JACK DREADNOUGHT. Erdélyi, iii. 16.
Cf. Grimm, "The Story of the youth who went to learn what fear was," and notes: ib. "The King's son who feared nothing," and notes. Household Stories from the Land of Hofer. "Fearless Johnny." Afanassieff, v. 46.
Page 232. The secret treasures guarded by ghosts, &c. is a world-wide tradition. Cf. Hofberg, Svenska Folksägner. "Skatten i Säbybäcken," where a carriage full of gold and silver is said to be sunk mid-stream, over which a weird light flickers. Many attempts, we are told, have been made to rescue it, but each time some one has spoken, or else the bull-calves—which are not to have a single black hair on them, and were to be fed for three years on unskimmed milk—were not strong enough; and so the attempts have ever failed. See also, in the same work "Skattgräfvarna," where the searchers were frightened away by the Demon guardians of the hidden store. In Lincolnshire I have heard of a field where, tradition says, countless
- ↑ There is a traditional air to which these lines are always sung.
the little frog spoke to her and asked her not to throw dirty water down, and she replied "Oh! you nasty, dirty little thing, I won't do as you ask me." Then the frog said "Whenever you speak frogs, and toads, and snakes shall drop from your mouth." She went home and it happened as the frog had said. At night when they were sitting at the table a little voice was heard singing outside—
"Come bring me my supper,[1]
My own sweet, sweet one."
When the step-daughter went to the door there was the little frog. She brought him in in spite of her step-mother; took him on her knee and fed him with bits from her plate. After a while he sang
"Come, let us go to bed,
My own sweet, sweet one."
So, unknown to her step-mother, she laid him at the foot of her bed, as she said he was a poor, harmless thing. Then she fell asleep and forgot all about him. Next morning there stood a beautiful prince, who said he had been enchanted by a wicked fairy and was to be a frog till a girl would let him sleep with her. They were married, and lived happily in his beautiful castle ever after. This is one of the few folk-stories I have been able to collect from the lips of a living story-teller in England.
