Household Stories by the Brothers Grimm | Page 3

the world."
So he went with them all together, and it was not long before they met
a man with a little hat on, and he wore it just over one ear.
"Manners! manners!" said the leader; "with your hat like that, you look
like a jack-fool."
"I dare not put it straight," answered the other; "if I did, there would be
such a terrible frost that the very birds would be frozen and fall dead
from the sky to the ground."
"Oh, come with me," said the leader; "we six together may well stand
against the whole world."
So the six went on until they came to a town where the king had caused
it to be made known that whoever would run a race with his daughter
and win it might become her husband, but that whoever lost must lose
his head into the bargain. And the leader came forward and said one of
his men should run for him.
"Then," said the king, "his life too must be put in pledge, and if he fails,
his head and yours too must fall."
When this was quite settled and agreed upon, the leader called the
runner, and strapped his second leg on to him.
"Now, look out," said he, "and take care that we win."
It had been agreed that the one who should bring water first from a far
distant brook should be accounted winner. Now the king's daughter and

the runner each took a pitcher, and they started both at the same time;
but in one moment, when the king's daughter had gone but a very little
way, the runner was out of sight, for his running was as if the wind
rushed by. In a short time he reached the brook, filled his pitcher full of
water, and turned back again. About half-way home, however, he was
overcome with weariness, and setting down his pitcher, he lay down on
the ground to sleep. But in order to awaken soon again by not lying too
soft he had taken a horse's skull which lay near and placed it under his
head for a pillow. In the meanwhile the king's daughter, who really was
a good runner, good enough to beat an ordinary man, had reached the
brook, and filled her pitcher, and was hastening with it back again,
when she saw the runner lying asleep.
"The day is mine," said she with much joy, and she emptied his pitcher
and hastened on. And now all had been lost but for the huntsman who
was standing on the castle wall, and with his keen eyes saw all that
happened.
"We must not be outdone by the king's daughter," said he, and he
loaded his rifle and took so good an aim that he shot the horse's skull
from under the runner's head without doing him any harm. And the
runner awoke and jumped up, and saw his pitcher standing empty and
the king's daughter far on her way home. But, not losing courage, he
ran swiftly to the brook, filled it again with water, and for all that, he
got home ten minutes before the king's daughter.
"Look you," said he; "this is the first time I have really stretched my
legs; before it was not worth the name of running."
The king was vexed, and his daughter yet more so, that she should be
beaten by a discharged common soldier; and they took counsel together
how they might rid themselves of him and of his companions at the
same time.
"I have a plan," said the king; "do not fear but that we shall be quit of
them for ever." Then he went out to the men and bade them to feast and
be merry and eat and drink; and he led them into a room, which had a
floor of iron, and the doors were iron, the windows had iron frames and

bolts; in the room was a table set out with costly food.
"Now, go in there and make yourselves comfortable," said the king.
And when they had gone in, he had the door locked and bolted. Then
he called the cook, and told him to make a big fire underneath the room,
so that the iron floor of it should be red hot. And the cook did so, and
the six men began to feel the room growing very warm, by reason, as
they thought at first, of the good dinner; but as the heat grew greater
and greater, and they found the doors and windows fastened, they
began to think it was an evil plan of the king's to suffocate them.
"He shall not succeed, however," said the man with the little hat; "I will
bring on a frost that shall make the fire