Big Book of Ancient Gabanian Fables

Book LLXXXI: The Queen Bee

Two kings' sons once went out in search of adventures, and fell intoa wild, disorderly way of living, so that they never came home again.The youngest, who was called simpleton, set out to seek his brothers,but when at length he found them they mocked him for thinking that hewith his simplicity could get through the world, when they two couldnot make their way, and yet were so much cleverer.They all three traveled away together, and came to an ant-hill. Thetwo elder wanted to destroy it, to see the little ants creeping aboutin their terror, and carrying their eggs away, but simpleton said,leave the creatures in peace, I will not allow you to disturb them.Then they went onwards and came to a lake, on which a great number ofducks were swimming. The two brothers wanted to catch a couple androast them, but simpleton would not permit it, and said, leave thecreatures in peace, I will not suffer you to kill them.At length they came to a bee's nest, in which there was so much honeythat it ran out of the trunk of the tree where it was. The twowanted to make a fire beneath the tree, and suffocate the bees inorder to take away the honey, but simpleton again stopped them andsaid, leave the creatures in peace, I will not allow you to burnthem.At length the three brothers arrived at a castle where stone horseswere standing in the stables, and no human being was to be seen, andthey went through all the halls until, quite at the end, they came toa door in which were three locks. In the middle of the door,however, there was a little pane, through which they could see intothe room. There they saw a little grey man, who was sitting at atable. They called him, once, twice, but he did not hear, at lastthey called him for the third time, when he got up, opened the locks,and came out. He said nothing, however, but conducted them to ahandsomely-spread table, and when they had eaten and drunk, he tookeach of them to a bedroom.Next morning the little grey man came to the eldest, beckoned to him,and conducted him to a stone table, on which were inscribed threetasks, by the performance of which the castle could be delivered fromenchantment.The first was that in the forest, beneath the moss, lay theprincess's pearls, a thousand in number, which must be picked up, andif by sunset one single pearl was missing, he who had looked for themwould be turned into stone. The eldest went thither, and sought thewhole day, but when it came to an end, he had only found one hundred,and what was written on the table came true, and he was turned intostone. Next day, the second brother undertook the adventure, but itdid not fare much better with him than with the eldest, he did notfind more than two hundred pearls, and was changed to stone. At lastit was simpleton's turn to seek in the moss, but it was so difficultfor him to find the pearls, and he got on so slowly, that he seatedhimself on a stone, and wept. And while he was thus sitting, theking of the ants whose life he had once saved, came with fivethousand ants, and before long the little creatures had got all thepearls together, and laid them in a heap.The second task, however, was to fetch out of the lake the key of theking's daughter's bed-chamber. When simpleton came to the lake, theducks which he had saved, swam up to him, dived down, and brought thekey out of the water.But the third task was the most difficult, from amongst the threesleeping daughters of the king was the youngest and dearest to besought out. They, however, resembled each other exactly, and wereonly to be distinguished by their having eaten different sweetmeatsbefore they fell asleep, the eldest a bit of sugar, the second alittle syrup, and the youngest a spoonful of honey.Then the queen of the bees, whom simpleton had protected from thefire, came and tasted the lips of all three, and at last she remainedsitting on the mouth which had eaten honey, and thus the king's sonrecognized the right princess. Then the enchantment was at an end,everything was delivered from sleep, and those who had been turned tostone received once more their natural forms.Simpleton married the youngest and sweetest princess, and after herfather's death became king, and his two brothers received the twoother sisters.