The Story of the Youngest Prince Who Killed the SparrowThe Story of the Youngest Prince Who Killed the Sparrow
There was once a King who had three sons. One day the oldest son went hunting and when night fell his huntsmen came riding home without him.
"Where is the prince?" the King asked.
"Isn't he here?" the huntsmen said. "He left us in midafternoon chasing a hare near the Old Mill up the river. We haven't seen him since and we supposed he must have come home alone."
When he hadn't returned the following day his brother, the second prince, went out to search for him.
"I'll go to the Old Mill," he said to the King, "and see what's become of him."
So he mounted his horse and rode up the river. As he neared the Old Mill a hare crossed his path and the second prince being a hunter like his brother at once gave chase. His attendant waited for his return but waited in vain. Night fell and still there was no sign of the second prince.
The attendant returned to the palace and told the King what had happened. The King was surprised but not unduly alarmed and the following day when theYoungest Prince asked to go hunting alone the King suggested that he go in the direction of the Old Mill to find out if he could what was keeping his brothers.
The Youngest Prince who had listened carefully to what his brothers' attendants had reported decided to act cautiously. So when a hare crossed his path as he approached the Old Mill, instead of giving it chase, he rode off as though he were hunting other game. Later he returned to the Old Mill from another direction.
He found an old woman sitting in front of it.
"Good evening, granny," he said in a friendly tone, pulling up his horse for a moment's chat. "Do you live here? You know I thought the Old Mill was deserted."
The old woman looked at him and shook her head gloomily.
"Deserted indeed! My boy, take an old woman's advice and don't have anything to do with this old mill! It's an evil place!"
"Why, granny," the Prince said, "what's the matter with it?"
The old woman peered cautiously around and when she saw they were alone she beckoned the Prince to come near. Then she whispered:
"A dragon lives here! A horrible monster! Hetakes the form of a hare and lures people into the mill. Then he captures them. Some of them he kills and eats and others he holds as prisoners in an underground dungeon. I'm one of his prisoners and he keeps me here to work for him."
"Granny," the Youngest Prince said, "would you like me to rescue you?"
"My boy, you couldn't do it! You have no idea what a strong evil monster the dragon is."
"If you found out something for me, granny, I think I might be able to overcome the dragon and rescue you."
The old woman was doubtful but she promised to do anything the Youngest Prince asked.
"Well then, granny, find out from the dragon where his strength is, whether in his own body or somewhere else. Find out to-night and I'll come back to-morrow at this same hour to see you."
So that night when the dragon came home, after he had supped and when she was scratching his head to make him drowsy for bed, the old woman said to him:
"Master, I think you're the strongest dragon in the world! Tell me now, where does your strength lie—in your own beautiful body or somewhere else?"
"You're right, old woman," the dragon grunted: "Iam pretty strong as dragons go. But I don't keep my strength in my own body. No, indeed! That would be too dangerous. I keep it in the hearth yonder."
At that the old woman ran over to the hearth and, stooping down, she kissed it and caressed it.
"O beautiful hearth!" she said, "where my master's strength is hidden! How happy are the ashes that cover your stones!"
The dragon laughed with amusement.
"That's the time I fooled you, old woman! My strength isn't in the hearth at all! It's in the tree in front of the mill."
The old woman at once ran out of the mill and threw her arms about the tree.
"O tree!" she cried, "most beautiful tree in the world, guard carefully our master's strength and let no harm come to it!"
Again the dragon laughed.
"I've fooled you another time, old woman! Come here and scratch my head some more and this time I'll tell you the truth for I see you really love your master."
So the old woman went back and scratched the dragon's head and the dragon told her the truth about his strength.
"I keep it far away," he said. "In the third kingdom from here near the Tsar's own city there is a deep lake. A dragon lives at the bottom of the lake. In the dragon there is a wild boar; in the boar a hare; in the hare a pigeon; in the pigeon a sparrow. My strength is in the sparrow. Let any one kill the sparrow and I should die that instant. But I am safe. No one but shepherds ever come to the lake and even they don't come any more for the dragon has eaten up so many of them that the lake has got a bad name. Indeed, nowadays even the Tsar himself is hard put to it to find a shepherd. Oh, I tell you, old woman, your master is a clever one!"
So now the old woman had the dragon's secret and the next day she told it to the Youngest Prince. He at once devised a plan whereby he hoped to overcome the dragon. He dressed himself as a shepherd and with crook in hand started off on foot for the third kingdom. He traveled through villages and towns, across rivers and over mountains, and reached at last the third kingdom and the Tsar's own city. He presented himself at the palace and asked employment as a shepherd.
The guards looked at him in surprise and said:
"A shepherd! Are you sure you want to be a shepherd?"
Then they called to their companions: "Here's a youth who wants to be a shepherd!" And the word went through the palace and even the Tsar heard it.
"Send the youth to me," he ordered.
"Do you really want to be my shepherd?" he asked the Youngest Prince.
The Youngest Prince said yes, he did.
"If I put you in charge of the sheep, where would you pasture them?"
"Isn't there a lake beyond the city," the Prince asked, "where the grazing is good?"
"H'm!" said the Tsar. "So you know about that lake, too! What else do you know?"
"I've heard the shepherds disappear."
"And still you want to try your luck?" the Tsar exclaimed.
Just then the Tsar's only daughter, a lovely Princess, who had been looking at the young stranger, slipped over to her father and whispered:
"But, father, you can't let such a handsome young man as that go off with the sheep! It would be dreadful if he never returned!"
The Tsar whispered back:
"Hush, child! Your concern for the young man's safety does credit to your noble feelings. But this isnot the time or the place for sentiment. We must consider first the welfare of the royal sheep."
He turned to the Youngest Prince:
"Very well, young man, you may consider yourself engaged as shepherd. Provide yourself with whatever you need and assume your duties at once."
"There is one thing," the Youngest Prince said; "when I start out to-morrow morning with the sheep I should like to take with me two strong boarhounds, a falcon, and a set of bagpipes."
"You shall have them all," the Tsar promised.
Early the next morning when the Princess peeped out of her bedroom window she saw the new shepherd driving the royal flocks to pasture. A falcon was perched on his shoulder; he had a set of bagpipes under his arm; and he was leading two powerful boarhounds on a leash.
"It's a shame!" the Princess said to herself. "He'll probably never return and he's such a handsome young man, too!" And she was so unhappy at thought of never again seeing the new shepherd that she couldn't go back to sleep.
Well, the Youngest Prince reached the lake and turned out his sheep to graze. He perched the falcon on a log, tied the dogs beside it, and laid his bagpipeson the ground. Then he took off his smock, rolled up his hose, and wading boldly into the lake called out in a loud voice:
"Ho, dragon, come out and we'll try a wrestling match! That is, if you're not afraid!"
"Afraid?" bellowed an awful voice. "Who's afraid?"
The water of the lake churned this way and that and a horrible scaly monster came to the surface. He crawled out on shore and clutched the Prince around the waist. And the Prince clutched him in a grip just as strong and there they swayed back and forth, and rolled over, and wrestled together on the shore of the lake without either getting the better of the other. By midafternoon when the sun was hot, the dragon grew faint and cried out:
"Oh, if I could but dip my burning head in the cool water, then I could toss you as high as the sky!"
"Don't talk nonsense!" the Prince said. "If the Tsar's daughter would kiss my forehead, then I could toss you twice as high!"
After that the dragon slipped out of the Prince's grasp, plunged into the water, and disappeared. The Prince waited for him but he didn't show his scaly head again that day.
When evening came, the Prince washed off the grime of the fight, dressed himself carefully, and then looking as fresh and handsome as ever drove home his sheep. With the falcon on his shoulder and the two hounds at his heels he came playing a merry tune on his bagpipes.
The townspeople hearing the bagpipes ran out of their houses and cried to each other:
"The shepherd's come back!"
The Princess ran to her window and, when she saw the shepherd alive and well, she put her hand to her heart and said:
"Oh!"
Even the Tsar was pleased.
"I'm not a bit surprised that he's back!" he said. "There's something about this youth that I like!"
The next day the Tsar sent two of his trusted servants to the lake to see what was happening there. They hid themselves behind some bushes on a little hill that commanded the lake. They were there when the shepherd arrived and they watched him as he waded out into the water and challenged the dragon as on the day before.
They heard the shepherd call out in a loud voice:
"Ho, dragon, come out and we'll try a wrestling match! That is, if you're not afraid!"
And from the water they heard an awful voice bellow back:
"Afraid? Who's afraid?"
Then they saw the water of the lake churn this way and that and a horrible scaly monster come to the surface. They saw him crawl out on shore and clutch the shepherd around the waist. And they saw the shepherd clutch him in a grip just as strong. And they watched the two as they swayed back and forth and rolled over and wrestled together without either getting the better of the other. By midafternoon when the sun grew hot they saw the dragon grow faint and they heard him cry out:
"Oh, if I could only dip my burning head in the cool water, then I could toss you as high as the sky!"
And they heard the shepherd reply:
"Don't talk nonsense! If the Tsar's daughter would kiss my forehead, then I could toss you twice as high!"
Then they saw the dragon slip out of the shepherd's grasp, plunge into the water, and disappear. They waited but he didn't show his scaly head again that day.
So the Tsar's servants hurried home before the shepherd and told the Tsar all they had seen and heard. The Tsar was mightily impressed with the bravery ofthe shepherd and he declared that if he killed that horrid dragon he should have the Princess herself for wife!
He sent for his daughter and told her all that his servants had reported and he said to her:
"My daughter, you, too, can help rid your country of this monster if you go out with the shepherd to-morrow and when the time comes kiss him on the forehead. You will do this, will you not, for your country's sake?"
The Princess blushed and trembled and the Tsar, looking at her in surprise, said:
"What! Shall a humble shepherd face a dragon unafraid and the daughter of the Tsar tremble!"
"Father," the Princess cried, "it isn't the dragon that I'm afraid of!"
"What then?" the Tsar asked.
But what it was she was afraid of the Princess would not confess. Instead she said:
"If the welfare of my country require that I kiss the shepherd on the forehead, I shall do so."
