“What a wonderful horn!” said the shepherd; “it sings by itself; I must
take it to my lord the King.” And when he came with it to the King the
horn again began to sing its little song. The King understood it all,
and caused the ground below the bridge to be dug up, and then the whole
skeleton of the murdered man came to light. The wicked brother could
not deny the deed, and was sewn up in a sack and drowned. But the bones
of the murdered man were laid to rest in a beautiful tomb in the
churchyard.
29 The Devil With the Three Golden Hairs
There was once a poor woman who gave birth to a little son; and as he
came into the world with a caul on, it was predicted that in his
fourteenth year he would have the King’s daughter for his wife. It
happened that soon afterwards the King came into the village, and no
one knew that he was the King, and when he asked the people what news
there was, they answered, “A child has just been born with a caul on;
whatever any one so born undertakes turns out well. It is prophesied,
too, that in his fourteenth year he will have the King’s daughter for
his wife.”
The King, who had a bad heart, and was angry about the prophecy, went
to the parents, and, seeming quite friendly, said, “You poor people,
let me have your child, and I will take care of it.” At first they
refused, but when the stranger offered them a large amount of gold for
it, and they thought, “It is a luck-child, and everything must turn out
well for it,” they at last consented, and gave him the child.
The King put it in a box and rode away with it until he came to a deep
piece of water; then he threw the box into it and thought, “I have
freed my daughter from her unlooked-for suitor.”
The box, however, did not sink, but floated like a boat, and not a drop
of water made its way into it. And it floated to within two miles of
the King’s chief city, where there was a mill, and it came to a
stand-still at the mill-dam. A miller’s boy, who by good luck was
standing there, noticed it and pulled it out with a hook, thinking that
he had found a great treasure, but when he opened it there lay a pretty
boy inside, quite fresh and lively. He took him to the miller and his
wife, and as they had no children they were glad, and said, “God has
given him to us.” They took great care of the foundling, and he grew up
in all goodness.
It happened that once in a storm, the King went into the mill, and he
asked the mill-folk if the tall youth was their son. “No,” answered
they, “he’s a foundling. Fourteen years ago he floated down to the
mill-dam in a box, and the mill-boy pulled him out of the water.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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