Norwegian children are just as fond of fairy stories as are any other children, and they are lucky in having a great number, for that famous story-teller, Hans Christian Andersen, was a Dane, and as the Danish language is very like the Norwegian, his stories were probably known in Norway long before they were known in England. But the Norwegians have plenty of other stories of their own, and they love to sit by the fire of burning logs or round the stove in the long winter evenings and listen to them. Of course, they know all about people like Cinderella and Jack the Giant-Killer, but their favorite hero is called by the name of Ashpot, who is sometimes a kind of boy Cinderella and sometimes a Jack the Giant-Killer.

The following are two stories which the little yellow-haired Norse children never fail to delight in:

Once upon a time there was a man who had been out cutting wood, and when he came home he found that he had left his coat behind, so he told his little daughter to go and fetch it. The child started off, but before she reached the wood darkness came on, and suddenly a great big hill-giant swooped down upon her.

“Please, Mr. Giant,” said she, trembling all over, “don’t take me away to-night, as father wants his coat; but to-morrow night, if you will come when I go to the stabbur to fetch the bread, I will go away with you quietly.”

So the giant agreed, and the next night, when she went to fetch the bread, he came and carried her off. As soon as it was found that she was missing, her father sent her eldest brother to look for her, but he came back without finding her. The second brother was also sent, but with no better result. At last the father turned to his youngest son, who was the drudge of the house, and said: “Now, Ashpot, you go and see if you can find your sister.”

So away went Ashpot, and no sooner had he reached the wood than he met a bear.

“Friend bear,” said Ashpot, “will you help me?”

“Willingly,” answered the bear. “Get up on my back.”

And Ashpot mounted the bear’s back and rode off. Presently they met a wolf.

“Friend wolf,” said Ashpot, “will you do some work for me?”

“Willingly,” answered the wolf.

“Then jump up behind,” said Ashpot, and the three went on deeper into the wood.

They next met a fox, and then a hare, both of whom were enlisted into Ashpot’s service, and, mounted on the back of the bear, were swiftly carried off to the giant’s abode.

“Good day, Mr. Giant!” said they.

“Scratch my back!” roared the giant, who lay stretched in front of the fire warming himself.

The hare immediately climbed up and began to scratch as desired; but the giant knocked him over, and down he fell on to the hearthstone, breaking off his forelegs, since which time all hares have had short forelegs.

The fox next clambered up to scratch the giant’s back, but he was served like the hare. Then the wolf’s turn came, but the giant said that he was no better at scratching than the others.

“You scratch me!” shouted the giant, turning impatiently to the bear.

“All right,” answered Bruin; “I know all about scratching,” and he forthwith dug his claws into the giant’s back and ripped it into a thousand pieces.

Then all the beasts danced on the dead body of the monster, and Ashpot recovered his sister and took her home, carrying off, at the same time, all the giant’s gold and silver. The bear and the wolf burst into the cattle-sheds and devoured all the cows and sheep, the fox feasted in the hen-roost, while the hare had the free run of the oatfield. So every one was satisfied.

The other story is also about Ashpot, whose two elder brothers still treated him very badly, and eventually turned him out of his home. Poor Ashpot wandered away up into the mountains, where he met a huge giant. At first he was terribly afraid, but after a little while he told the giant what had happened to him, and asked him if he could find a job for him.

“You are just the very man I want,” said the giant. “Come along with me.”

The first work to be done was to make a fire to brew some ale, so they went off together to the forest to cut firewood. The giant carried a club in place of an axe, and when they came to a large birch-tree he asked Ashpot whether he would like to club the tree down or climb up and hold the top of it. The boy thought that the latter would suit him best, and he soon got up to the topmost branches and held on to them. But the giant gave the tree such a blow with his club as to knock it right out of the ground, sending Ashpot flying across the meadows into a marsh. Luckily he landed on soft ground, and was none the worse for his adventure; and they soon managed to get the tree home, when they set to work to make a fire.

But the wood was green, and would not burn, so the giant began to blow. At the first puff Ashpot found himself flying up to the ceiling as if he had been a feather, but he managed to catch hold of a piece of birch-bark among the rafters, and on reaching the ground again he told the giant that he had been up to get something to make the fire burn.

The fire was soon burning splendidly, and the giant commenced to brew the ale, drinking it off as fast as it was made. Ashpot watched him getting gradually stupid, and heard him mutter to himself, “To-night I will kill him,” so he began to think of a plan to outwit his master. When he went to bed he placed the giant’s cream-whisk, with which the giant used to beat his cream, between the sheets as a dummy, while Ashpot himself crept under the bedstead, where he was safely hidden.

In the middle of the night, just as he had expected, he heard the giant come into his room, and then there was a tremendous whack as the giant brought his club down on to the bed. Next morning the boy came out of his room as if nothing had happened, and his master was very much surprised to find him still alive.

“Hullo!” said the giant. “Didn’t you feel anything in the night?”

“I did feel something,” said Ashpot; “but I thought that it was only a sausage-peg that had fallen on the bed, so I went to sleep again.”

The giant was more astonished than ever, and went off to consult his sister, who lived in a neighboring mountain, and was about ten times his size. At length it was settled that the giantess should set her cooking-pot on the fire, and that Ashpot should be sent to see her, when she was to tip him into the caldron and boil him. In the course of the day the giant sent the boy off with a message to his sister, and when he reached the giantess’s dwelling he found her busy cooking. But he soon saw through her design, and he took out of his pocket a nut with a hole in it.

“Look here,” he said, showing the nut to the ogress, “you think you can do everything. I will tell you one thing that you can’t do: you can’t make yourself so small as to be able to creep into the hole in this nut.”

“Rubbish!” replied the giantess. “Of course I can!”

And in a moment she became as small as a fly, and crept into the nut, whereupon Ashpot hurled it into the fire, and that was the end of the giantess.

The boy was so delighted that he returned to his old tyrant the giant and told him what had happened to his sister. This set the big man thinking again as to how he was to rid himself of this sharp-witted little nuisance. He did not understand boys, and he was afraid of Ashpot’s tricks, so he offered him as much gold and silver as he could carry if he would go away and never return. Ashpot, however, replied that the amount he could carry would not be worth having, and that he could not think of going unless he got as much as the giant could carry.

The giant, glad to get rid of him at any cost, agreed, and, loading himself with gold and silver and precious stones, he set out with the boy toward his home. When they reached the outskirts of the farms they saw a herd of cattle, and the giant began to tremble.

“What sort of beasts are these?” he asked.

“They are my father’s cows,” replied Ashpot, “and you had better put down your burden and run back to your mountain, or they may bite you.”

The giant was only too happy to get away, so, depositing his load, which was as big as a small hill, he made off, and left the boy to carry his treasure home by himself.

So enormous was the amount of the valuables that it was six years before Ashpot succeeded in removing everything from the field where the giant had set it down; but he and all his relations were rich people for the rest of their lives.