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There was once a young fellow who dwelt near the Brocken, and he had won a lovely maiden for his bride. He thought himself a lucky man, but then he did not know that both the girl and her mother were witches. Now one evening he tarried very late at his bride’s house, and could not guess why she and her mother were so eager to send him away, for generally the maiden was loth to let him go; and he did not know that this was Walpurgis-night, the great meeting-time of the witches. Yet he grew suspicious, and after he had bidden his dear “good-night,” he hid himself in the hay-loft, for he half expected to see another man creep up for a stolen meeting with his sweetheart, and was ready to fly at his throat. But, instead of this, he beheld mother and daughter step into the hay-loft alone, and the mother held in her hand a strangely shaped glass. There they stood in the middle of the barn, and spoke strange words, and drank from the glass, when lo! on a sudden they had disappeared.

Now this tore the bridegroom’s heart with dread and foreboding, and he determined to follow them. So he came from his hiding-place, and took up the glass they had left behind. A few drops of red, fiery liquid still remained in it. Then the lad went out and plucked a garland of dragon-wort, which he wound round about him, to preserve him from witchcraft; and after he had done this, he boldly drank all that remained in the glass, repeating the same words that he had heard his sweetheart use. And behold! in the twinkling of an eye, he found himself on the Brocken, in the midst of the magic circle among the rocks, where the witches meet.

Jagged peaks and giant fir-trees, with boughs bent crooked by the breath of the storm-wind, rose on every side, and here and there, on the rocks, huge fires were burning. The company was arriving in great numbers, and the bridegroom was astonished to see how many of his neighbours and familiar acquaintance came riding up, some on pitchforks, some on goats, cats, or geese. His lovely bride was there, riding pillion behind her mother on the hay-fork that had been lying beside him in the loft. He himself was sitting, he knew not how, on a great hay-waggon, that was drawn to one side of the open dancing-space, and he laid his wreath of dragon-wort so as to form a kind of circle around him. Presently the oldest and fiercest among the witches came swooping down upon him, riding a huge tom-cat. “Ah!” she cried with a disappointed scowl, “curse thy hedge of dragon-wort, thou interloper! ’Twould have gone ill with thee but for that!” The tom-cat gave an angry spit, and the baffled witch pulled him round by the whiskers, and rode away into the dance. For the dance had begun, fast and furious, so that the lad could hardly see which way the frantic creatures bounded and pranced; and all the while there was a terrible being with horns upon his head, who moved about and directed the festivities. And what was the bridegroom’s dismay when this fearful being came towards him, and looking up with a jeering expression, said: “A bridegroom should have a merry heart, and thou art not here only to stare and be idle, I take it. I know thee well enough for a fine cornet-player; here, catch hold of this instrument, and help to play for our dance.”

With that he threw up a splendid new cornet into the waggon, and the bridegroom was fain to take it, and join in with the other players, who, hidden among the rocks, where he could not see them, were filling the air with a burst of music. Now the bridegroom could not help agreeing with the opinion expressed about his playing, and so for some time he played on, not a little pleased with himself, upon the beautiful cornet.

But after a while the Terrible Being gave a sign, and music and dance stopped at once. Then all the company stood silent, while he drew water from the “witches’ well,” and poured it into the “witches’ basin,” where the witches then had to wash themselves, while he sprinkled some of the water, too, upon them.

While the bridegroom was watching this dread ceremony, he became aware that his sweetheart had spied him out, and was gazing at him anxiously. As soon as she caught his eye, she danced up, and whispered: “Dear lover, come with me, and I will prepare a couch for thee, for thou must be weary of this long, wild night.” He would have opened his lips to scold her, but she touched them, and he was unable to say another word. Then, taking him by the hand, she drew him, as he thought, into the neighbouring thicket, where she showed him a downy feather-bed, shut in by flowered curtains. “Creep in there,” she whispered, “and sleep; but thy new cornet thou mayst keep as thy reward for playing so finely; our master hath said so.” With this, she was gone, and he heard the music and tumult of the dance break forth again, but presently a great weariness overcame him, and he fell asleep.

When he awoke it was high noon, and he lay in a meadow close to his home; the downy bed with thick curtains turned out to be the skeleton of an old horse, which had lain mouldering in the fields, and between the ribs of which he found himself wedged. The new cornet, too, proved to be nothing but a dead cat, with a stumpy tail, which he had almost chewed off during his fine musical efforts.

