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

Heroine dislikes proposed husband--Hen-wife aid-- Counter- tasks--Heroine disguise --Heroine flight--Menial heroine-- Fairy aid--Magic dresses--Meeting-place (church)--Threefold flight--Lost shoe--Shoe marriage test--Mutilated foot (henwife's daughter's)--False bride--Animal witness (bird)--Happy marriage.

TABULATION

(1) Rashie Coat was a king's daughter, and her father wanted her to marry a man she did not like.-- (2) She consulted the hen-wife, who told her to say she wouldn't marry him unless they gave her a c of beaten gold; they gave her this, but still she wouldn't marry. She again went to the henwife, and under her advice asked for a coat made of the feathers of birds. The king sent a man with corn to cry out to all the birds, each bird take up a pea and put down a feather; this the birds did, and the coat was produced; but Rashie Coat would not marry, and, instructed by the hen-wife, she asked for a coat of rushes and a pair of slippers these they gave her, and the hen-wife couldn't help her any more.-- (3) She left her father's house and went far and wide till she came to a king's house; she obtained service there in the kitchen to wash the dishes.-- (4) On Sunday they all went to church and left her to cook the dinner; a fairy came to her and told her to put on the coat of beaten gold, and go to church, and the fairy would cook the dinner. She went to the church, and the king's son fell in love with her, but she ran home before the church was over, and he could not find out who she was-- (5) The next Sunday the fairy told her to put on her coat of bird's feathers, and go to church ; this she did, and the king's s again did n succeed in finding out who she was.-- (6) The third Sunday the fairy told her to put on the coat of rushes and the slippers, and go to church. The king's son sat next the door, and when Rashie Coat left the church as before, he left too, and gripped her; she got away from him, but lost her slipper, which he took up.-- (7) lie caused a cry through the country that he would marry anyone who could get the slipper on ; all the ladies of the Court tried, but in vain ; the hen-wife sent her daughter, who clipped her feet and got it on that way.-- (8) The king's son was going to marry her, and was riding away with her, when a bird sang out as they passed by

Nippit fit and clippit fit,
Ahint the king's son rides;
But bonny fit and pretty fit
Ahint the caudron hides."

-- (9) The king's son thereupon flung off the hen-wife's daughter, and sought for and found Rashie Coat; he fitted the slipper on her and married her.

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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