The Violet Fairy Book (12 page)

On the outskirts of a village just where the oxen were turned out
to pasture, and the pigs roamed about burrowing with their noses
among the roots of the trees, there stood a small house. In the
house lived a man who had a wife, and the wife was sad all day
long.

'Dear wife, what is wrong with you that you hang your head like a
drooping rosebud?' asked her husband one morning. 'You have
everything you want; why cannot you be merry like other women?'

'Leave me alone, and do not seek to know the reason,' replied
she, bursting into tears, and the man thought that it was no time
to question her, and went away to his work.

He could not, however, forget all about it, and a few days after
he inquired again the reason of her sadness, but only got the
same reply. At length he felt he could bear it no longer, and
tried a third time, and then his wife turned and answered him.

'Good gracious!' cried she, 'why cannot you let things be as they
are? If I were to tell you, you would become just as wretched as
myself. If you would only believe, it is far better for you to
know nothing.'

But no man yet was ever content with such an answer. The more
you beg him not to inquire, the greater is his curiosity to learn
the whole.

'Well, if you MUST know,' said the wife at last, 'I will tell
you. There is no luck in this house—no luck at all!'

'Is not your cow the best milker in all the village? Are not
your trees as full of fruit as your hives are full of bees? Has
anyone cornfields like ours? Really you talk nonsense when you
say things like that!'

'Yes, all that you say is true, but we have no children.'

Then Stan understood, and when a man once understands and has his
eyes opened it is no longer well with him. From that day the
little house in the outskirts contained an unhappy man as well as
an unhappy woman. And at the sight of her husband's misery the
woman became more wretched than ever.

And so matters went on for some time.

Some weeks had passed, and Stan thought he would consult a wise
man who lived a day's journey from his own house. The wise man
was sitting before his door when he came up, and Stan fell on his
knees before him. 'Give me children, my lord, give me children.'

'Take care what you are asking,' replied the wise man. 'Will not
children be a burden to you? Are you rich enough to feed and
clothe them?'

'Only give them to me, my lord, and I will manage somehow!' and
at a sign from the wise man Stan went his way.

He reached home that evening tired and dusty, but with hope in
his heart. As he drew near his house a sound of voices struck
upon his ear, and he looked up to see the whole place full of
children. Children in the garden, children in the yard, children
looking out of every window—it seemed to the man as if all the
children in the world must be gathered there. And none was
bigger than the other, but each was smaller than the other, and
every one was more noisy and more impudent and more daring than
the rest, and Stan gazed and grew cold with horror as he realised
that they all belonged to him.

'Good gracious! how many there are! how many!' he muttered to
himself.

'Oh, but not one too many,' smiled his wife, coming up with a
crowd more children clinging to her skirts.

But even she found that it was not so easy to look after a
hundred children, and when a few days had passed and they had
eaten up all the food there was in the house, they began to cry,
'Father! I am hungry—I am hungry,' till Stan scratched his head
and wondered what he was to do next. It was not that he thought
there were too many children, for his life had seemed more full
of joy since they appeared, but now it came to the point he did
not know how he was to feed them. The cow had ceased to give
milk, and it was too early for the fruit trees to ripen.

'Do you know, old woman!' said he one day to his wife, 'I must go
out into the world and try to bring back food somehow, though I
cannot tell where it is to come from.'

To the hungry man any road is long, and then there was always the
thought that he had to satisfy a hundred greedy children as well
as himself.

Stan wandered, and wandered, and wandered, till he reached to the
end of the world, where that which is, is mingled with that which
is not, and there he saw, a little way off, a sheepfold, with
seven sheep in it. In the shadow of some trees lay the rest of
the flock.

Stan crept up, hoping that he might manage to decoy some of them
away quietly, and drive them home for food for his family, but he
soon found this could not be. For at midnight he heard a rushing
noise, and through the air flew a dragon, who drove apart a ram,
a sheep, and a lamb, and three fine cattle that were lying down
close by. And besides these he took the milk of seventy-seven
sheep, and carried it home to his old mother, that she might
bathe in it and grow young again. And this happened every night.

The shepherd bewailed himself in vain: the dragon only laughed,
and Stan saw that this was not the place to get food for his
family.

But though he quite understood that it was almost hopeless to
fight against such a powerful monster, yet the thought of the
hungry children at home clung to him like a burr, and would not
be shaken off, and at last he said to the shepherd, 'What will
you give me if I rid you of the dragon?'

'One of every three rams, one of every three sheep, one of every
three lambs,' answered the herd.

'It is a bargain,' replied Stan, though at the moment he did not
know how, supposing he DID come off the victor, he would ever be
able to drive so large a flock home.

However, that matter could be settled later. At present night
was not far off, and he must consider how best to fight with the
dragon.

Just at midnight, a horrible feeling that was new and strange to
him came over Stan—a feeling that he could not put into words
even to himself, but which almost forced him to give up the
battle and take the shortest road home again. He half turned;
then he remembered the children, and turned back.

'You or I,' said Stan to himself, and took up his position on the
edge of the flock.

'Stop!' he suddenly cried, as the air was filled with a rushing
noise, and the dragon came dashing past.

'Dear me!' exclaimed the dragon, looking round. 'Who are you,
and where do you come from?'

'I am Stan Bolovan, who eats rocks all night, and in the day
feeds on the flowers of the mountain; and if you meddle with
those sheep I will carve a cross on your back.'

When the dragon heard these words he stood quite still in the
middle of the road, for he knew he had met with his match.

'But you will have to fight me first,' he said in a trembling
voice, for when you faced him properly he was not brave at all.

'I fight you?' replied Stan, 'why I could slay you with one
breath!' Then, stooping to pick up a large cheese which lay at
his feet, he added, 'Go and get a stone like this out of the
river, so that we may lose no time in seeing who is the best
man.'

