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There were once a man and a woman who had
long, in vain, wished for a child. At length it appeared that God was
about to grant their desire.
These people had a
little window at the back of their house from which a splendid garden
could be seen, which was full of the most beautiful flowers and herbs.
It was, however, surrounded by a high wall, and no one dared to go into
it because it belonged to an enchantress, who had great power and was
dreaded by all the world.
One day the woman was
standing by this window and looking down into the garden, when she saw a
bed which was planted with the most beautiful rampion, and it looked so
fresh and green that she longed for it. She quite pined away, and began
to look pale and miserable.
Her husband was alarmed, and asked: 'What ails you, dear wife?'
'Ah,' she replied, 'if I can't eat some of the rampion, which is in the garden behind our house, I shall die.'
The man, who loved her, thought: 'Sooner than let your wife die,
bring her some of the rampion yourself, let it cost what it will.'
At twilight, he clambered down over the wall into the garden of
the enchantress, hastily clutched a handful of rampion, and took it to
his wife. She at once made herself a salad of it, and ate it greedily.
It tasted so good to her - so very good, that the next day she longed
for it three times as much as before.
If he was to
have any rest, her husband knew he must once more descend into the
garden. Therefore, in the gloom of evening, he let himself down again;
but when he had clambered down the wall he was terribly afraid, for he
saw the enchantress standing before him.
'How can you
dare,' said she with angry look, 'descend into my garden and steal my
rampion like a thief? You shall suffer for it!'
'Ah,' answered he, 'let mercy
take the place of justice, I only made up my mind to do it out of
necessity. My wife saw your rampion from the window, and felt such a
longing for it that she would have died if she had not got some to eat.'
The enchantress allowed her anger to be softened,
and said to him: 'If the case be as you say, I will allow you to take
away with you as much rampion as you will, only I make one condition,
you must give me the child which your wife will bring into the world; it
shall be well treated, and I will care for it like a mother.'
The man in his terror consented to everything.
When the woman was brought to bed, the enchantress appeared at
once, gave the child the name of Rapunzel, and took it away with her.
Rapunzel grew into the most beautiful child under the sun. When
she was twelve years old, the enchantress shut her into a tower in the
middle of a forest. The tower had neither stairs nor door, but near the
top was a little window. When the enchantress wanted to go in, she
placed herself beneath it and cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
Rapunzel had magnificent long hair, fine as spun gold, and when she
heard the voice of the enchantress, she unfastened her braided tresses,
wound them round one of the hooks of the window above, and then the hair
fell twenty ells down, and the enchantress climbed up by it.
After a year or two, it came to pass that the king's son rode
through the forest and passed by the tower. Then he heard a song, which
was so charming that he stood still and listened. It was Rapunzel, who
in her solitude passed her time in letting her sweet voice resound. The
king's son wanted to climb up to her, and looked for the door of the
tower, but none was to be found. He rode home, but the singing had so
deeply touched his heart, that every day he went out into the forest and
listened to it.
Once when he was thus standing behind a tree, he saw that an enchantress came there, and he heard how she cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
Then Rapunzel let down the braids of her hair, and the enchantress climbed up to her.
'If that is the ladder by which one mounts, I too will try my
fortune,' said he, and the next day when it began to grow dark, he went
to the tower and cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
Immediately the hair fell down and the king's son climbed up.
At first Rapunzel was terribly frightened when a man, such as
her eyes had never yet beheld, came to her; but the king's son began to
talk to her quite like a friend, and told her that his heart had been so
stirred that it had let him have no rest, and he had been forced to see
her. Then Rapunzel lost her fear, and when he asked her if she would
take him for her husband, and she saw that he was young and handsome,
she thought: 'He will love me more than old Dame Gothel does'; and she
said yes, and laid her hand in his.
She said: 'I
will willingly go away with you, but I do not know how to get down.
Bring with you a skein of silk every time that you come, and I will
weave a ladder with it, and when that is ready I will descend, and you
will take me on your horse.'
They agreed that until
that time he should come to her every evening, for the old woman came by
day. The enchantress remarked nothing of this, until once Rapunzel said
to her: 'Tell me, Dame Gothel, how it happens that you are so much
heavier for me to draw up than the young king's son - he is with me in a
moment.'
'Ah! you wicked child,' cried
the enchantress. 'What do I hear you say! I thought I had separated you
from all the world, and yet you have deceived me!'
In her anger she clutched Rapunzel's beautiful tresses, wrapped them
twice round her left hand, seized a pair of scissors with the right, and
snip, snap, they were cut off, and the lovely braids lay on the ground.
And she was so pitiless that she took poor Rapunzel into a desert where
she had to live in great grief and misery.
On the
same day that she cast out Rapunzel, however, the enchantress fastened
the braids of hair, which she had cut off, to the hook of the window,
and when the king's son came and cried:
'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your hair to me.'
she let the hair down. The king's son ascended, but instead of finding
his dearest Rapunzel, he found the enchantress, who gazed at him with
wicked and venomous looks.
'Aha!' she cried
mockingly, 'you would fetch your dearest, but the beautiful bird sits no
longer singing in the nest; the cat has got it, and will scratch out
your eyes as well. Rapunzel is lost to you; you will never see her
again.'
The king's son was beside himself with pain,
and in his despair he leapt down from the tower. He escaped with his
life, but the thorns into which he fell pierced his eyes.
He wandered quite blind about the forest, ate nothing but roots
and berries, and did naught but lament and weep over the loss of his
dearest wife. Thus he roamed about in misery for some years, and at
length came to the desert where Rapunzel, with the twins to which she
had given birth, a boy and a girl, lived in wretchedness. He heard a
voice, and it seemed so familiar to him that he went towards it, and
when he approached, Rapunzel knew him and fell on his neck and wept. Two
of her tears wetted his eyes and they grew clear again, and he could
see with them as before. He led her to his kingdom where he was joyfully
received, and they lived for a long time afterwards, happy and
contented.
sumber : http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/Rapu.shtml
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Because Lulu was so determined, she climbed to the top faster than Bella could run. Lulu was so happy that she closed her eyes while she jumped down the tree saying "Yippy!"