So the next morning when the shepherd started out with his sheep, the falcon on his shoulder, the dogs at his heels, the bagpipes under his arm, the Princess walked beside him.
Her eyes were downcast and he saw that she was trembling.
"Do not be afraid, dear Princess," he said to her. "Nothing shall harm you—I promise that!"
"I'm not afraid," the Princess murmured. But she continued to blush and tremble and, although the shepherd tried to look into her eyes to reassure her, she kept her head averted.
This time the Tsar himself and many of his courtiers had gone on before and taken their stand on the hill that overlooked the lake to see the final combat of the shepherd and the dragon.
When the shepherd and the Princess reached the lake, the shepherd put his falcon on the log as before and tied the dogs beside it and laid his bagpipes on the ground. Then he threw off his smock, rolled up his hose, and wading boldly into the lake called out in a loud voice:
"Ho, dragon, come out and we'll try a wrestling match! That is, if you're not afraid!"
"Afraid?" bellowed an awful voice. "Who's afraid?"
Next Morning the Princess Peeped Out and Saw the ShepherdNext Morning the Princess Peeped Out and Saw the Shepherd
The water of the lake churned this way and that and the horrible scaly monster came to the surface. He crawled to shore and clutched the shepherd around thewaist. The shepherd clutched him in a grip just as strong and there they swayed back and forth and rolled over and wrestled together on the shore of the lake without either getting the better of the other. The Princess without the least show of fear stood nearby calling out encouragement to the shepherd and waiting for the moment when the shepherd should need her help.
By midafternoon when the sun was hot, the dragon grew faint and cried out:
"Oh, if I could but dip my burning head in the cool water, then I could toss you as high as the sky!"
"Don't talk nonsense!" the shepherd said. "If the Tsar's daughter would kiss my forehead then I could toss you twice as high!"
Instantly the Princess ran forward and kissed the shepherd three times. The first kiss fell on his forehead, the second on his nose, the third on his mouth. With each kiss his strength increased an hundredfold and taking the dragon in a mighty grip he tossed him up so high that for a moment the Tsar and all the courtiers lost sight of him in the sky. Then he fell to earth with such a thud that he burst.
Out of his body sprang a wild boar. The shepherd was ready for this and on the moment he unleashedthe two hounds and they fell on the boar and tore him to pieces.
Out of the boar jumped a rabbit. It went leaping across the meadow but the dogs caught it and killed it.
Out of the rabbit flew a pigeon. Instantly the shepherd unloosed the falcon. It rose high in the air, then swooped down upon the pigeon, clutched it in its talons, and delivered it into the shepherd's hands.
He cut open the pigeon and found the sparrow.
"Spare me! Spare me!" squawked the sparrow.
"Tell me where my brothers are," the shepherd demanded with his fingers about the sparrow's throat.
"Your brothers? They are alive and in the deep dungeon that lies below the Old Mill. Behind the mill there are three willow saplings growing from one old root. Cut the saplings and strike the root. A heavy iron door leading down into the dungeon will open. In the dungeon you will find many captives old and young, your brothers among them. Now that I have told you this are you going to spare my life?"
But the shepherd wrung the sparrow's neck for he knew that only in that way could the monster who had captured his brothers be killed.
Well, now that the dragon was dead the Tsar and all his courtiers came down from the hill and embracedthe shepherd and told him what a brave youth he was.
"You have delivered us all from a horrid monster," the Tsar said, "and to show you my gratitude and the country's gratitude I offer you my daughter for wife."
"Thank you," said the shepherd, "but I couldn't think of marrying the Princess unless she is willing to marry me."
The Princess blushed and trembled just as she had blushed and trembled the night before and that morning, too, on the way to the lake. She tried to speak but could not at first. Then in a very little voice she said:
"As a Princess I think it is my duty to marry this brave shepherd who has delivered my country from this terrible dragon, and—and I think I should want to marry him anyway."
She said the last part of her speech in such a very low voice that only the shepherd himself heard it. But that was right enough because after all it was intended only for him.
So then and there beside the lake before even the shepherd had time to wash his face and hands and put on his smock the Tsar put the Princess's hand in his hand and pronounced them betrothed.
After that the shepherd bathed in the lake and then refreshed and clean he sounded his bagpipes and he and the Princess and the Tsar and all the courtiers returned to the city driving the sheep before them.
All the townspeople came out to meet them and they danced to the music of the bagpipes and there was great rejoicing both over the death of the dragon and over the betrothal of the Princess and the brave shepherd.
The wedding took place at once and the wedding festivities lasted a week. Such feasting as the townspeople had! Such music and dancing!
When the wedding festivities were ended, the shepherd told the Tsar who he really was.
"You say you're a Prince!" the Tsar cried, perfectly delighted at this news. Then he declared he wasn't in the least surprised. In fact, he said, he had suspected as much from the first!
"Do you think it likely," he asked somewhat pompously, "that any daughter of mine would fall in love with a man who wasn't a prince?"
"I think I'd have fallen in love with you whatever you were!" whispered the Princess to her young husband. But she didn't let her father hear her!
The Prince told the Tsar about his brothers' captivity and how he must go home to release them, and theTsar at once said that he and his bride might go provided they returned as soon as possible.
