There were once a man and a woman who had long, in vain, wished for a child.
At length it appeared that God was about to grant their desire.
These people had a little window at the back of their house from which a
splendid garden could be seen, which was full of the most beautiful flowers and
herbs. It was, however, surrounded by a high wall, and no one dared to go into
it because it belonged to an enchantress, who had great power and was dreaded by
all the world.
One day the woman was standing by this window and looking down into the
garden, when she saw a bed which was planted with the most beautiful rampion,
and it looked so fresh and green that she longed for it. She quite pined away,
and began to look pale and miserable.
Her husband was alarmed, and asked: 'What ails you, dear wife?'
'Ah,' she replied, 'if I can't eat some of the rampion, which is in the
garden behind our house, I shall die.'
The man, who loved her, thought: 'Sooner than let your wife die, bring
her some of the rampion yourself, let it cost what it will.'
At twilight, he clambered down over the wall into the garden of the
enchantress, hastily clutched a handful of rampion, and took it to his wife. She
at once made herself a salad of it, and ate it greedily. It tasted so good to
her - so very good, that the next day she longed for it three times as much as
before.
If he was to have any rest, her husband knew he must once more descend
into the garden. Therefore, in the gloom of evening, he let himself down again;
but when he had clambered down the wall he was terribly afraid, for he saw the
enchantress standing before him.
'How can you dare,' said she with angry look, 'descend into my garden
and steal my rampion like a thief? You shall suffer for it!'
'Ah,' answered he, 'let mercy take the place of justice, I only made up
my mind to do it out of necessity. My wife saw your rampion from the window, and
felt such a longing for it that she would have died if she had not got some to
eat.'
The enchantress allowed her anger to be softened, and said to him: 'If
the case be as you say, I will allow you to take away with you as much rampion
as you will, only I make one condition, you must give me the child which your
wife will bring into the world; it shall be well treated, and I will care for it
like a mother.'
The man in his terror consented to everything.
When the woman was brought to bed, the enchantress appeared at once,
gave the child the name of Rapunzel, and took it away with her.
Rapunzel grew into the most beautiful child under the sun. When she was
twelve years old, the enchantress shut her into a tower in the middle of a
forest. The tower had neither stairs nor door, but near the top was a little
window. When the enchantress wanted to go in, she placed herself beneath it and
cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
Rapunzel had magnificent long hair, fine as spun gold, and when she
heard the voice of the enchantress, she unfastened her braided tresses, wound
them round one of the hooks of the window above, and then the hair fell twenty
ells down, and the enchantress climbed up by it.
After a year or two, it came to pass that the king's son rode through
the forest and passed by the tower. Then he heard a song, which was so charming
that he stood still and listened. It was Rapunzel, who in her solitude passed
her time in letting her sweet voice resound. The king's son wanted to climb up
to her, and looked for the door of the tower, but none was to be found. He rode
home, but the singing had so deeply touched his heart, that every day he went
out into the forest and listened to it.
Once when he was thus standing behind a tree, he saw that an enchantress
came there, and he heard how she cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
Then Rapunzel let down the braids of her hair, and the enchantress
climbed up to her.
'If that is the ladder by which one mounts, I too will try my fortune,'
said he, and the next day when it began to grow dark, he went to the tower and
cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
Immediately the hair fell down and the king's son climbed up.
At first Rapunzel was terribly frightened when a man, such as her eyes
had never yet beheld, came to her; but the king's son began to talk to her quite
like a friend, and told her that his heart had been so stirred that it had let
him have no rest, and he had been forced to see her. Then Rapunzel lost her
fear, and when he asked her if she would take him for her husband, and she saw
that he was young and handsome, she thought: 'He will love me more than old Dame
Gothel does'; and she said yes, and laid her hand in his.
She said: 'I will willingly go away with you, but I do not know how to
get down. Bring with you a skein of silk every time that you come, and I will
weave a ladder with it, and when that is ready I will descend, and you will take
me on your horse.'
They agreed that until that time he should come to her every evening,
for the old woman came by day. The enchantress remarked nothing of this, until
once Rapunzel said to her: 'Tell me, Dame Gothel, how it happens that you are so
much heavier for me to draw up than the young king's son - he is with me in a
moment.'
'Ah! you wicked child,' cried the enchantress. 'What do I hear you say!
I thought I had separated you from all the world, and yet you have deceived me!'
In her anger she clutched Rapunzel's beautiful tresses, wrapped them
twice round her left hand, seized a pair of scissors with the right, and snip,
snap, they were cut off, and the lovely braids lay on the ground. And she was so
pitiless that she took poor Rapunzel into a desert where she had to live in
great grief and misery.
On the same day that she cast out Rapunzel, however, the enchantress
fastened the braids of hair, which she had cut off, to the hook of the window,
and when the king's son came and cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
she let the hair down. The king's son ascended, but instead of finding
his dearest Rapunzel, he found the enchantress, who gazed at him with wicked and
venomous looks.
'Aha!' she cried mockingly, 'you would fetch your dearest, but the
beautiful bird sits no longer singing in the nest; the cat has got it, and will
scratch out your eyes as well. Rapunzel is lost to you; you will never see her
again.'
The king's son was beside himself with pain, and in his despair he leapt
down from the tower. He escaped with his life, but the thorns into which he fell
pierced his eyes.
He wandered quite blind about the forest, ate nothing but roots and
berries, and did naught but lament and weep over the loss of his dearest wife.
Thus he roamed about in misery for some years, and at length came to the desert
where Rapunzel, with the twins to which she had given birth, a boy and a girl,
lived in wretchedness. He heard a voice, and it seemed so familiar to him that
he went towards it, and when he approached, Rapunzel knew him and fell on his
neck and wept. Two of her tears wetted his eyes and they grew clear again, and
he could see with them as before. He led her to his kingdom where he was
joyfully received, and they lived for a long time afterwards, happy and
contented.
