The Fairy Ring
Copyright© 2024 by Kate Douglas Wiggin
The Widow’s Daughter
THERE was once a poor widow woman, living in the North of Ireland, who had one daughter named Nabla. And Nabla grew up both idle and lazy, till at length, when she had grown to be a young woman, she was both thriftless and useless, fit only to sit with her heels in the ashes and croon to the cat the day long. Her mother was annoyed with her, so that one day, when Nabla refused to do some little trifle about the house, her mother got out a good stout sally rod and came in and thrashed her soundly with it.
As her mother was giving Nabla the whacking she had so richly earned, who should happen to be riding past but the King’s son himself. He heard the mother beating and scolding, and Nabla crying and pleading within. So he drew rein, and at the top of his voice shouted to know what was the matter. The widow came to the door, courtesying when she saw who he was. Not wishing to give out a bad name on her daughter, she told the King’s son that she had a daughter who killed herself working the leelong day and refused to rest when her mother asked her, so that she had always to be beaten before she would stop.
“What work can your daughter do?” the Prince asked.
“She can spin, weave, and sew, and do every work that ever a woman did,” the mother replied.
Now, it so happened that a twelvemonth before the Prince had taken a notion of marrying, and his mother, anxious he should have none but the best wife, with his approval, sent messengers over all Ireland to find him a woman who could perform all a woman’s duties, including the three accomplishments the widow named—spinning, that is, weaving and sewing. But all the candidates whom the messengers had secured were found unsatisfactory on being put to trial, and the Prince had remained unwedded. When, now, the King’s son heard this account of Nabla from her own mother he said:
“You are not fit to have the charge of such a good girl. For twelve months, through all parts of my mother’s kingdom, search was being made for just such a young woman that she might become my wife. I’ll take Nabla with me.”
Poor Nabla was rejoiced and her mother astonished. The King’s son helped Nabla to a seat behind him on the horse’s back and bidding adieu to the widow, rode off.
When he had got Nabla home, he introduced her to his mother, telling the Queen that by good fortune he had secured the very woman they had so long sought in vain. The Queen asked what Nabla could do, and he replied that she could spin, weave, and sew, and do everything else a woman should; and, moreover, she was so eager for work that her mother was beating her within an inch of her life to make her rest herself when he arrived on the scene at Nabla’s own cottage. The Queen said that was well.
She took Nabla to a large room and gave her a heap of silk and a golden wheel, and told her she must have all the silk spun into thread in twenty-four hours. Then she bolted her in.
Poor Nabla, in amazement, sat looking at the big heap of silk and the golden wheel. And at length she began to cry, for she had not spun a yard of thread in all her life. As she cried an ugly woman, having one of her feet as big as a bolster, appeared before her.
“What are you crying for?” she asked.
Nabla told her, and the woman said, “I’ll spin the silk for you if you ask me to the wedding.”
“I’ll do that,” Nabla said. And then the woman sat down to the wheel, and working it with her big foot, very soon had the whole heap spun.
When the Queen came and found all spun she said: “That is good.” Then she brought in a golden loom and told Nabla she must have all that thread woven in twenty-four hours.
When the Queen had gone, Nabla sat down and looked from the thread to the loom and from the loom to the thread, wondering, for she had not in all her life even thrown a shuttle. At length she put her face in her hands and began to cry. There now appeared to her an ugly woman with one hand as big as a pot hanging by her side. She asked Nabla why she cried. Nabla told her, and then the woman said:
“I’ll weave all that for you if you’ll give me the promise of your wedding.”
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