“Child,” said the old woman, “what a fright you look. Come, I will lace you properly for once.”
Little Snow-White had no suspicion, but stood before her, and let herself be laced with the new laces. But the old woman laced so quickly and laced so tightly that little Snow-White lost her breath and fell down as if dead.
“Now I am the most beautiful,” said the Queen to herself, and ran away.
Not long afterward, in the evening, the Seven Dwarfs came home. But how shocked they were when they saw their dear little Snow-White lying on the ground, and that she neither stirred nor moved, and seemed to be dead. They lifted her up, and, as they saw that she was laced too tightly, they cut the laces. Than she began to breathe a little, and after a while came to life again.
When the Dwarfs heard what had happened, they said, “The old pedler-woman was no one else than the wicked Queen. Take care and let no one come in when we are not with you.”
But the wicked woman, when she had reached home, went in front of the Glass and asked:
“Looking-Glass, Looking-Glass, on the wall,
Who in this land is the fairest of all?”
and it answered as before:
“Oh, Queen, thou art fairest of all I see,
But over the hills, where the Seven Dwarfs dwell,
Little Snow-White is alive and well,
And none is so fair as she.”
When she heard that, all her blood rushed to her heart with fear, for she saw plainly that little Snow-White was again alive. “But now,” she said, “I will think of something that shall put an end to you,” and by the help of witchcraft, which she understood, she made a poisonous comb.