"Well," she said to her, "without my little hood where would you be now, darling?" And, to restore heart and legs to the child, she made her eat a good piece of her cake, and drink a good draught of wine, after which she took her by the hand and led her back to the house.
And then, who was it who scolded her when she knew all that had happened?
It was the mother.
But Blanchette promised over and over again that she would never more stop to listen to a wolf, so that at last the mother forgave her.
And Blanchette, the Little Golden Hood, kept her word. And in fine weather she may still be seen in the fields with her pretty little hood, the color of the sun.
But to see her you must rise early.
[163]
The next Perrault story is given in the traditional English form made by "R. S., Gent." Perrault met the popular taste of his time for "morals" by adding more or less playful ones in verse to his stories. Here is a prose rendering of a portion of the Moralité attached to "Puss-in-Boots": "However great may be the advantage of enjoying a rich inheritance coming down from father to son, industry and ingenuity are worth more to young people as a usual thing than goods acquired without personal effort." In relation to this moral, Ralston says, "the conclusion at which an ordinary reader would arrive, if he were not dazzled by fairy-land glamor, would probably be that far better than either tact and industry on a master's part is the loyalty of an unscrupulous retainer of an imaginative turn of mind. The impropriety of this teaching is not balanced by any other form of instruction. What the story openly inculcates is not edifying, and it does not secretly convey any improving doctrine." But on the other hand it may be argued that the "moral" passes over the child's head. Miss Kready, in her Study of Fairy Tales (p. 275), makes a very elaborate and proper defense of "Puss-in-Boots" as a story for children. There is delight in its strong sense of adventure, it has a hero clever and quick, there is loyalty, love, and sacrifice in Puss's devotion to his master, the tricks are true to "cat-nature," there are touches of nature beauty, a simple and pleasing plot, while we should not forget the delightful Ogre and his transformations into Lion and Mouse. The story is found in many forms among many different peoples. Perhaps the great stroke of genius which endears Perrault's version is in the splendid boots with which his tale provides the hero so that briers may not interfere with his doings. (Extended studies of this tale and its many parallels may be found in Lang's Perrault's Popular Tales; in McCulloch's Childhood of Fiction, chap. viii; in an article by Ralston in the Nineteenth Century, January, 1883, reprinted in Living Age, Vol. CLVI, p. 362.)
PUSS-IN-BOOTS
There was once a miller who left no more estate to the three sons he had than his mill, his ass, and his cat. The partition was soon made. Neither the clerk nor the attorney was sent for. They would soon have eaten up all the poor patrimony. The eldest had the mill, the second the ass, and the youngest nothing but the cat.