“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 the Glass speak thus, she trembled and shook with rage. “Little Snow-White shall die,” she cried, “even if it costs me my life!”
Thereupon she went into a secret, lonely room, where no one ever came, and there she made a very poisonous apple. Outside it looked pretty, white with a red cheek, so that every one who saw it longed for it. But whoever ate a piece of it must surely die.
When the apple was ready, she painted her face, and dressed herself as a countrywoman, and so she went over the Seven Mountains to the Seven Dwarfs. She knocked at the door. Little Snow-White put her head out of the window and said, “I cannot let any one in. The Seven Dwarfs have forbidden me.”
“It is all the same to me,” answered the woman, “I shall soon get rid of my apples. There, I will give you one.”
“No,” said little Snow-White, “I dare not take anything.”
“Are you afraid of poison?” said the old woman. “Look, I will cut the apple in two pieces. You eat the red cheek, and I will eat the white.”
The apple was so cunningly made that only the red cheek was poisoned. Little Snow-White longed for the fine apple, and when she saw that the woman ate part of it, she could resist no longer, and stretched out her hand and took the poisonous half. But hardly had she a bit of it in her mouth, than she fell down dead.
Then the Queen looked at her with a dreadful look, and laughed aloud, and said, “White as snow, red as blood, black as ebony-wood! This time the Dwarfs cannot wake you up again!”
And when she asked of the Looking-Glass at home: