( Kreutzwald .)
Once upon a time there lived a king who was so mild and good to his subjects that there was no one who did not bless him, and pray to the Heavenly Father to grant him a long life.
The king had lived happily with his wife for many years, but as yet no child had blessed his marriage. Great was the rejoicing of the king and all his subjects when at length the queen brought a fair child into the world. But their happiness was short-lived, for three days after the birth of the prince, the mother closed her eyes for ever, leaving her child an orphan and her husband a widower. The king mourned grievously for the loss of his dear consort, and his subjects mourned with him, and there was not a cheerful face to be seen anywhere. Three years afterwards the king married again, in deference to the wishes of his subjects, but he was unfortunate in his second choice. He had buried a dove and married a hawk in her place, and unfortunately it goes thus with many widowers. The new consort was a wicked, hard-hearted woman, who never showed any good-will towards the king and his subjects. She could not bear the sight of the former queen's son, as she feared that the succession would fall to him, for the people loved him greatly for his mother's sake. The crafty queen conceived the wicked design of sending the boy to some place where the king would be unable to discover him, for she had not courage to murder him. She paid a wicked old woman a large sum to help her to carry out her infamous design. The child was handed over to the old woman at night, and she carried it far away along unfrequented paths, and delivered it to some poor people to adopt as their child. On the way, the old woman stripped off the child's good clothes, and wrapped it in rags, so that no one should discover the deceit. The queen had bound her by a solemn oath never to reveal to any one the place to which she had carried the prince. The child-stealer did not venture to travel by day, because she feared pursuit, so that it was a long time before she found a sufficiently retired spot. At last she reached a lonely house in a wood, where the feet of strangers rarely penetrated, and she thought this a suitable abode for the prince, and paid the peasant a hundred roubles for the expense of bringing up the child. It was lucky for the prince that he had fallen among good people, who cared for him as if he had been their own dear child. The lively boy often made them laugh, especially when he called himself a prince. They saw from the liberal payment that they had received that the boy could be from no common stock, and that he must be of noble birth on either the father's or the mother's side, but their ideas never soared high enough to fancy the boy's sallies to be actual truth.
It can easily be imagined how great was the consternation at the palace when it was discovered in the morning that the prince had been stolen during the night, and in so strange a manner that no one had heard anything, and that not the slightest trace of the thief was left behind. The king wept bitterly for days for his son, whom he loved so tenderly in remembrance of his mother, and all the more because he was so unhappy with his new consort. Every place was searched thoroughly for a long time for some trace of the vanished child, and a great reward was offered to any one who could give any information; but every effort was vain, and it seemed as if the boy had been blown away. None of the searchers found his way to the lonely cottage in the wood where the prince lived, and no one brought the news to the inhabitants. No one could discover the secret, and many people thought that the prince had been carried away by an evil spirit or by witchcraft. But while the prince was wept for at home as if he was dead, he grew up in the lonely forest, and prospered wonderfully, till he grew to such an age that he was fit for work. Meantime he developed such wonderful intelligence, that his foster-parents were often obliged to admit that the egg was much cleverer than the hen.
The prince had lived thus for more than ten years, when he became anxious to associate with other people. He begged his foster-parents to allow him to earn his bread with his own hands, and said, "I have strength and understanding enough to keep myself without your help. I find the time very long during this lonely life here." His foster-parents opposed the plan at first, but were at length obliged to consent and to gratify the young fellow's wish. The peasant himself accompanied him in search of suitable employment. He found a rich farmer in a village who wanted a herd-boy, and as his foster-son wanted just such a post, they soon came to an agreement. The arrangement was made for a year, but it was settled that the boy might leave his employment at any time and return to his foster-parents. It was also settled that if the farmer was dissatisfied with the boy, he might send him away during the course of the year, but not without informing his foster-parents.