They agreed to this and the Tsar fitted out a splendid escort for them and sent them away with his blessing.
So the Prince now traveled back through the towns and villages of three kingdoms, across rivers and over mountains, no longer a humble shepherd on foot, but a rich and mighty personage riding in a manner that befitted his rank.
When he reached the deserted mill, his friend the old woman was waiting for him.
"I know, my Prince, you have succeeded for the monster has disappeared."
"Yes, granny, you are right: I have succeeded. I found the dragon in the lake, and the boar in the dragon, and the rabbit in the boar, and the pigeon in the rabbit, and the sparrow in the pigeon. I took the sparrow and killed it. So you are free now, granny, to return to your home. And soon all those other poor captives will be free."
He went behind the mill and found the three willow saplings. He cut them off and struck the old root. Sure enough a heavy iron door opened. This led down into a deep dungeon which was crowded with unfortunate prisoners. The Prince led them all out and sent them their various ways. He found his own two brothers among them and led them home to his father.
There was great rejoicing in the King's house, and in the King's heart, too, for he had given up hope of ever seeing any of his sons again.
The King was so charmed with the Princess that he said it was a pity that she couldn't marry his oldest son so that she might one day be Queen.
"The Youngest Prince is a capable young man," the King said, "and there's no denying that he managed this business of killing the dragon very neatly. But he is after all only the Youngest Prince with very little hope of succeeding to the kingdom. If you hadn't married him in such haste one of his older brothers might easily have fallen in love with you."
"I don't regret my haste," the Princess said. "Besides he is now my father's heir. But that doesn't matter for I should be happy with the Youngest Prince if he were only a shepherd."
The Story of a Girl Whose Parents Were Ashamed of Her
There was once a poor laborer and his wife who had no children. Every day the woman would sigh and say:
"If only we had a child!"
Then the man would sigh, too, and say:
"It would be pleasant to have a little daughter, wouldn't it?"
At last they went on a pilgrimage to a holy shrine and there they prayed God to give them a child.
"Any kind of a child!" the woman prayed. "I'd be thankful for a child of our own even if it were a frog!"
God heard their prayer and sent them a little daughter—not a little girl daughter, however, but a little frog daughter. They loved their little frog child dearly and played with her and laughed and clapped their hands as they watched her hopping about the house. But when the neighbors came in and whispered: "Why, that child of theirs is nothing but a frog!" they were ashamed and they decided that when people were about they had better keep their child hidden in a closet.
So the frog girl grew up without playmates of her own age, seeing only her father and mother. She used to play about her father as he worked. He was a vine-dresser in a big vineyard and of course it was great fun for the little frog girl to hop about among the vines.
Every day at noontime the woman used to come to the vineyard carrying her husband's dinner in a basket. The years went by and she grew old and feeble and the daily trip to the vineyard began to tire her and the basket seemed to her to grow heavier and heavier.
"Let me help you, mother," the frog daughter said. "Let me carry father's dinner to him and you sit home and rest."
So from that time on the frog girl instead of the old woman carried the dinner basket to the vineyard. While the old man ate, the frog girl would hop up into the branches of a tree and sing. She sang very sweetly and her old father, when he petted her, used to call her his Little Singing Frog.
Now one day while she was singing the Tsar's Youngest Son rode by and heard her. He stopped his horse and looked this way and that but for the life of him he couldn't see who it was who was singing so sweetly.
"Who is singing?" he asked the old man.
But the old man who, as I told you before, wasashamed of his frog daughter before strangers, at first pretended not to hear and then, when the young Prince repeated his question, answered gruffly:
"There's no one singing!"
But the next day at the same hour when the Prince was again riding by he heard the same sweet voice and he stopped again and listened.
"Surely, old man," he said, "there is some one singing! It is a lovely girl, I know it is! Why, if I could find her, I'd be willing to marry her at once and take her home to my father, the Tsar!"
"Don't be rash, young man," the laborer said.
"I mean what I say!" the Prince declared. "I'd marry her in a minute!"
"Are you sure you would?"
"Yes, I'm sure!"
"Very well, then, we'll see."
The old man looked up into the tree and called:
"Come down, Little Singing Frog! A Prince wants to marry you!"
So the little frog girl hopped down from among the branches and stood before the Prince.
"She's my own daughter," the laborer said, "even if she does look like a frog."
"I don't care what she looks like," the Prince said."I love her singing and I love her. And I mean what I say: I'll marry her if she'll marry me. My father, the Tsar, bids me and my brothers present him our brides to-morrow. He bids all the brides bring him a flower and he says he'll give the kingdom to the prince whose bride brings the loveliest flower. Little Singing Frog, will you be my bride and will you come to Court to-morrow bringing a flower?"
"Yes, my Prince," the frog girl said, "I will. But I must not shame you by hopping to Court in the dust. I must ride. So, will you send me a snow-white cock from your father's barnyard?"
"I will," the Prince promised, and before night the snow-white cock had arrived at the laborer's cottage.
Early the next morning the frog girl prayed to the Sun.
"O golden Sun," she said, "I need your help! Give me some lovely clothes woven of your golden rays for I would not shame my Prince when I go to Court."
The Sun heard her prayer and gave her a gown of cloth of gold.
Instead of a flower she took a spear of wheat in her hand and then when the time came she mounted the white cock and rode to the palace.
This, the Bride of the Youngest Prince, Is My ChoiceThis, the Bride of the Youngest Prince, Is My Choice
The guards at the palace gate at first refused to admit her.
"This is no place for frogs!" they said to her. "You're looking for a pond!"
But when she told them she was the Youngest Prince's bride, they were afraid to drive her away. So they let her ride through the gate.
"Strange!" they murmured to one another. "The Youngest Prince's bride! She looks like a frog and that was certainly a cock she was riding, wasn't it?"
They stepped inside the gates to look after her and then they saw an amazing sight. The frog girl, still seated on the white cock, was shaking out the folds of a golden gown. She dropped the gown over her head and instantly there was no frog and no white cock but a lovely maiden mounted on a snow-white horse!
Well, the frog girl entered the palace with two other girls, the promised brides of the older princes. They were just ordinary girls both of them. To see them you wouldn't have paid any attention to them one way or the other. But standing beside the lovely bride of the Youngest Prince they seemed more ordinary than ever.
The first girl had a rose in her hand. The Tsar looked at it and at her, sniffed his nose slightly, and turned his head.
The second girl had a carnation. The Tsar looked at her for a moment and murmured:
"Dear me, this will never do!"
Then he looked at the Youngest Prince's bride and his eye kindled and he said:
"Ah! This is something like!"
She gave him the spear of wheat and he took it and held it aloft. Then he reached out his other hand to her and had her stand beside him as he said to his sons and all the Court:
"This, the bride of the Youngest Prince, is my choice! See how beautiful she is! And yet she knows the useful as well as the beautiful for she has brought me a spear of wheat! The Youngest Prince shall be the Tsar after me and she shall be Tsarina!"
So the little frog girl of whom her parents were ashamed married the Youngest Prince and when the time came wore a Tsarina's crown.
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The Story of the Sultan's Youngest Son and the Princess Flower o' the WorldThe Story of the Sultan's Youngest Son and the Princess Flower o' the World
There was once a Sultan who was so pious and devout that he spent many hours every day in prayer.
"For the glory of Allah," he thought to himself, "I ought to build the most beautiful mosque in the world."
So he called together the finest artisans in the country and told them what he wanted. He spent a third of his riches on the undertaking, and when the mosque was finished everybody said:
"See now, our Sultan has built the most beautiful mosque in the world for the greater glory of Allah!"
On the first day when the Sultan went to pray in the new mosque, a Dervish who was sitting cross-legged at the entrance spoke to him in a droning sing-song voice and said:
"Nay, but your mosque is not yet beautiful enough! There is something it lacks and your prayers will be unavailing!"
The words of the holy man grieved the Sultan and he had the mosque torn down and another built in its place even more beautiful.
"This is certainly the most beautiful mosque in the world!" the people said, and the Sultan's heart was very happy on the first day as he went in to pray.
But again the Dervish, seated at the entrance, said to him in his droning, sing-song voice:
"Nay, but your mosque is not yet beautiful enough! There is something it lacks and your prayers will be unavailing!"
At the holy man's words the Sultan had the second mosque torn down and a third one built, the most beautiful of them all. But when it was finished for a third time the Dervish droned out:
"Nay, but your mosque is not yet beautiful enough! There is something it lacks and your prayers will be unavailing!"
"What can I do?" the Sultan cried. "I have spent all my riches and now I have no means wherewith to build another mosque!"
He fell to grieving and nothing any one could say would comfort him.
His three sons came to him and said:
"Father, is there not something we can do for you?"
The Sultan sighed and shook his head.
"Nothing, my sons, unless indeed you were to findout for me why my third mosque is not the most beautiful in the world."
"Brothers," the youngest suggested, "let us go to the Dervish and ask him why it is that the third mosque is not yet beautiful enough. Perhaps he will tell us what is lacking."
So they went to the Dervish and asked him what he meant by saying to the Sultan that the third mosque was not yet beautiful enough and they begged him to tell them what it was that was lacking.
The Dervish fixed his eyes in the distance and slightly swaying his body back and forth answered them in his sing-song tone.
"The mosque is beautiful," he said, "and the fountain in its midst is beautiful, but where is the glorious Nightingale Gisar? With the Nightingale Gisar singing beside the fountain, then indeed would the Sultan's third mosque be the most beautiful mosque in the world!"
"Only tell us where this glorious Nightingale is," the brothers begged, "and we will get him if it costs us our lives!"
"I cannot tell you that," the Dervish droned. "You will have to go out into the world and find him for yourselves."
So the three brothers returned to the Sultan and told him what the Dervish had said.
"All your third mosque lacks to be the most beautiful mosque in the world," they told him, "is the Nightingale Gisar singing beside the fountain. So grieve no more, father. We, your three sons, will go out into the world in quest of this glorious bird and within a year's time we will return with the bird in our hands if so be that it is anywhere to be found in all the wide world."
