SurLaLune Fairy Tales: Marian Roalfe Cox: Cinderella: Three Hundred and Forty-five Variants of Cinderella, Catskin, and Cap O' Rushes, abstracted and tabulated

Three sisters are servants at palace--Menial heroine (swine herd)--Task, to prepare dinner from two peas and two grains of barley and rye---Task-performing old man--Heroine searches head of second old man, who gives her stick to open treasure- rock--Magic dresses--Meeting-place (church)--Threefold flight--Pitch trap--Lost shoe--Shoe marriage test--Mutilated feet --Happy marriage.

TABULATION

(1) Three sisters are servants at palace, the youngest being swineherd. Her clothes are made of tarpaulin (vétements goudronnnes) and no one takes much account of her, deeming her half-witted.-- (2) King is fond of the two prowl servants, and every Sunday asks who is going to church. They say, "We are; Finette can stay at home." The swineherd goes to the stove and weeps; an old man enters and asks why. She has to prepare the dinner for the whole court out of two peas and two grains of barley and rye. Old man says, "You go to church; I'll prepare the dinner. Only be back before the others, as though you had been at home cooking."-- (3) Heroine departs, and meets old man, who asks her to search his head. "I have not time; I am already very late." "Do it all the same;" and she does so. He makes her a present of a stick, saying, "Strike the rock with this, and you will find clothes of gold. Hide them for three Sundays in succession under your tarpaulin; don't show them to anyone; leave church before the rest, and hide them in the rock." Heroine does as bidden, and returns home to lay the table.-- (4) Second Sunday all happens as before. King's son notices that someone goes to the court wearing gold clothes under her ordinary dress.-- (5) And third Sunday he has the threshold of the church tarred, so that heroine's shoe sticks to it, for she always puts her foot on the step, so as not to show her shoes. Heroine takes no notice of lost shoe, but king's son picks it up, and says whoever can wear it shall be his beloved wife.-- (6) Many come and try it in vain. Heroine's sisters even cut their toes, but cannot get it on. Heroine stands aside watching; she is told to try. Shoe fits her perfectly.-- (7) She goes home before the others, takes off her tarpaulin, and lays the table in her gold clothes. All rejoice except the sisters, who are now her servants.

Cox, Marian Roalfe. Cinderella: Three Hundred and Forty-five Variants of Cinderella, Catskin, and Cap O' Rushes, abstracted and tabulated. London: David Nutt for the Folklore Society, 1893.

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