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47

Grundtvig, S., Unpublished Collection. (Told and written down by Mr. Nis Callesen, a farmer in N. Sleswick.)

"METTE SKINDKJOLE"
(Mette Skin-gown).

ABSTRACT

Ill-treated heroine (by step-mother)--Hearth abode--Help at grave. Heroine to strike certain tree with white stick and get all she wishes--Magic dresses--Meeting-place (church)-- Three fold flight--Lost shoe--Shoe marriage test--Mutilated feet-- Animal witness (bird) --Happy marriage.

TABULATION

(1) Heroine's mother dies, and her father marries a widow by whom he has two daughters. Heroine is called Mette Skin-gown, and stepmother makes her always sit blowing into the ash-hole.-- (2) Heroine goes weeping to mother's grave, and mother gives her a white stick with which to touch a certain tree in the garden, and obtain anything she wants.-- (3) When Sunday comes, and she is left at home alone, heroine wishes for a carriage and coach man, and drives to church.

"Darkness behind,
Light before!"

she says, and is back home again before the others, and sitting in the ashes when they return. This happens three Sundays, when she is clad in silk, in silver, in gold. King falls in love with the beautiful princess, and on the third Sunday catches her golden shoe.-- (4) Whoever can wear the shoe shall be his queen. Stepsisters cut their heel and toe; but a little bird tells king of their treachery, and they are sent back-- (5) Heroine puts on the shoe, and the bird sings out that she is the right girl; so she is made queen.

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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