prince kept the shoe, and Rashin-coatie got home all right, and the folk said the dinner was very nice.
Now the prince was resolved to find out who the bonnie lady was, and he sent a servant through all the land with the shoe. Every lady was to try it on, and the prince promised to marry the one it would fit. That servant went to a great many houses, but could not find a lady that the shoe would go on, it was so little and neat. At last he came to a henwife's house, and her daughter had little feet. At first the shoe would not go on, but she paret her feet, and clippit her toes, until the shoe went on. Now the prince was very angry. He knew it was not the lady that he wanted; but, because he had promised to marry whoever the shoe fitted, he had to keep his promise. The marriage day came, and, as they were all riding to the kirk, a little bird flew through the air, and it sang:—
"Clippit feet an paret taes is on the saidle set;
Bat bonnie feet an braw feet sits in the kitchen neuk."
"What's that ye say?" said the prince. "Oh," says the henwife, "would ye mind what a feel bird says?" But the prince said, "Sing that again, bonnie birdie." So the bird sings:—
"Clippit feet an paret taes is on the saidle set;
Bat bonnie feet an braw feet sits in the kitchen neuk."
The prince turned his horse and rode home, and went straight to his father's kitchen, and there sat Rashin-coatie. He kent her at once, she was so bonnie; and when she tried on the shoe it fitted her, and so the prince married Rashin-coatie, and they lived happy and built a house for the red calf, who had been so kind to her.[1]
- ↑ Popular Rhymes of Scotland, pp. 66-70. A. Machado y Alvarez, in Bibliotheca de lag traditionea populares cspanoles (pp. 114-120), gives a story contaniing several of the incidents of this version of Rashin-coatie. It comes from Santa Jaana, in Chile.