The bridegroom went home, seething with indignation, and bent upon revenge. That very same evening he betook himself, armed with his righteous wrath, to his sweetheart’s house, and began:—

“Wretched girl! what honest man can have any more to do with thee now?”

But in a moment the tables were turned, and he found himself in an unexpected position. “Wretched!” cried she. “I? whom thou hast spied upon, stolen a march upon, from whose magic glass thou hast dared drink, and but for whose care thou wouldst have been crushed to powder last night, thou foolhardy meddler!”

“’Twas not thou, but my dragon-wort, that saved me,” began the unlucky fellow.

“Nonsense!” screamed mother and daughter, now both together. “Dost think that could have availed thee at all had we raised our voices against thee? Nay, ’twas we who saved thee; and hadst thou not been kept out of sight and put to sleep, thou couldst never have lived through the terrible hour of the ‘witches’ sprinkling.’”

“At any rate,” complained the brow-beaten man, trying to keep up his dignity, “I should have been warned it was a witch I was taking for my bride. But it is time yet,” he added angrily, “and take such a bride I will not—I will not, I say!”

“Warned!” shouted mother and daughter at once; “he, a common mortal, warned of the honour we did him in stooping to mate with his like! Nay, ’tis plain he is only fit for one lot—a donkey’s! And a donkey he shall be; let that be his punishment.”

So before the hapless bridegroom could defend himself, or take refuge in flight, the magic words were pronounced, and he went forth, an ugly, rough, braying donkey, a terrible example of man’s folly in attempting, with however much right on his side, to argue with a witch—or a woman.

Down the road the poor donkey ambled, trying to express his deep sense of injury by piteous brayings. Presently a neighbour heard him, and though far from recognising in him an old comrade of the workshop and the ale-house, he still had pity on him, and noticing, besides, that he was a fine donkey, he drove him into a stall and put fresh hay before him. But the donkey could neither eat nor drink, nor bear to be put to work, so at last the farmer lost patience and drove it out of his stable. And now the wretched donkey wandered about the country, munching such dusty grass and thistles as he could find by the wayside, but driven out of every green paddock as a useless beast,[Pg 211]
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[Pg 213] and receiving more kicks than kind handling. At last, half starved and hopeless, he determined to swallow his pride, and return to beg the cruel witches for mercy.

Now, his bride had been thinking things over, on her side, since he had been turned from her door in the shape of a donkey. She noticed that the village-folk shunned her more of late, and besides, they had always held a kind of suspicious attitude towards her and her mother.

What if the bridegroom should have let out the horrid truth, during those few hours that he had spent in the village, after awaking from his enchanted sleep? What if she should get no one else to woo her now? So, when she saw the poor donkey appear beneath her window, with lean ribs and drooping ears, her heart was quite prepared to be softened, and she listened graciously to his bray of apology and repentance.

“Well, I will forgive thee this once,” she said, “on one condition, and that is, that thou dost wed me within twelve hours of the time thou art rid of thy donkey’s skin. If thou wilt promise this, I will tell thee how to get back thy proper shape.”

The donkey went feebly down on his knees in the dust, and held up one hoof, as a solemn sign that his promise was given.

“Listen, then,” said the little witch; “thou must watch for a child to be christened in the village, and wait at the church door till the water from the font is thrown out; if some only falls on thy back, thou wilt be changed directly.”

The donkey threw up his hoofs in glee, and trotted off to the village. It was a long time before any christening took place; never had there seemed such a scarcity of births before. But at last the donkey heard that the son and heir of his old friend the farmer was to be christened the following Sunday, and he watched eagerly for the party to go to church, and return again, and then for the beadle to come out upon the porch and empty away the water from the font. When at last he did so, the donkey stood right in his way. “Get away, foolish beast,” called the beadle; but the donkey did not budge. “What care I?” the beadle thereupon angrily exclaimed, and threw the whole pan of water over the donkey’s back. He nearly fell to the ground when he saw his old friend the bridegroom, who had so long been missing, standing in the donkey’s place; but the young fellow gave him a golden crown to hold his tongue, and trump up some tale about his having been away on a journey, and he firmly believed ever after that the beadle had done so.

Then the bridegroom hurried to claim his bride, and keep his promise, which was not so very hard after all, for she was a pretty bride, and one only had to forget that little matter of the Brocken, and take care to sleep sound on every future Walpurgis-night. But she kept him in order—“For, mind,” said she, “if ever thou dost treat me to any foolish behaviour, back into the donkey’s skin thou shalt go again, and this time every one shall know of it.”