Danish ballads

by Unknown

28

“I think not of the big ones, I think not of the small,

Of the baby in the cradle I’ll think least of all!”

—Ha ha ha!

Of the baby in the cradle I’ll think least of all.

XX
THE ENCHANTED MAIDEN

The story told by this Ballad takes us into no very remote region of Faërie; wicked stepdame, enchanted maid, and knightly deliverer are all familiar personages. The belief in human blood as means whereby the bewitched mortal is delivered from the beast-likeness is found in the folk-lore of many nations, and may be a dim memory of sacrificial cannibal feasts. But the beautiful Introductory Stanzas are noteworthy; for such detailed descriptions of Nature occur but rarely in Ballads, Danish or other. This one recalls the famous opening of one among the Ballads of Robin Hood:

“In summer when the shawes be sheen,

And leves be large and long,