The Sultan blessed them and they set forth the three of them, side by side. They traveled together until they reached a place where three roads branched. Upon the stone of the left-hand road nothing was written. Upon the stone of the middle road was the inscription:Who goes this way returns. The inscription on the third stone read:Who goes this way shall meet many dangers and may never return.
"Let us part here," the oldest brother said, "and each take a separate road. Then if all goes well, let us meet here again on this same spot one year hence. As our father's oldest son it would be wrong for me to run unnecessary risks, so I will take the left-hand road."
"And I will take the middle road," the second brother cried.
The Youngest Brother laughed and said:
"That leaves the dangerous road for me! Very well, brothers, that's the very road I wish to take for why should I leave home if it were not to have adventures! Farewell then until we meet again in one year's time."
The oldest traveled his safe road until he reached a city where he became a barber. He asked every man whose head he shaved:
"Do you know anything of the Nightingale Gisar?"
He never found any one who had even heard of the bird, so after a time he stopped asking.
The second brother followed the middle road to a city where he settled down and opened a coffee-house.
"Have you ever heard of a glorious Nightingale known as Gisar?" he asked at first of every traveler who came in and sipped his coffee. Not one of them ever had and as time went by the second brother gradually stopped even making inquiries.
The Youngest Brother who took the dangerous road came to no city at all but to a far-off desolate place without houses or highways or farms. Wild creatures hid in the brush and snakes glided in and out among the rocks. One day he came upon a wild woman who was combing her hair with a branch of juniper.
"That isn't the way to comb your hair," the Youngest Brother said. "Here, let me show you."
He took his own comb and smoothed out all the tangles in the wild woman's hair until she was comfortable and happy.
"You have been very kind to me," she said. "Now isn't there something I can do for you in return?"
"I am looking for the Nightingale Gisar. If you know where that glorious bird is, tell me and that will more than repay me."
But the wild woman had never heard of the Nightingale Gisar.
"Only wild animals inhabit this desolate place," she said, "and a few wild people like me. The Nightingale Gisar is not here."
"Then I must go farther," the Youngest Brother said.
This the wild woman begged him not to do.
"Beyond these mountains," she said, "is a wilder desert with fiercer animals. Turn back while you can."
"No," the Youngest Brother insisted, "I'm going as God leads me."
So he left the wild woman and crossed the mountains. He went on and on until he was footsore and weary. Then at last he came to the Tiger's house.
The Tiger's wife met him.
"Be off, young man!" she warned him, "or the Tiger when he comes home will eat you!"
"No!" said the Youngest Brother, "now I'm here I'm going to stay for I have a question to ask the Tiger."
The Tiger's wife was making bread. When the dough was ready to go into the oven, she leaned over the glowing embers of the fire and began to brush them aside with her body.
"Stop!" the Youngest Brother cried. "You will burn yourself!"
"But how else can I brush aside the glowing embers?" the Tiger's wife asked.
"I'll show you."
The Youngest Brother cut a branch from a tree outside and fashioned it into a rough broom. Then he showed the Tiger's wife how to use it.
"Ah!" she said gratefully, "before this always when I've baked bread I've been sick for ten days afterwards. Now I shall be sick no more for you have taught me how to use a broom. In return let me hide you in a dark corner and when the Tiger comes home I'll tell him how kind you have been and perhaps he will not eat you."
So she hid the Youngest Brother in a dark cornerand when the Tiger came home she met him and said:
"See, I have baked bread to-day but I am not sick, for a youth has shown me how I can brush aside the embers without burning myself."
The Tiger was overjoyed to hear that his wife had been able to bake bread without being made sick and he swore to be a brother to him who had taught her the use of a broom. So the Youngest Brother came out from the dark corner where he was hiding and the Tiger made him welcome.
"What are you doing wandering about in this wild country?" the Tiger asked.
"I am searching for the Nightingale Gisar and I have come to you to ask you if you can tell me where I can find that glorious bird."
The Tiger had never heard of the Nightingale Gisar but he thought that his oldest brother the Lion might know.
"Go straight on from here," he said, "until you come to the Lion's house. His old wife stands outside facing the house with her long thin old dugs thrown over her shoulders. Go up to her from behind and take her dugs and put them in your mouth and suck them and when she asks you who you are, say: 'Don't you know me,old mother? I'm your oldest cub.' Then she will lead you in to the Lion who is so old that his eyelids droop. Prop them open and when he sees you he will tell you what he knows."
So the Youngest Brother went on to the Lion's house and he found the Lion's old wife standing outside as the Tiger said he would. He did all the Tiger had told him to do and when the Lion's wife asked him who he was, he said: 'Don't you know me, old mother? I'm your oldest cub.' Then the Lion's old wife led him in to the Lion and he propped open the Lion's drooping eyelids and asked about the Nightingale Gisar.
The old Lion shook his head.
"I have never heard of the Nightingale Gisar. He has never sung in this wild place. Turn back, young man, and seek him elsewhere. Beyond this is a country of wilder creatures where you will only lose your life."
"That is as God wills," the Youngest Brother said.
With that he bade the old Lion and his old wife farewell and pushed on into the farther wilds. The mountains grew more and more rugged, the plains more parched and barren, and the Youngest Son was hard put to it to find food from day to day.
