Little White Duck

Immediately after his marriage the prince had to go off to war. The newly-we princes was left alone in the palace.

She was not supposed to go out of the palace. All that she could do was to stroll in the royal garden. One day. an old woman accosted her in the garden. "Be happy. dear," she told the princess, "Just take a bath in the garden pond and relax." The unsuspecting princess accepted the advice. No sooner had she dived into the water than the old woman -- in fact a witch -- cackled, "Fly, fly, little white Duck."

The next moment, the princess turned into a white duck, flapping her wings. Now the witch assumed the figure of the princess and welcomed the prince when he returned after winning the war. In the meantime, the white duck laid two eggs and hatched two human children a boy and a girl. She mothered them with utmost care, keeping the witch at bay. But the witch got the scent of two human children being brought up by the duck. She ordered the royal iron-smith, "Get me a sharp knife by tomorrow, sharp enough to cut the throat of a boy and a girl in one stroke." The duck's daughter heard her instructions. She did not go to sleep on her usual bed.

At night the witch entered the children's room and slayed the sleeping boy. "Where is the girl?" she wondered and could do nothing.

The next day mother duck discovered her son, slayed to death. She cried in agony. The prince heard it. "I hear a duck wailing in human voice," he told witch princess. "You are mistaken, my prince," countered the witch princess. She asked the servants to catch the duck. But much though the servants tried, the duck dodged them. So the prince himself came to survey the scene.

The duck at once flew into the prince's arm. The very touch with the prince's body turned her into a maiden again. The witch's game was over. She was sent to prison. The prince, princess and their surviving daughter began their life anew.