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Catskin
There was once a princess whose mother died when she was born. She grew up very beautiful, with lovely golden hair. Her father wanted her to marry against her will. So she thought of a plan to put off the wedding. She asked to make her three new dresses. One was to be golden like the sun, the second was to be silver like the moon, and the third must sparkle like the stars. She also asked for a fur cloak with a hood made of a thousand different skins from a thousand different animals. The princess said to herself, “It will be very difficult to make these clothes, and the wedding will be put off for a long time.”
But her father set all his best workers to make the three dresses, and his hunters took a tiny piece from the fur of a thousand different animals and a cloak with a hood was made. So the dresses and the cloak were soon ready and the wedding could not be put off much longer.
At night the princess got up secretly and took from her jewel box a gold ring, a gold necklace and a gold brooch.
Then she took the golden dress like the sun and the silver dress like the moon and the dress that sparkled like the stars, and folded them. They were so light and so magic that she could pack all three into a nutshell. She put on her fur cloak and pulled the hood over her golden hair, and rubbed soot on her face and hands so that no one would know who she was. Then she left her father’s palace. She walked till she was tired, and when she came to a hollow tree she crept inside and fell asleep.
Next day the king of the neighbouring country was hunting, and his hunters found the girl in her fur cloak, asleep in the tree. When the dogs barked, she woke up and was very frightened. She said, “I am a poor girl and I have no parents. Please take me with you.”
“Yes, Miss Catskin,” said the hunters. “We shall take you with us and you can work in the kitchen.”
And they took her to the palace and showed her a little dark room under the stairs and said, “You can sleep there, Catskin.”
They thought it was quite a good room for a girl who had sooty hands and a sooty face.
She had to work very hard in the kitchen. She fetched water and wood, looked after the fires and raked out the ashes. At night she often cried in her little dark room.
One day there was a feast in the king’s palace and she asked the cook, “May I go and watch the fine ladies and gentlemen?”
“You can go for just half-an-hour,” said the cook, “and then you must come back and rake out the ashes.”
So Catskin washed the soot off her face and hands, and went into her little room. She opened the nutshell, shook out her golden dress, and put it on. She went to the party and no one knew who she was. The king thought she was very beautiful and danced with her himself.
