The Swineherd

Once upon a time there lived a prince. His kingdom was tiny, so tiny that you could walk around it in a morning and still be home for lunch. But the prince was cheerful and brave, and he decided to ask for the hand of the emperor’s own daughter.

His gifts were no ordinary ones. In the garden where his father rested grew a rose bush. It bloomed only once in five years, and then with a single flower. But oh, how it smelled! Whoever sniffed it forgot all their troubles. And the prince also had a nightingale. When it sang, it seemed that every song in the world was hiding in its tiny throat.

The prince laid the rose and the nightingale in two silver boxes and sent them to the princess.

The emperor himself carried the boxes into the hall where the princess and her ladies-in-waiting were playing at visiting. She saw the presents and clapped her hands:

“Oh, I do hope there is a kitten inside!”

They opened the first box, and there lay a rose.

“What lovely workmanship!” gasped the ladies-in-waiting.

“Not just lovely, but splendid!” said the emperor.

The princess touched a petal with one finger and made a face.

“Ugh, Papa! It isn’t made. It’s real!”

“Ugh!” echoed the ladies-in-waiting. “Real!”

“Let’s not be cross ahead of time,” said the emperor. “Let’s see what is in the second one.”

Out flew the nightingale. It perched on the windowsill and sang so sweetly that in the kitchen the cook dropped his ladle.

“Charmant! Charmant!” twittered the ladies-in-waiting. They loved to chatter in French, though they knew only a few words.

“Oh, how it reminds me of the late empress’s music box,” sighed an old courtier. “The same voice, the same trills!”

“Yes,” said the emperor, and he cried like a little child.

“I hope the bird isn’t real?” asked the princess.

“Quite real,” the messengers bowed.

“Then let it fly away,” said the princess with a wave of her hand.

And she would not let the prince into the palace.

But the prince was not discouraged. He smeared his face with soot, pulled an old cap down over his eyebrows and knocked at the palace.

“Good day, Your Imperial Majesty! Might there be some work for me?”

“Oh, plenty of people want work,” said the emperor, scratching his head. “Still, I do need someone to mind the pigs. I have a whole herd of them.”

So the prince became the emperor’s swineherd. They gave him a cramped little room next to the pigsty. All day long he whittled and hammered in there, and by evening he had made a small pot, hung all over with little bells. When the water boiled in it, the bells went ting-a-ling and played an old tune:

“Oh, my dear Augustin, all is gone, all is gone!”

But the most wonderful thing was this: whoever held a finger over the steam could smell at once what was cooking in every kitchen in town. The baker had poppy-seed buns, and the cobbler had cabbage with peas.

The princess was walking past the pigsty with her ladies-in-waiting. She heard the tune and stopped. It was the only tune she could play on the piano, and even that with one finger.

“Why, that’s my song!” she cried. “The swineherd must be very well educated. Go and ask how much his instrument costs.”

A lady-in-waiting ran off, wearing wooden clogs so as not to dirty her slippers.

“How much do you want for the pot?”

“Ten kisses from the princess,” said the swineherd.

“Goodness gracious!” cried the lady-in-waiting, clasping her hands.

“I won’t take less.”

The princess stamped her foot.

“How rude! Let’s go.”

But she had not gone many steps when the bells began to jingle again: “Oh, my dear Augustin…”

“Listen,” the princess called to the lady-in-waiting, “ask whether he would take ten kisses from you instead.”

“No, thank you,” said the swineherd. “Ten from the princess, or the pot stays with me.”

“What a nuisance!” sighed the princess. “Well then, stand around me, so that nobody sees.”

The ladies-in-waiting spread their wide skirts in a circle. The swineherd received ten quick kisses, light as a sparrow’s peck, and the princess received the pot.

What joy that was! All evening and all the next day the pot boiled without stopping. The princess and her ladies-in-waiting held their fingertips over it and sniffed.

“We know who has sweet porridge today and who has pancakes!” cried the ladies-in-waiting, clapping.

“But not a word to anyone,” said the princess. “I am the emperor’s daughter, after all!”

And the swineherd, who was really the prince, though nobody knew it, did not sit idle for a single day. Now he made a rattle. When you spun it, whirr-r-r, it played every waltz and polka there is in the world.

“Well!” said the princess when she heard the music. “I have never heard anything finer. Ask how much he wants. But I won’t give any more kisses!”

“A hundred kisses from the princess,” said the lady-in-waiting when she came back.

“He must be out of his mind!” said the princess indignantly, and she walked away.

She went a few steps, listened to the waltz and stopped.

“One must support the arts,” she said gravely. “I am the emperor’s daughter, after all. Tell him I will give ten kisses, as yesterday, and he may take the rest from my ladies-in-waiting.”

“Oh, we don’t want to!” squeaked the ladies-in-waiting.

“Nonsense! If I can, so can you.”

But the swineherd shook his head.

“A hundred from the princess, or the rattle stays with me.”

“Well then, stand around me!” commanded the princess.

The ladies-in-waiting spread their skirts in a circle again, and the counting began.

Meanwhile the emperor stepped out onto the balcony. He rubbed his eyes and put on his spectacles.

“What is all that fuss by the pigsty? Let me have a look.”

He pulled up his slippers, which he wore with the backs trodden down, and crept quietly down into the yard. The ladies-in-waiting were so absorbed in counting, to make sure it was all fair, no more and no less, that they did not notice him. The emperor rose on tiptoe.

“Eighty-four… eighty-five… eighty-six…”

“What is going on here?!” roared the emperor, and he waved his slipper.

The ladies-in-waiting scattered, and the rattle went crash on the ground.

“Out!” stamped the emperor. “Both of you, out of my empire!”

And he drove them out through the gate, the princess and the swineherd both.

The princess stood in the rain, soaked, and wept. The swineherd stood silently beside her.

“Oh, how unhappy I am!” she sobbed. “Why did I not marry that handsome prince? Oh, how unhappy I am!”

Then the swineherd stepped behind a tree, wiped the soot from his face, threw off his old rags and came out in a prince’s clothes. He looked so fine that the princess even dropped a curtsy.

“You did not want an honest prince, you did not understand the rose and the nightingale,” he said. “But you kissed a swineherd for a toy.”

He went off to his little kingdom and shut the gate behind him. Clack went the bolt.

And the princess was left outside, singing softly:

“Oh, my dear Augustin, all is gone, all is gone!”