Fairy tales

by Wilhelm Hauff

“Eat, my little man,” said she, “and you will have all that you have coveted in me. You shall become a clever cook too, but you shall never, never find the herb that was missing in your mother’s basket.”

The boy did not understand what she was talking about; but he went on eating his soup, which was delicious. His mother often cooked tasty dishes for him, but never anything like this. An odour of fine herbs and vegetables arose from it, it was both sour and sweet and very strong. As he finished the last of it the guinea-pigs set light to some incense, which rose in a blue cloud and was wafted through the room. Thicker and thicker the incense rose and the little boy began to feel stupefied.

He tried to rise, telling himself that he must hasten back to his mother, but he only fell back again, and at length, quite overcome, he fell fast asleep on the old woman’s sofa.

Then he began to dream, such strange dreams! It seemed to him as though the old woman took off all his clothes and dressed him up in a squirrel’s skin and he was at once able to jump about like the other squirrels in the house and began to take his place with them and the guinea-pigs, and that, like they, he too became one of the old woman’s servants.

At first he was the shoe-black and it was his duty to polish the cocoa-nut shells the old woman wore instead of shoes. He had learnt to polish shoes in his own home, and as his father was a cobbler he had been particularly well taught, so that he was clever at his work. A year seemed to pass and then he dreamt that he was given more important duties. He and some other squirrels were set to work to catch the sunbeam dust and sift it through fine sieves. This dust was used instead of flour to make the bread the old woman ate, for she had no teeth, and sunbeam dust makes the very softest and finest of bread. Another dream year passed and then he was promoted to be one of the water-carriers. You must not imagine the old woman kept a water-cistern or a water-butt handy. Oh! dear no! Jacob and the squirrels had to draw the dew from the roses into hazel-nut shells; this was the old woman’s drinking water, and as she was always thirsty it was hard work to keep her supplied with it. At the end of another year he was appointed to do the indoor work. His particular duty was to keep the glass floor in order. He had to sweep it over and then wrap soft polishing cloths round his feet and slide up and down the room until the glass shone brilliantly.

At the end of the year he was promoted to the kitchen; this was a place of honour, only to be reached after long training. He began at the beginning as a scullion and advanced rapidly until he was head cook. Sometimes he could not but wonder at his own skill, for he could cook the most difficult dishes and could make no less than two hundred different kinds of pastries. Then he was a first-rate hand at soups, and could make every kind that had ever been heard of, and knew the use of every kind of vegetable that grew.

Jacob had to draw the dew from the roses. (P. [118].)

Several years had now passed away in the service of the old woman and one day she put on her cocoa-nut shoes, took her staff and basket in her hand, and prepared to go out. Before leaving she told Jacob to cook a chicken for her dinner on her return and be sure to stuff it well with seasoning.

When he had prepared the chicken, he went to the room where the herbs were kept to collect some to stuff it with, and to his surprise saw a little cupboard that he had not noticed before. The door was ajar and he peeped curiously in and saw a number of little baskets from which issued a strong and pleasant odour. He opened one of them and saw that it contained a very curious-looking plant. The leaves and stalks were of a bluish-green colour and it bore a flower of a deep red hue, flecked with yellow. He looked closely at the flower, then smelt it and noticed it had the same scent as the soup which the old woman had once cooked for him. It was a very strong scent, so strong indeed that it made him sneeze, and he went on sneezing again and again until at length—he awoke.