The dragon did as Stan bade him, and brought back a stone out of
the brook.

'Can you get buttermilk out of your stone?' asked Stan.

The dragon picked up his stone with one hand, and squeezed it
till it fell into powder, but no buttermilk flowed from it. 'Of
course I can't!' he said, half angrily.

'Well, if you can't, I can,' answered Stan, and he pressed the
cheese till buttermilk flowed through his fingers.

When the dragon saw that, he thought it was time he made the best
of his way home again, but Stan stood in his path.

'We have still some accounts to settle,' said he, 'about what you
have been doing here,' and the poor dragon was too frightened to
stir, lest Stan should slay him at one breath and bury him among
the flowers in the mountain pastures.

'Listen to me,' he said at last. 'I see you are a very useful
person, and my mother has need of a fellow like you. Suppose you
enter her service for three days, which are as long as one of
your years, and she will pay you each day seven sacks full of
ducats.'

Three times seven sacks full of ducats! The offer was very
tempting, and Stan could not resist it. He did not waste words,
but nodded to the dragon, and they started along the road.

It was a long, long way, but when they came to the end they found
the dragon's mother, who was as old as time itself, expecting
them. Stan saw her eyes shining like lamps from afar, and when
they entered the house they beheld a huge kettle standing on the
fire, filled with milk. When the old mother found that her son
had arrived empty-handed she grew very angry, and fire and flame
darted from her nostrils, but before she could speak the dragon
turned to Stan.

'Stay here,' said he, 'and wait for me; I am going to explain
things to my mother.'

Stan was already repenting bitterly that he had ever come to such
a place, but, since he was there, there was nothing for it but to
take everything quietly, and not show that he was afraid.

'Listen, mother,' said the dragon as soon as they were alone, 'I
have brought this man in order to get rid of him. He is a
terrific fellow who eats rocks, and can press buttermilk out of a
stone,' and he told her all that had happened the night before.

'Oh, just leave him to me!' she said. 'I have never yet let a
man slip through my fingers.' So Stan had to stay and do the old
mother service.

The next day she told him that he and her son should try which
was the strongest, and she took down a huge club, bound seven
times with iron.

The dragon picked it up as if it had been a feather, and, after
whirling it round his head, flung it lightly three miles away,
telling Stan to beat that if he could.

They walked to the spot where the club lay. Stan stooped and
felt it; then a great fear came over him, for he knew that he and
all his children together would never lift that club from the
ground.

'What are you doing?' asked the dragon.

'I was thinking what a beautiful club it was, and what a pity it
is that it should cause your death.'

'How do you mean—my death?' asked the dragon.

'Only that I am afraid that if I throw it you will never see
another dawn. You don't know how strong I am!'

'Oh, never mind that be quick and throw.'

'If you are really in earnest, let us go and feast for three
days: that will at any rate give you three extra days of life.'

Stan spoke so calmly that this time the dragon began to get a
little frightened, though he did not quite believe that things
would be as bad as Stan said.

They returned to the house, took all the food that could be found
in the old mother's larder, and carried it back to the place
where the club was lying. Then Stan seated himself on the sack
of provisions, and remained quietly watching the setting moon.

'What are you doing?' asked the dragon.

'Waiting till the moon gets out of my way.'

'What do you mean? I don't understand.'

'Don't you see that the moon is exactly in my way? But of
course, if you like, I will throw the club into the moon.'

At these words the dragon grew uncomfortable for the second time.

He prized the club, which had been left him by his grandfather,
very highly, and had no desire that it should be lost in the
moon.

'I'll tell you what,' he said, after thinking a little. 'Don't
throw the club at all. I will throw it a second time, and that
will do just as well.'

'No, certainly not!' replied Stan. 'Just wait till the moon
sets.'

But the dragon, in dread lest Stan should fulfil his threats,
tried what bribes could do, and in the end had to promise Stan
seven sacks of ducats before he was suffered to throw back the
club himself.

'Oh, dear me, that is indeed a strong man,' said the dragon,
turning to his mother. 'Would you believe that I have had the
greatest difficulty in preventing him from throwing the club into
the moon?'

Then the old woman grew uncomfortable too! Only to think of it!
It was no joke to throw things into the moon! So no more was
heard of the club, and the next day they had all something else
to think about.

'Go and fetch me water!' said the mother, when the morning broke,
and gave them twelve buffalo skins with the order to keep filling
them till night.

They set out at once for the brook, and in the twinkling of an
eye the dragon had filled the whole twelve, carried them into the
house, and brought them back to Stan. Stan was tired: he could
scarcely lift the buckets when they were empty, and he shuddered
to think of what would happen when they were full. But he only
took an old knife out of his pocket and began to scratch up the
earth near the brook.

'What are you doing there? How are you going to carry the water
into the house?' asked the dragon.

'How? Dear me, that is easy enough! I shall just take the
brook!'

At these words the dragon's jaw dropped. This was the last thing
that had ever entered his head, for the brook had been as it was
since the days of his grandfather.

'I'll tell you what!' he said. 'Let me carry your skins for
you.'

'Most certainly not,' answered Stan, going on with his digging,
and the dragon, in dread lest he should fulfil his threat, tried
what bribes would do, and in the end had again to promise seven
sacks of ducats before Stan would agree to leave the brook alone
and let him carry the water into the house.

On the third day the old mother sent Stan into the forest for
wood, and, as usual, the dragon went with him.

Before you could count three he had pulled up more trees than
Stan could have cut down in a lifetime, and had arranged them
neatly in rows. When the dragon had finished, Stan began to look
about him, and, choosing the biggest of the trees, he climbed up
it, and, breaking off a long rope of wild vine, bound the top of
the tree to the one next it. And so he did to a whole line of
trees.