ASH-MAIDEN
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Grimm, Jacob, Grimm, Wilhelm, Olcott, Frances Jenkins, and Cramer, Rie
The wife of a rich man fell sick, and as she felt that her end was drawing near, she called her only daughter to her bedside and said, “Dear Child, be good and pious, and then the dear God will always protect you, and I will look down on you from Heaven and be near you.” Thereupon she closed her eyes and departed.
Every day, the maiden went out to her mother’s grave and wept, and she remained pious and good. When winter came the snow spread a white sheet over the grave, and when the spring-sun had drawn it off again, the man had taken another wife.
The woman had brought two daughters into the house with her, who were beautiful and fair of face, but vile and black of heart. Now began a bad time for the poor child. “Is the stupid goose to sit in the parlor with us?” said they. “He who wants to eat bread, must earn it. Out with the kitchen-wench!”
They took her pretty clothes away from her, put an old gray bedgown on her and gave her wooden shoes. “Just look at the proud Princess, how decked out she is!” they cried, and laughed, and led her into the kitchen.
There she had to do hard work from morning till night, get up before daybreak, carry water, light fires, cook and wash. Besides this, the sisters did her every imaginable injury—they mocked her and emptied her peas and lentils into the ashes, so that she was forced to sit and pick them out again.
In the evening, when she had worked till she was weary, she had no bed to go to, but had to sleep by the fireside in the ashes. And as on that account she always looked dusty and dirty, they called her Ash-Maiden.
It happened once that the father was going to the Fair, and he asked the two daughters what he should bring back for them.
“Beautiful dresses,” said one. “Pearls and jewels,” said the second.
“And you, Ash-Maiden,” said he, “what will you have?”
“Father, break off for me the first branch which knocks against your hat on your way home.”
So he bought beautiful dresses, pearls and jewels for the two daughters, and on his way home, as he was riding through a green thicket, a hazel twig brushed against him and knocked off his hat. Then he broke off the branch and took it with him.
When he reached home he gave the two daughters the things which they had wished for, and to Ash-Maiden he gave the branch from the hazel-bush. Ash-Maiden thanked him, went to her mother’s grave and planted the branch on it, and wept so much that the tears fell down on it and watered it.
It grew, however, and became a handsome tree. Thrice a day Ash-Maiden went and sat beneath it, and wept and prayed, and a little White Bird always came on the tree. And if Ash-Maiden expressed a wish, the bird threw down to her what she had wished for.
It happened that the King gave a feast, which was to last three days. To it all the beautiful young girls in the country were invited, in order that his son might choose himself a Bride. When the two sisters heard that they too were to appear among the number, they were delighted.
They called Ash-Maiden and said, “Comb our hair, brush our shoes, and fasten our buckles, for we are going to the feast at the King’s palace.”
Ash-Maiden obeyed, but wept, because she too would have liked to go with them to the dance, and she begged her mother to allow her to do so.
“You go, Ash-Maiden!” said she; “you are dusty and dirty, and would go to the feast? You have no clothes and shoes, and yet would dance!”
As, however, Ash-Maiden went on asking, the mother at last said, “I have emptied a dish of lentils into the ashes for you. If you have picked them out again in two hours, you shall go with us.”
The maiden went through the back-door into the garden, and called, “You tame Pigeons, you Turtledoves, and all you birds beneath the sky, come and help me to pick
“The good into the pot, The bad into the crop!”
Then two white pigeons came in by the kitchen-window, and afterward the turtledoves. And at last all the birds beneath the sky came whirring and crowding in, and alighted amongst the ashes. And the pigeons nodded with their heads and began pick, pick, pick, pick, and the rest began also pick, pick, pick, pick, and gathered all the good grains into the dish. Hardly had one hour passed before they had finished, and all flew out again.
Then the girl took the dish to the mother, and was glad, and believed that now she would be allowed to go with them to the feast.
But the mother said, “No, Ash-Maiden, you have no clothes and you cannot dance. You would only be laughed at.”
And as Ash-Maiden wept at this, the mother said, “If you can pick two dishes of lentils out of the ashes for me in one hour, you shall go with us.” And she thought to herself, “That she most certainly cannot do.”
When the mother had emptied the two dishes of lentils amongst the ashes, the maiden went through the back-door into the garden and cried, “You tame Pigeons, you Turtledoves, and all you birds under heaven, come and help me to pick
“The good into the pot, The bad into the crop!”
Then two white pigeons came in by the kitchen-window, and afterward the turtledoves. And at last all the birds beneath the sky came whirring and crowding in, and alighted amongst the ashes. And the doves nodded with their heads and began pick, pick, pick, pick, and the others began also pick, pick, pick, pick, and gathered all the good seeds into the dishes. And before half an hour was over they had already finished, and all flew out again.
Then the maiden carried the dishes to the mother and was delighted, and believed that she might now go with them to the feast.
But the mother said, “All this will not help you. You go not with us, for you have no clothes and cannot dance. We should be ashamed of you!”
Then she turned her back on Ash-Maiden, and hurried away with her two proud daughters.
As no one was now at home, Ash-Maiden went to her mother’s grave beneath the hazel-tree, and cried:
“Shiver and quiver, Little Tree, Silver and gold throw over me!”
Then the bird threw a gold and silver dress down to her, and slippers embroidered with silk and silver. She put on the dress with all speed, and went to the feast.
Her sisters and the mother, however, did not know her, and thought she must be a foreign Princess, for she looked so beautiful in the golden dress. They never once thought of Ash-Maiden, and believed that she was sitting at home in the dirt, picking lentils out of the ashes.
The Prince went to meet her, took her by the hand, and he danced with her. He would dance with no other maiden, and never let go of her hand. And if any one else came to invite her, he said, “This is my partner.”
She danced till it was evening, and then she wanted to go home. But the King’s Son said, “I will go with you and bear you company,” for he wished to see to whom the beautiful maiden belonged.
She escaped from him, however, and sprang into the pigeon-house. The King’s Son waited until her father came, and then he told him that the stranger maiden had leapt into the pigeon-house. The old man thought, “Can it be Ash-Maiden?” and they had to bring him an axe and a pickaxe that he might hew the pigeon-house to pieces, but no one was inside it.
And when they got home, Ash-Maiden lay in her dirty clothes among the ashes, and a dim little oil-lamp was burning on the mantelpiece. For Ash-Maiden had jumped quickly down from the back of the pigeon-house, and had run to the little hazel-tree. There she had taken off her beautiful clothes and laid them on the grave, and the bird had taken them away again. Then she had placed herself in the kitchen amongst the ashes, in her gray gown.
Next day, when the feast began afresh, and her parents and the sisters had gone once more, Ash-Maiden went to the hazel-tree, and said:
“Shiver and quiver, Little Tree, Silver and gold throw over me!”