What said the king? ‘My old man, here is the maiden whom you demand. Take her to you.’
And he gave him also a house by itself for her to live in with her husband. She, the bride, trembled at him.
The snake said, ‘Fear not, my wife, for I am no snake as you see me. Behold me as I am.’
He turned a somersault, and became a golden youth, in armour clad; he had but to wish to get anything. The maiden, when she saw that, took him in her arms and kissed him, and said, ‘Live, my king, many years. I thought you would eat me.’
The king sent a man to see how it fares with his daughter. When the king’s servant came, what does he see? The maiden fairer, lovelier than before. He went back to the king. ‘O king, your daughter is safe and sound.’
‘As God wills with her,’ said the king. Then he called many people and held the marriage; and they kept it up three days and three nights, and the marriage was consummated. And I came away and told the story.
Cf. Hahn’s No. 31, ‘Schlangenkind’ (i. 212) and notes, but the stories are not identical; and his No. 100, especially the note (ii. 313) for Indian version. Wratislaw’s Croatian story, No. 54, ‘The Wonder-3working Lock,’ p. 284 (see under No. 54), offers striking analogies. Cf. too for cobra palace, Mary Frere’s Old Deccan Days, p. 21.
No. 8.—The Bad Mother
There was an emperor. He had been married ten years, but had no children. And God granted that his empress conceived and bore a son. Now that son was heroic; there was none other found like him. And the father lived half a year longer, and died. Then what is the lad to do? He took and departed in quest of heroic achievements. And he journeyed a long while, and took no heed, and came into a great forest. In that forest there was a certain house, and in that house were twelve dragons. Then the lad went straight thither, and saw that there was no one. He opened the door and went in, and he saw a sabre on a nail and took it, and posted himself behind the door, and waited for the [[25]]coming of the dragons. They, when they came, did not go in all at once, but went in one by one. The lad waited, sabre in hand; and as each one went in, he cut off his head, flung it on the floor. So the lad killed eleven dragons, and the youngest dragon remained. And the lad went out to him, and took and fought with him, and fought half a day. And the lad vanquished the dragon, and took him and put him in a jar, and fastened it securely.