Page:Grimm's Household Tales, vol.1.djvu/488

 406 she sees from her window the musician turning a little reel; and while he is doing it the most delightful tones resound; she wants to see it, and asks to have one like it; but the goldsmiths are still less able to produce such a skilful piece of workmanship. And now the handsome musician offers her the little wheel and the reel if she will marry him, and, as her longing for both is so great, she says, yes. Soon, however, repentance comes, and her pride lets her have no rest. She wants to retract her promise, but the King forces her to keep it, and the wedding is celebrated. Then the musician conducts her to the wretched hut in the forest. The rest of the story agrees with ours, and makes it more complete. At the ball when the pan with the food falls down on the ground, she faints with terror. When she awakes, she is lying in a magnificent bed, and the handsome musician is a king. A fourth story has the following peculiarity. The King's daughter made it known that she would give her hand to him who could guess to what species of animal a skin which was stretched out with neither a head nor feet, belonged. It was that of a she-wolf. Thrushbeard learnt the secret, guessed wrongly with great persistence, and then came back disguised as a beggar to guess rightly. Compare No 2. in Pröhle's Kindermärchen. Also (4. 10) in the Pentamerone, Pride punished; in Norwegian, Hakon Borkenbart, Asbjörnsen, part 2.

Thrushbeard (Drosselbart) is also called "Crumb-beard" (Bröselbart), because the crumbs of bread remain sticking in his beard. A "Brochselhart" appears in a song of Nithard (Benecke's Beiträge, p. 291); perhaps it is Brochselhart. The two names are indeed almost convertible, for in Ulfilas a crumb is called drauhsna; we may however also derive Drosselbart from Drossel, Drüssel, Rüssel (snout), mouth, nose, or beak, which also would suit the story.

From various stories from Hesse, where this story is one of the best known of all, yet even in that district, where High German especially prevails, the Low German name of Sneewitchen is retained, or even corrupted into Schliwitchen. In the opening it is like the story of the Juniper-tree; and it is still more like it in another story where the Queen, whilst driving with the King in the sledge, peels an apple, and cuts her finger while doing it. Another beginning of the story is this. A Count and Countess were driving past three heaps of white snow, and the Count said, "How I wish I had a girl as white as this snow!" Soon they came to three pits filled with red blood, and again he spoke, and said, "I wish I had a girl with cheeks as red as this blood." Finally, three black ravens flew by, and he wished for "a girl with hair as black as those ravens."