The village where the prince had thus taken service was not far from a great highway, along which many people passed daily, both high and low. The royal herd-boy often sat close to the road, and talked to the passers-by, from whom he learned many things which would otherwise have remained unknown to him. So it happened one day that an old man with grey hair and a long white beard passed that way when the prince was sitting on a stone and playing the flute while the animals were grazing, and if one of them strayed too far from the others, the boy's dog drove it back. The old man gazed awhile at the boy and his flock, and then he went a few paces nearer and said, "You don't seem to have been born a herd-boy." The boy answered, "It may be so; I only know that I was born to be a ruler, and first learned the business of a ruler. If it goes well with the quadrupeds, I will perhaps try my fortune later on with the bipeds." The old man shook his head in wonder and went his way. Another time a handsome coach passed by, in which sat a lady and two children. There was a coachman on the box and a footman behind. The prince happened to have a basket of freshly-plucked strawberries in his hand, which attracted the notice of the proud Saxon lady. [151] She ordered the coachman to stop, and called out from the coach-window, "Come here, you lout, and bring me the strawberries. I will give you a few copecks for them, to buy wheaten bread." The royal herd-boy did as if he had heard nothing, and did not imagine that the order was addressed to him, while the lady called out a second and a third time; but it was as if she had spoken to the wind. Then she called to the footman behind, "Go and give that vagabond a box on the ear, to teach him to listen." The footman jumped down to execute the order. But before he reached him, the herd-boy jumped up, seized a thick stick, and called out to the footman, "If you don't want a broken head, don't come a step nearer, or I'll smash your face." The footman went back and reported the occurrence. Then the lady cried out angrily, "What, you rascal, are you afraid of this lout of a boy? Go and take away his basket by force. I'll show him who I am, and I'll punish his parents too, for not bringing him up better."
"Oho!" cried the herd-boy, who heard the order. "As long as there is any life in my limbs, nobody shall deprive me of my rightful property by force. I'll stamp anybody to broth who tries to rob me of my strawberries." As he spoke, he spat on his hands, and whirled his cudgel round his head till it whistled. When the footman saw it, he had not the least desire to attempt it, but the lady drove away with violent threats, declaring that she would not permit this insult to remain unpunished. Other herd-boys who had seen and heard the affair from a distance related it to their companions in the evening. The people were all frightened, for they thought it would fare ill with them also if the great lady complained to the authorities about the boy's stupid obstinacy and an inquiry was ordered. The prince's master scolded him, and said, "I can't say anything in your favour, and what you've cooked you must eat yourself." The boy replied, "I shall come off scatheless; that's my affair. God has put a mouth in my head and a tongue in my mouth, and I can speak for myself if necessary, and I won't ask you to be my advocate. If the lady had asked for the strawberries in a proper way, I would have given them to her; but how dared she call me a lout? My nose [152] is just as clean as hers."
