East of the Sun and West of the Moon: Old Tales from the North. Asbjørnsen Peter Christen
lad might have the key if he had a mind to milk the lions. So the lad took the key and a milking pail, and strode off; and when he unlocked the gate and got into the garden, there stood all the twelve lions on their hind-paws, rampant and roaring at him. But the lad laid hold of the biggest, and led him about by the fore-paws, and dashed him against stocks and stones till there wasn’t a bit of him left but the two paws. So when the rest saw that, they were so afraid that they crept up and lay at his feet like so many curs. After that they followed him about wherever he went, and when he got home, they lay down outside the house, with their fore-paws on the door sill.
“Now, mother, you’ll soon be well,” said the lad, when he went in, “for here is the lion’s milk.”
He had just milked a drop in the pail.
But the Troll, as he lay in bed, swore it was all a lie. He was sure the lad was not the man to milk lions.
When the lad heard that, he forced the Troll to get out of bed, threw open the door, and all the lions rose up and seized the Troll, and at last the lad had to make them leave their hold.
That night the Troll began to talk to the old dame again. “I’m sure I can’t tell how to put this lad out of the way – he is so awfully strong; can’t you think of some way?”
“No,” said the old dame, “if you can’t tell, I’m sure I can’t.”
“Well!” said the Troll, “I have two brothers in a castle; they are twelve times as strong as I am, and that’s why I was turned out and had to put up with this farm. They hold that castle, and round it there is an orchard with apples in it, and whoever eats those apples sleeps for three days and three nights. If we could only get the lad to go for the fruit, he wouldn’t be able to keep from tasting the apples, and as soon as ever he fell asleep my brothers would tear him in pieces.”
The old dame said she would sham sick, and say she could never be herself again unless she tasted those apples; for she had set her heart on them.
All this the lad lay and listened to.
When the morning came the old dame was so poorly that she couldn’t utter a word but groans and sighs. She was sure she should never be well again, unless she had some of those apples that grew in the orchard near the castle where the man’s brothers lived; only she had no one to send for them.
Oh! the lad was ready to go that instant; but the eleven lions went with him. So when he came to the orchard, he climbed up into the apple tree and ate as many apples as he could, and he had scarce got down before he fell into a deep sleep; but the lions all lay round him in a ring. The third day came the Troll’s brothers, but they did not come in man’s shape. They came snorting like man-eating steeds, and wondered who it was that dared to be there, and said they would tear him to pieces, so small that there should not be a bit of him left. But up rose the lions and tore the Trolls into small pieces, so that the place looked as if a dung heap had been tossed about it; and when they had finished the Trolls they lay down again. The lad did not wake till late in the afternoon, and when he got on his knees and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, he began to wonder what had been going on, when he saw the marks of hoofs. But when he went towards the castle, a maiden looked out of a window who had seen all that had happened, and she said:
“You may thank your stars you weren’t in that tussle, else you must have lost your life.”
“What! I lose my life! No fear of that, I think,” said the lad.
So she begged him to come in, that she might talk with him, for she hadn’t seen a Christian soul ever since she came there. But when she opened the door the lions wanted to go in too, but she got so frightened that she began to scream, and so the lad let them lie outside. Then the two talked and talked, and the lad asked how it came that she, who was so lovely, could put up with those ugly Trolls. She never wished it, she said; ’twas quite against her will. They had seized her by force, and she was the King of Arabia’s daughter. So they talked on, and at last she asked him what he would do; whether she should go back home, or whether he would have her to wife. Of course he would have her, and she shouldn’t go home.
After that they went round the castle, and at last they came to a great hall, where the Trolls’ two great swords hung high up on the wall.
“I wonder if you are man enough to wield one of these,” said the Princess.
“Who? I?” said the lad. “’Twould be a pretty thing if I couldn’t wield one of these.”
With that he put two or three chairs one a-top of the other, jumped up, and touched the biggest sword with his finger tips, tossed it up in the air, and caught it again by the hilt; leapt down, and at the same time dealt such a blow with it on the floor that the whole hall shook. After he had thus got down, he thrust the sword under his arm and carried it about with him.
So, when they had lived a little while in the castle, the Princess thought she ought to go home to her parents, and let them know what had become of her; so they loaded a ship, and she set sail from the castle.
After she had gone, and the lad had wandered about a little, he called to mind that he had been sent out on an errand thither, and had come to fetch something for his mother’s health; and though he said to himself, “After all the old dame was not so bad but she’s all right by this time” – still he thought he ought to go and just see how she was. So he went and found both the man and his mother quite fresh and hearty.
“What wretches you are to live in this beggarly hut,” said the lad. “Come with me up to my castle, and you shall see what a fine fellow I am.”
Well! they were both ready to go, and on the way his mother talked to him, and asked how it was he had got so strong.
“If you must know it came of that blue belt which lay on the hill-side that time when you and I were out begging,” said the lad.
“Have you got it still?” asked she.
“Yes” – he had. It was tied round his waist.
“Might she see it?”
“Yes” – she might; and with that he pulled open his waistcoat and shirt to show it to her.
Then she seized it with both hands, tore it off, and twisted it round her fist.
“Now,” she cried, “what shall I do with such a wretch as you? I’ll just give you one blow, and dash your brains out!”
“Far too good a death for such a scamp,” said the Troll. “No! let’s first burn out his eyes, and then turn him adrift in a little boat.”
So they burned out his eyes and turned him adrift, in spite of his prayers and tears; but, as the boat drifted, the lions swam after, and at last they laid hold of it and dragged it ashore on an island, and placed the lad under a fir tree. They caught game for him, and they plucked the birds and made him a bed of down; but he was forced to eat his meat raw and he was blind. At last, one day the biggest lion was chasing a hare which was blind, for it ran straight over stock and stone, and the end was, it ran right up against a fir-stump and tumbled head over heels across the field right into a spring; but lo! when it came out of the spring it saw its way quite plain, and so saved its life.
“So, so!” thought the lion, and went and dragged the lad to the spring, and dipped him over head and ears in it. So, when he had got his sight again, he went down to the shore and made signs to the lions that they should all lie close together like a raft; then he stood upon their backs while they swam with him to the mainland. When he had reached the shore he went up into a birchen copse, and made the lions lie quiet. Then he stole up to the castle, like a thief, to see if he couldn’t lay hands on his belt; and when he got to the door, he peeped through the keyhole, and there he saw his belt hanging up over a door in the kitchen. So he crept softly in across the floor, for there was no one there; but as soon as he had got hold of the belt, he began to kick and stamp about as though he were mad. Just then his mother came rushing out:
“Dear heart, my darling little boy! do give me the belt again,” she said.
“Thank you kindly,”