[Notes by LKG]
This story is part of the Brothers Grimm (Hunt) unit. Story source: Household Tales by Jacob Grimm and Wilhelm Grimm, translated by Margaret Hunt (1884).
Hans the Hedgehog (cont.)
Thereupon the princess was glad and said he had done well, for she never would have gone away with the Hedgehog.
Hans the Hedgehog, however, looked after his asses and pigs, and was always merry, and sat on the tree, and played his bagpipes.
Now it came to pass that another King came journeying by with his attendants and runners, and he also had lost his way and did not know how to get home again because the forest was so large. He likewise heard the beautiful music from a distance, and asked his runner what that could be, and told him to go and see.
Then the runner went under the tree, and saw the cock sitting at the top of it and Hans the Hedgehog on the cock. The runner asked him what he was about up there.
"I am keeping my asses and my pigs, but what is your desire?"
The messenger said that they had lost their way, and could not get back into their own kingdom, and asked if he would not show them the way. Then Hans the Hedgehog got down the tree with the cock, and told the aged King that he would show him the way, if he would give him for his own whatsoever first met him in front of his royal palace.
The King said, "Yes," and wrote a promise to Hans the Hedgehog that he should have this.
(illustration by Otto Ubbelohde)
Now he had an only daughter who was very beautiful; she ran to meet him, threw her arms round his neck, and was delighted to have her old father back again. She asked him where in the world he had been so long.
So he told her how he had lost his way and had very nearly not come back at all, but that as he was travelling through a great forest, a creature — half hedgehog, half man, who was sitting astride a cock in a high tree and making music — had shown him the way and helped him to get out, but that in return he had promised him whatsoever first met him in the royal court-yard, and how that was she herself, which made him unhappy now.
But on this she promised that, for love of her father, she would willingly go with this Hans if he came.
Hans the Hedgehog, however, took care of his pigs, and the pigs multiplied until they became so many in number that the whole forest was filled with them. Then Hans the Hedgehog resolved not to live in the forest any longer and sent word to his father to have every stye in the village emptied, for he was coming with such a great herd that all might kill who wished to do so.
When his father heard that, he was troubled, for he thought Hans the Hedgehog had died long ago. Hans the Hedgehog, however, seated himself on the cock, and drove the pigs before him into the village, and ordered the slaughter to begin. Ha! but there was a killing and a chopping that might have been heard two miles off!
After this Hans the Hedgehog said, "Father, let me have the cock shod once more at the forge, and then I will ride away and never come back as long as I live." Then the father had the cock shod once more, and was pleased that Hans the Hedgehog would never return again.
Next: Hans the Hedgehog (end)
(700 words)
