Segnius Irritant: or Eight Primitive Folk-lore Stories/Right after all remains Right
Right after all remains Right.
[Upper Lusatian.]
Now there was a gamekeeper who had a son who was also a gamekeeper. He sent him into a foreign land to see the world and learn a little more. Here he comes to an ale-house where he finds a strange man, with whom he enters into conversation. And the two discourse together on all sorts of topics, until at last they begin to talk in earnest. And the stranger said that it was possible, with the help of money, to make even the most unrighteous thing right. The gamekeeper, on the other hand, maintained that right after all remained right, and said that as a foreigner he was willing to stake three hundred dollars on it. The stranger was quite satisfied with this arrangement, and the two agreed to ask the opinion of three advocates in the matter. The two go to the first advocate, and he says that it is possible for money to turn wrong into right. Then the two go to the next one. He also says that, for money, wrong can be turned into right. Finally, the two go to the third. And he also tells the pair that it is possible for money to make wrong right. After this the two go home again together, and as they had been walking about the whole day, they reached the ale-house quite late in the evening. The stranger then asks the gamekeeper whether he does not now believe that it is possible for the most unrighteous act to be made right with the help of money, and the gamekeeper replies that he must almost believe it, according to the ruling of the three legal gentlemen, although it still did not seem true to him. The stranger was willing to leave him his head provided he paid the three hundred dollars; but just as the two were talking it over, another man arrived, who suggested to the stranger that he ought to stand by the arrangement they had made together at first. However, he does not do so, but just deprives the gamekeeper of the light of his eyes with a red hot iron, observing at the same time that he, too, will believe that right remains right in the world when the gamekeeper gets his sight again.
And the gamekeeper entreated the ale-house keeper to conduct him on to the right road to the town. Mine host conducted him on to the road to the gallows, and went his way. When the gamekeeper had gone on some distance, the road came to an end, and he heard eleven strike. He could go no further, and remained lying there in the hopes that perhaps some one would come in the morning. After a little while he hears a tapping, then again some one comes, and no long time elapsed before a third joined the other two. Now it was three spirits who at night left their bodies and performed all sorts of abominations on earth. They began to talk among themselves, and one remarked: “’Tis exactly a year and a day since we were here together and related to one another our performances of the previous year. A year is again gone by, and the time has come for us to investigate which of us in the past year has done the best stroke of business.” The first answered, and said: ‘I deprived the inhabitants of the city of Ramuli of their water; but there is still help for them, if some one will discover what it is that stops up the source.” “And what pray is it?” says the second; and the first replies: “I have placed a great she-toad upon the source from which the water used to run; if this toad is taken away, the water will then again flow as before.” The second says: “I bewitched the princess of Sarahawsky, so that her beauty perishes, and she is shrinking into a skeleton; still there is help for her, if some one will draw out the silver broad-headed nail which is fixed above her couch.” The third said: “Yesterday evening I had another man deprived of the light of his eyes with a red hot iron; still there is help for him, if he laves his eyes with the water which is to be found in a well not far from this gallows.” After this, in the town it strikes twelve, and in a twinkling the three spirits vanish; the gamekeeper, however, carefully keeps in mind all he has heard, and rejoices to think that he will be able to get the light of his eyes again.
Early next morning he hears some one passing somewhere near, and begs him to send him people from the city to tell him where that good well is. After this, all sorts of people come to him, but none of them can shew him the well, until an old woman does so. He has himself conducted thither, and when he had washed his eyes, he then and there gets the light of his eyes again.
He now immediately enquires for the city of Ramuli, and sets off thither. As soon as he arrived there, he announced at once to the town council that he was willing to give them their water back. Now as plenty of persons had already stayed there and the town had lavished much money upon them, but none of them had done any practical good, since everything had been in vain, they were now unwilling to have any further hand in the matter. Then he said that he was willing to do everything free of expense, if only they would let him have some of the slaves to give him help. And so it is arranged. When they had dug so far down as to have reached the appliances through which the water formerly flowed, and which were adapted to the source, he sent all the workmen away, and after groping about for a short time, lo! there was the she-toad seated on the source, like a copper built into a wall. He drew it out, and immediately the water began to flow, and after a short time all the wells were full and running over with water. Then the town prepared a grand feast in his honour, and rewarded him with much money for what he had done.
After this he continued his journey, and reached the town of Sarahawsky. There he found out after a short time that the princess was as ill as he had heard, and that no doctor could do her any good; that, consequently, the king had promised that he should marry her who succeeded in curing her complaint. Hereupon, he dressed himself up very smart, went to the king’s castle, and there said that he had come from a distant country and that he wished to help the princess. The king replied that now he had quite lost all hope; but that at the same time he might try his hand on her. The gamekeeper said that he must go and get some medicines. He goes off and buys all sorts of nasty sweets, and then presents himself to the princess. He gives her the first dose and looks round to see in which of the beams the silver nail is fixed. Next day early, he visits her again, gives her some of his medicine, and while she is taking it seizes the nail and tugs away at it so long that at last it moves a little. In the evening the princess already feels a little better. The third day he again goes to her, and as the princess is taking her physic he again catches hold of the beam, pulls the nail clean out, and secretly stows it away in his pocket. By the forenoon the princess was now so perfectly cured that she wanted to dine, and the king invited the gamekeeper to a grand dinner. And they settled when the marriage was to be; the gamekeeper, however, made up his mind that he ought first to go home.
And after staying at home, he again came to the ale-house where he had lost the light of his eyes, and the stranger man was also there. Again they began to discourse on all sorts of topics, and the gamekeeper mentioned what he had heard under the gallows; how he had discovered the water, and finally, also, how he had got the light of his eyes again, and he added that the strange man ought now to believe that right in the world still remained right. The strange man was very much astonished, and said that he was ready to believe it.
After this the gamekeeper pursued his way and came to his princess, and they had a grand wedding festival for a whole week in succession. The strange man now thinks to himself that he will go under the gallows: perhaps he, too, may discover things as the gamekeeper had done, and afterwards get some princess for his wife. And he goes there just as the year has run out. He hears eleven strike, and then after a little while a tapping, then again some one, and in no long time a third joins them. They begin to speak among themselves, and number one says: ‘It cannot be but last year some one overheard us, for everything which we had contrived has been spoilt and ruined. So before we recount to one another the past year’s performances, let us make a thorough search.” Forthwith they begin to search, and soon light upon the strange man. They rend him in three pieces and hang them upon the three arms of the gallows.
Now when the old king was dead, his people choose the gamekeeper to be their king, and if he is not yet dead, he is still ruling at the present day, and sticks to his faith in right being always and for ever right—in his kingdom at all events.
NOTE.
Just as the Venetian story, The Love of the Three Oranges, is a corrupted version of the Three Citrons, so the present story is a more modern and corrupted version of Father Know-All. We have left far behind us the open-air life of nature with its complete moral indifference and exuberant vitality as depicted in the earlier myths, and have got into an atmosphere of pot-houses, gallows, pettifogging lawyers and morality. It is worth noticing how in many of the Venetian variants, also relatively modern, pot-houses take the place of castles. This is the case in the Three Waiters, a variant of the Cymbeline legend, and also in others. Another indication of its more recent character is the confusion of the dates and the transference of the pin and dove incident, properly belonging to the epilogue of the Three Citrons, in a very corrupted form to an earlier section of the story, just as the three kings of the Sun-horse legend with their jewels of ice and snow have taken the place of the three Norns present at the birth of Plavachek in the more modern Bethlehem variant.
Both these variants are interesting and important as giving an indication of the great antiquity of the primitive myth.