Introduction
“The Three Oranges” (also told as “The Three Citrons” or “Le tre arance”) is a classic Mediterranean wonder-tale, widespread in Iberia and Italy and classed by folklorists as ATU 408.
The story
There was once a king’s son who fell into a strange melancholy. Physicians bled him and minstrels played to him, but nothing eased his sighing. An old woman at the gate—one of those who know how stories run—looked the prince full in the face and said:
“You will not be cured till you win the Three Oranges from the Ogress of the Crystal Mountain.”
At that word, the prince rose. He took his sword, a loaf, and his courage, and set out alone. After many days he came to a forked road where an ancient woman sat spinning.
“Grandmother,” said he, “which path leads to the Crystal Mountain?”
“You go to a hard house,” she said, and pressed a gift into his palm. “Take this comb. If the ogress hunts you, throw it behind you, and it will become a forest so thick that a bird could not fly through.”
He thanked her and went on, and farther along another old woman gave him a bar of soap. “Cast this and it will turn into a mountain of slippery foam.” A third gave him a towel. “Cast this and it will become a river no hunter can ford.”
So he came at last to the Crystal Mountain, which was smooth as glass and steep as a scythe. He climbed by cracks and will, till he reached a door set with teeth of iron. Inside, the ogress slept, snoring like wind in a chimney. Hanging from a beam above her were three oranges, large as a child’s head, shining faintly as if each held a little day.
The prince crept on cat’s feet, reached up, and took them down one by one. But the door’s hinge cried out, and the ogress stirred, opening one yellow eye.
“Who is that who dares pluck my oranges?”
“It is I, the king’s son,” said the prince, and ran.
The ogress came after him like a storm. He flung down the comb: at once a forest sprang up between them, pines so close-woven that even the wind had trouble passing. She gnawed through with iron teeth and came on. He flung down the soap: a shining mountain of suds rose, and she slipped and slithered until she found her claws again. He flung down the towel: a river burst from the ground and rushed between them; she raged on the far bank while the prince, oranges safe in his satchel, walked on till evening.
Thirsty and tired, he came to a stony place with no water. “What harm in a little look?” he thought, and drew out an orange. He cut it with his knife—and out stepped a maiden, white as milk and red as a pomegranate seed, with hair like spun gold. She smiled and held out her hands.
“Water, my love, or I die.”
The prince had none to give. Before he could so much as run a mile, the maiden faded like dew and was gone.
“Fool that I am,” he said, and hurried on until he found a green hollow and a spring like a bright eye. “Here, at least,” he said, and cut the second orange. Out stepped another maiden, no less lovely than the first.
“Water, my love, or I die.”
He splashed for her—but he had taken the wrong turn of the fruit; the spring slipped from his hands; she paled and was gone.
“Patience now,” he told his heart. He sat by the spring till his breath and wits were steady. Then he cut the third orange, and out came a maiden whose beauty would have made noon stand still.
“Water, my love—”
“Drink, life of my life!” cried the prince, and he cupped the spring in his palms and gave her to drink. Colour rose to her cheeks like dawn. They sat together, laughing and weeping for joy. He took off his cloak to warm her and said:
“Wait here by the spring, my heart. I will fetch you fine clothes and call the court to honour you. I am the king’s son, and you shall be my bride.”
He ran to the city to set everything in order. While he was gone, a scullery-maid from the palace came to the spring to fill her pails. She saw the maiden’s face mirrored in the water, thought it her own, and cried, “Ah! At last I am beautiful!” She looked up and saw the true owner of that reflection seated in the tree’s shade. Jealousy bit her hard.
“What are you doing here?” asked the scullery-maid.
“Waiting for my prince,” said the maiden plainly.
The scullery-maid set down her pails. “Then may the sun burn you and the wind tangle you!” And with a wicked little pin she carried in her sleeve she pricked the maiden’s arm. At once the orange-maiden fluttered up in the form of a white dove and flew away. The scullery-maid climbed into the prince’s cloak and sat in the same place, hiding her face.
The prince came back with silks and jewels. “My love!” he cried.
She kept her head down. “The sun burned me,” she muttered. “The wind tangled me.”
He stood speechless. The voice was not the voice; the grace was not the grace; but a promise is a promise and he had brought the court. The king, noting the change, frowned, but the prince, caught by his own haste and honour, led the veiled figure home. The wedding was fixed for seven days hence, “to give her time,” he told himself, “to grow easy in a strange place.”
Meanwhile the white dove came to the palace kitchens and perched on the lattice. Every day she watched the pots and flames, and when the cook lifted the lid of the prince’s soup she sang:
“Cook, good cook, do not let it burn;
For there is a bride, and a true bride’s turn.”
The cook, startled, told the prince. The prince came next day and hid behind the spice chest. When the lid lifted, the dove sang again—only this time she added:
“Water, my love, or I die—
Remember the spring and the orange sky.”
The prince’s heart leapt. “That is my bride’s own word!” he whispered.
He put out his hand to the dove, but the false bride, passing by the kitchen, saw and hissed, “Drive that bird away!” The cook clapped, and the dove flew; at the gate she shook herself, and where a feather fell a myrtle sprang up, green as hope.
The gardener found the myrtle and planted it in a fair pot. It grew so sweetly that whoever passed it felt lighter than before. The prince walked that way and felt his sorrow ease. “Whose tree is this?” he asked.
“Mine, Highness,” said the gardener. “Plucked as a wonder from the gate.”
“Let it stand by my window,” said the prince.
The false bride saw his delight and said, “I want that myrtle for my chamber.”
“It is spoken for,” said the prince, almost without thinking.
“I am the bride,” she snapped. “Am I to be denied a shrub?”
So the myrtle was set by the false bride’s bed. At night, as the moon looked in, the leaves rustled and a whisper ran through the room. The scullery-maid, frightened, called for a light and a knife. “Cut it down!” she cried.
The knife went in—once, twice—and out from the sundered bark stepped the orange-maiden, whole and living, with the moon upon her hair. She took up the myrtle’s broken roots and, kneeling by a bowl, set them to drink. The tree trembled and healed where she touched it; then she veiled herself and went to the window to breathe.
In the morning the prince came—drawn by a thing he could not name—and saw her. He did not speak at once, for joy is shy; then he said very softly:
“Water, my love, or I die.”
She turned, smiling. “Drink, life of my life.”
He took her by the hands, and the rings he had bought for her slid into place as if they had known from the beginning where to go. He called the court. The false bride was brought out, trembling in a rage.
“Who are you?” asked the king.
“I am the prince’s bride,” she said.
The prince lifted his hand. “You sat where another should have sat,” he said. “What have you to say about the spring, and the oranges, and the words we spoke?”
She ground her teeth and said nothing. The cook told of the dove; the gardener told of the myrtle; the old women of the road were sent for and told of the gifts and the chase. Truth, like a river, found its way.
Judgement was given. Some say the scullery-maid was stripped of her stolen silks and banished with nothing but a bucket and a broom; some say worse befell her. But the prince and the orange-maiden were wed with all honour, and the myrtle, replanted by their window, never failed to flower on their wedding day.
As for the ogress, she raged on her mountain till the wind thinned her to a whisper; and if you put your ear to certain pines on a still day, you can still hear her grumbling about her lost fruit.
Leave a Reply