Once when he was crossing a desert three eaglesswooped down upon him and it was all he could do to fight them off. He slashed at them with his sword and succeeded in cutting off the beak of one, a wing of another, and a leg of the third. He put these three things in his bag as trophies.
He came at last to a hut where an old woman was baking cakes on the hearth.
"God bless you, granny!" he said. "Can you give me a bite of supper and shelter for the night?"
The old woman shook her head.
"My boy, you had better not stop here. I have three daughters and if they were to come home and find you here, they'd kill you."
But the Youngest Brother insisted that he was not afraid and at last the old woman let him stay. She hid him in the corner behind the firewood and warned him to keep still.
Presently the three eagles whom he had maimed came flying into the hut. The old woman put a bowl of milk on the table, the birds dipped in the milk, and lo! their feather shirts opened and they stepped out three maidens. One of them had lost her lips, one an arm, and the third a leg.
"Ah!" they cried to their mother, "see what has befallen us! If only the youth who maimed us would return the beak and the wing and the leg that he hacked off, we would tell him anything he wants to know."
At that the Youngest Brother stepped out from behind the firewood and said:
"Tell me then where I can find the Nightingale Gisar and you shall have back your beak and your wing and your leg."
He opened his bag and the maidens were overjoyed to see their beak and their wing and their leg. Then they told the Youngest Brother all they knew about the Nightingale Gisar.
"Far from here," they said, "there is a Warrior Princess, so beautiful that men call her Flower o' the World. She has the Nightingale Gisar in a golden cage hanging in her own chamber. The chamber door is guarded by a lion and a wolf and a tiger for the Flower o' the World knows that she will have to marry the man who steals from her the Nightingale Gisar."
"How can a man enter the chamber of the Flower o' the World?" the Youngest Brother asked.
"For a few moments at midnight," the sisters told him, "the three animals sleep. During those few moments a man could enter the chamber, get the Nightingale Gisar, and escape. But even then he might notbe safe for the Flower o' the World might gather her army together and pursue him."
"Now tell me how to reach the palace of that Warrior Princess, Flower o' the World."
"You could never get there alone," they told him, "the way is too long and the dangers are too many. Stay here with us for three months and at the end of three months we will carry you thither on our wings."
So for three months the Youngest Brother stayed on in the hut with the old woman and her three daughters. The three daughters flew in their eagle shirts to the spring of the Water of Life and bathing in that magic pool they made grow on again the beak and the wing and the leg which the Youngest Brother had hacked off.
At the end of three months they carried the Youngest Brother on their wings to the distant kingdom where the Warrior Princess, Flower o' the World, lived.
At midnight they set him down in front of the palace and he slipped unseen through the guards at the gate and through the halls of the palace to the Princess's own chamber. The lion, the wolf, and the tiger were asleep and he was able to push back the curtain before which they were lying and creep up to the Princess's very bedside without being discovered.
He looked once at the sleeping Flower o' the World and she was so beautiful that he dared not look again for fear he should forget the Nightingale Gisar and betray himself by crying out.
At the head of the bed were four lighted candles and at the foot four unlighted ones. He blew out the lighted ones and lit the others. Then quickly he took the golden cage in which the Nightingale Gisar was perched asleep, unfastened it from the golden chain on which it was hanging, and hurried out. The eagles were waiting for him and at once they spread their wings and carried him away.
They put him down at the crossroads where he had parted from his brothers just one year before. Then they bade him farewell and flew off to their home in the desert.
"My brothers will probably be here in an hour or so," the Youngest Son thought. "I had better wait for them."
He felt sleepy, so he lay down by the roadside and closed his eyes.
While he slept his brothers arrived and of course the first thing they saw was the golden cage and the Nightingale Gisar.
Then envy and hatred filled their hearts and theybegan cursing and complaining to think that he who was the Youngest had succeeded where they had failed.
"We'll be the laughing-stock of the whole country!" they said, "if we let him come home carrying the Nightingale Gisar! Let us take the bird while he sleeps and hurry home with it. Then if he comes home later and says it was he who really found the bird no one will believe him."
So they beat their brother into insensibility and tore his clothes to rags to make him think that he had been set upon by robbers, and then taking the golden cage and the Nightingale Gisar they hurried home and presented themselves to their father, the Sultan.
"Here, O father," they said, "is the Nightingale Gisar! To get this glorious bird for you we have endured all the perils in the world!"
"And your Youngest Brother," the Sultan asked, "where is he?"
"The Youngest? Think no more of him, father, for he is unworthy to be your son. Instead of searching the wide world for the Nightingale Gisar, he settled down in the first city he reached and lived a life of idleness and ease. Some say he became a barber and some say he opened a coffee-house and spent his days chatting with passing travelers. He has not come home with us for no doubt it shames him to know that we have succeeded where he has failed."
The Sultan was grieved to hear this evil report of his Youngest Son, but he was overjoyed to have the Nightingale Gisar. He had the golden cage carried to the mosque and hung beside the fountain in the court.
But imagine his disappointment when the bird refused to sing!
"Let him who found the Nightingale come to the mosque," the Dervish said in his droning sing-song voice, "and then the Nightingale will sing."
The Sultan immediately sent for his two sons. They came but still the bird was silent.
"See now," the Sultan said, "my two sons are here and yet the bird is silent."
But the Dervish would only repeat:
"Let him who found the Nightingale come to the mosque and then the Nightingale will sing."
The next day a youth in rags whom nobody knew entered the mosque to pray and instantly the Nightingale began to sing.
A messenger was sent running to the Sultan with the news that the Nightingale was singing. The Sultan hurried to the mosque but by the time he got therethe beggar youth was gone and the Nightingale had stopped singing.
"Now that I'm here," cried the Sultan, "why does the bird not sing?"
The Dervish, swaying his body gently back and forth, made answer as before:
"Let him who found the Nightingale come to the mosque and then the Nightingale will sing."
Thereafter every day when the beggar youth came to the mosque to pray the Nightingale sang, and always when the Sultan approached the beggar walked away and the bird stopped singing. At last people began whispering:
"Strange that the Nightingale should sing only when that beggar youth is near! And yet the Dervish says it will not sing unless he who found it comes to the mosque! What can he mean?"
Report of the beggar youth reached the ears of the Sultan and he went to the Dervish and questioned him.
"Why do you say that the Nightingale Gisar will not sing unless he who found him comes to the mosque? Lo, here are my two sons who found him and the bird remains silent, yet people tell me that when a certain beggar comes to the mosque he sings. Why does he not sing when I and my two sons come to pray?"
And always the Dervish made the same answer in the same sing-song voice:
"Let him who found the Nightingale come to the mosque and then the Nightingale will sing."
Soon a terrifying rumor spread through the land that a great Warrior Princess called Flower o' the World was coming with a mighty army to make war on the Sultan and to destroy his city. Her army far outnumbered the Sultan's and when she encamped in a broad valley over against the city the Sultan's people, seeing her mighty hosts, were filled with dread and besought their ruler to make peace with the Princess at any cost. So the Sultan called his heralds and sent them to her and through them he said:
"Demand of me what you will even to my life but spare my city."
The Warrior Princess returned this answer:
"I will spare you and your city provided you deliver me your son who stole from me the Nightingale Gisar. Him I shall have executed or let live as it pleases me."
Now the Sultan's two sons knew that the Flower o' the World was fated to marry the man who had stolen from her the Nightingale Gisar, so when they heard the Princess's demand they were overjoyed thinkingthat she would have to fall in love with one of them. So they disputed at great length as to which of them had done the actual deed of taking the bird, each insisting that it was he and not his brother. The Sultan himself had finally to decide between them.
"You have told me," he said, "that you captured the bird together. As that is the case and as I can't send you both to the Warrior Princess it is only right that the older should go."
So under a splendid escort the oldest son rode to the tent of the Warrior Princess. She bade him enter alone and when he appeared before her she looked at him long and steadily. Then she said:
"Nay, but you are never the man who stole from me the Nightingale Gisar! You would lack the courage to face the perils of the way!"
The oldest prince answered the Flower o' the World craftily:
"But how, Princess, if I did not steal from you the Nightingale Gisar was I then able to bring back that glorious bird and hang his cage beside the fountain in the mosque?"
But Flower o' the World was not to be deceived by such specious words.
"Tell me then," she said, "if it was you who stolemy glorious Nightingale, where did you find him hanging in his golden cage?"
The oldest prince could not answer this, so he said at random:
"I found his golden cage hanging in the cypress tree that grows in the garden of your palace."
"Enough!" cried the Princess.
She clapped her hands and when her guards appeared she said to them:
"Have this man executed at once and let his head be sent to the Sultan with the message:This is the head of a liar and a coward! Send me at once your son who stole my glorious Nightingale Gisar or I will march against your city!"
The Sultan was greatly shocked to receive this message together with the head of his oldest son.
"Alas!" he cried, calling his second son, "would that I had listened to you when you insisted that it was you and not your brother who actually did the deed! Unhappily I listened to your brother! See now the awful result of this mistake! Go you now to this heartless Princess whom men call Flower o' the World or else our poor defenseless city will have to pay the penalty."
So the second prince was taken to the tent of the Warrior Maiden and she put to him the same questionsand he fared even worse than his brother had fared. So his head, too, was sent to the Sultan with this message:
"Send me no more liars and cowards but the son who actually did steal from me my glorious Nightingale Gisar."
In despair the Sultan went to the mosque to pray. As he bowed his head he heard the Nightingale burst forth in song. Then when he looked up he saw a beggar youth standing near the fountain.
When his prayers were finished the Sultan went outside to the Dervish and said to him:
"The Warrior Princess, Flower o' the World, demands that I send her another son. I know not where my Third Son is. What shall I do?"
Without looking at the Sultan the Dervish answered in his sing-song voice:
"Send her the son for whom the Nightingale sings."
The Sultan turned away in disappointment, not understanding what the Dervish meant, but one of his attendants plucked his sleeve and whispered:
"The Nightingale sings for yonder beggar youth. Perhaps it is he the Dervish means. Why not ask him if he will go to Flower o' the World in place of your Youngest Son?"