Page:Grimm's household tales, volume 2 (1884).djvu/402

388 thee back for the evil thou hast done me, but I am sorry for thee. I am the king of the elves. I will take thee out of the cavern; for if thou remainest here one second longer, all will be over with thee." The knight replies, "If I am to die the death immediately, I will not go away until I know whether the king's daughters are concealed here or not." Then the elf says, "They are in this subterranean cavern, guarded by three dragons; the eldest is imprisoned in the first cave, and a three-headed dragon is with her. He lays his heads on her lap every noon, and she has to comb them until he falls asleep. In front of the door a basket is hanging in which are a flute, a wand, and a sword, and the three crowns belonging to the princesses are in it too. Thou must first carry away the basket and place it in safety, then grasp the sword and go in and cut the dragon's heads off, but cut off all three at once for if thou failest to cut off one the others will grow again immediately, and nothing can save thee." Then he gives him a bell, and says if he rings it, he will instantly hasten to his assistance. After he has released the eldest, he releases the second from a seven-headed dragon, and the third who is guarded by a nine-headed one. Then he takes them to the bucket in which he has been let down, and calls to his companions to draw it up again. So they draw up the three princesses one after the other, and when they are up, the two faithless companions throw down the rope intending him to perish down below but he rings the bell, on which the elf appears, and bids him play the flute, and as he does that, many thousand elves hurry up to him. Then their king orders them to make stairs for the knight, and tells him that when he is up he is to strike the ground with the wand which is in the basket. So the elves place themselves together and form a staircase up which the knight ascends, and when he is above, he strikes the ground with the rod, on which they instantly vanish again.

A third story from the neighbourhood of Hanover contains the following peculiarities. The three princesses are carried away while bathing. Instead of the dwarf, an aged man appears to the three who go out in search of them, and when he asks the third for some food, the latter orders him to draw a wedge out of a cleft bit of wood. While the old man is stooping the other pulls out the axe and wedges him fast by the beard, which is hanging down in the cleft. The aged man tears his beard out by force, and runs away; they follow his bloody track, and thus come to the cave in the earth wherein the princesses are confined. When the third has been left behind all alone, and plays the flute, a handsome man appears, who leads him out of the cave by a long passage, gives him the dresses in which the three princesses were stolen, which they have forgotten to take away with them and tells him to go to the court-tailor, and engage himself