who grants his every whim. Now I am certain he will never grow up! Aladdin's Mother, in Aladdin and the Wonderful...
Broom-maker
My brother is a goldsmith, and he's very rich. Me, I just make brooms. Today, when I went into the forest to collect wood, a golden bird flew out of the bushes. I threw a stone at it, and it got away, but it left behind a golden feather. I picked the feather up and...