Meantime the lady drove to the royal city, where she had nothing more pressing to do than to complain to the authorities of the insolent behaviour of the herd-boy. An investigation was ordered at once, and the youth and his master were ordered to appear before the authorities. When the messenger entered the village to enforce the order, the prince said, "My master has nothing to do with this affair, and I myself must answer for what I did yesterday." They wanted to bind his hands behind his back, and to lead him before the court as a prisoner, but he drew a sharp knife from his pocket, stepped some paces back, turned the point against his breast, and cried out, "No one shall bind me while I live! Rather than let you bind me, I will thrust the knife into my heart. You may then bind my corpse, or do whatever you please with it, but no man shall lay a cord or fetter on me while I live. I am quite ready to appear before the court and give evidence, but I will never go there as a prisoner." His boldness frightened the messengers, and they were afraid to approach him, for they feared that the blame would fall on them if the boy carried out his threat; and as he was ready to go with them of his own accord, they were obliged to be content. On the way, the messengers wondered more and more at the understanding and cleverness of their prisoner, for he knew everything better than they did themselves. But much greater was the astonishment of the judges when they heard the account of the affair from the boy's own mouth. He spoke so clearly and reasonably that they gave judgment in his favour, and acquitted him of all blame. The great lady then applied to the king, who promised to investigate the whole affair himself; but he also was forced to agree with the judges and to pronounce the youth innocent. The lady was now ready to burst with rage at the thought that a peasant boy should have gained a verdict in her despite. She complained to the queen, knowing that she was very much harsher than the king. "My consort," said the queen, "is an old idiot, and his judges are all fools. It is a pity that you brought the matter before the court, instead of coming to me, for I would have managed the affair differently, and would have done you justice. Now that the matter has passed through the court, and the judgment is confirmed by the king, I am no longer in a position to put a better face on it openly, but we must see how we can arrange to punish the youth without attracting attention." It occurred to the lady that there lived a very ill-tempered peasant woman on her estate, with whom no servant would stay, while her husband said that his life with her was more uncomfortable than if he was in hell. If the impudent boy could be induced to go to her as herd-boy, she thought the woman would give him a severer punishment than any judge could inflict upon him. "I'll arrange the matter just as you wish," said the queen. So she summoned a trustworthy messenger, and instructed him what to do. If she had had the least idea that the herd-boy was the exiled prince, she would have had him put to death at once, without troubling herself about the king or the judges' decision.
As soon as the prince's master heard the queen's desire, he at once released the herd-boy from his service. He thanked his stars that he had got out of the scrape so easily. The queen's messenger now took the lad to the farm to which she had consigned him without his consent. The wicked old woman shouted for joy when she heard that the queen had found her a herd-boy, and sent word that she might treat him as she pleased, because the youth was very perverse, and nothing good was to be got out of him. She did not know how hard the new millstone was, and hoped to treat him in her usual fashion; but she was soon to discover that this fence was too high to jump over, and that the youth would not sacrifice a hair's-breadth of his rights. If she gave him a single bad word without cause, he gave her a dozen back; and if she lifted her hand against him, he caught up a stone or a log of wood, or anything else which happened to come to hand, and cried out, "Don't dare to come a step nearer, or I'll split your skull and mash you to soup." The woman had never heard such language from anybody, least of all from her servants; but her husband rejoiced in secret when he heard her quarrelling, and he did not stand by his wife, for the boy did not neglect his duty. The woman tried to break the boy's spirit with hunger, and refused him food, but the boy helped himself by force to whatever he could find, and helped himself to milk from the cow besides, so that he was never hungry. The more difficult she found it to manage the boy, the more she vented her rage on her husband and others about her. When the prince had led this vexatious life for some weeks, and found that each day was like the other, he determined to pay the old woman out for her wickedness in such a fashion that the world should be quite rid of such a monster. In order to carry out his design, he caught a dozen wolves and shut them up in a cave, and he threw them a beast from his flock every day, so that they should not starve. Who can describe the woman's rage when she saw her property gradually dwindling, for every day the boy brought home an animal less than he had taken to pasture in the morning, and his only answer when questioned was, "The wolves have devoured it." She screamed like a maniac, and threatened to throw the boy to the wild beasts to devour, but he answered, laughing, "Wouldn't your own savage meat be better for them?" Then he left the wolves for three days without food in the cave, and at night, when every one was asleep, he drove the herd from their stall, and put the twelve wolves in instead, fastening the door securely, so that the wild beasts should not escape. When he had thus arranged everything, he turned his back on the farm, for he had long been tired of playing herd-boy, and now felt strong enough for greater undertakings. [153]
But what horrors happened next morning, when the woman went into the stall to let out the animals and to milk the cows! The wolves, maddened with hunger, rushed upon her, pulled her down, and devoured the whole of her, clothes and skin, and hair and all, so that nothing remained but her tongue and heart, which were too poisonous for even the wild beasts to touch. Neither her husband nor her servants lamented the misfortune, for every one was delighted to be rid of such an infernal woman.