I have a new resource I am delighted to find and share: https://www.venetiajane.co.uk/ (and https://twitter.com/VenetiaJane where I first found her and today's illustration.) Like VenetiaJane, it will always be Twitter to me. X can mean too many things and is so impersonal. She shares the wonders of flowers and nature, gardening, plant history, folklore, art, and poetry accompanied by her photography. Her photographs are available on note cards,Christmas cards, prints and calendars. That photography also supports a few related charities in the United Kingdom.
Her December 1 "tweet" about holly had this photograph which almost looks like a painting.
Going to her website for the Holly notecard, be sure to scroll down to the "Floral Notes." It will give you additional folklore and yet another legend about this plant seen at this time of year.
Today's story comes from yet another of the Skinner sisters' books of seasonal stories with a jewel name, The Pearl Story Book; Stories and Legends of Winter, Christmas, and New Year's Day. There are two stories of "Holly." This is the second, found in the section of "Christmas Everywhere." The earlier one by Janet Harvey Kelman in the "Winter Woods" section is more factual, but this blog is all about the stories. It's a story not only about Christmas, but also about peace and war and is most appropriate this year.
HOLLY
Ada M. Marzials
Highty-tighty, Paradighty,
Clothèd all in green.
The King could not read it
No more could the Queen.
They sent for a Wise Man out of the East,
Who said it had horns but was not a beast.
(Old Riddle.)
There was once upon a time a very war-like
kingdom where they had never heard of
Christmas. The men spent all their days
fighting, and the women spent their days in
urging the warriors to further deeds of valour.
This had gone on for a very long time, and
no one had ever yet said that he was tired
of it. There was but one person in the whole
kingdom who had openly declared that war was hateful, but as she was only the Youngest
Princess nobody paid any heed to her.
Then came a time, just before our Christmas
Day, when the King was preparing a
great campaign against a far-off country. He
called together his Council of War—grave old
warriors, dressed completely in armour.
“My friends,” said he, “we are about to
wage war on the distant kingdoms of Zowega.
Up till this time the people of that country
have been our very good friends, but as we
have now conquered all our enemies, there
seems no one but our friends left to fight,
and of these the King of the Zowegians is
chief.
“You will remember that his youngest son,
Prince Moldo, spent some of his boyhood at
our court in order to gain instruction in feats
of arms, and that the Prince left us to travel
over the world. A few months ago his father
sent word to me that the Prince had returned
home, bringing with him the news of a Pearl
of Great Price, which contained the Secret of
Happiness. It is this Pearl which I have
made the excuse for war, for I have demanded
it in payment for the services that we rendered
to Prince Moldo. In my message I have said
that if the Pearl, and the Secret which it contains,
are not brought and revealed to us here
within the next five days, our troops will descend
upon the kingdom of Zowega and wipe
it off the face of the earth.”
Loud and long cheered the Council at the
speech of their King, as, indeed, was their
duty, though in their hearts of hearts they had
no wish to fight against the King of the Zowegians,
who was their very good friend. The
Queen and the Princesses smiled graciously
upon them, all save the Youngest Princess,
who had been Prince Moldo’s playfellow. She
disgraced herself by bursting into passionate
tears, and was forthwith ordered out of the
Council Hall.
At the end of five days the Council once
more assembled to await the arrival of the
messenger with the answer from the King of
Zowega.
The day was bright and cold, and there was
snow on the ground. The King and Queen
were wrapped in thick fur cloaks. The
Princesses were all assembled, too, even the Youngest,
who was dressed in ermine and looked as
pale as death.
It was Christmas Eve, but there were no
Christmas trees preparing and no presents.
No one was thinking of hanging his stockings
up. The Hall was not decorated, neither
were the churches; indeed, there were no
churches to decorate, for, as you remember,
the people in this kingdom knew nothing
about Christmas.
The Council sat and waited in the big bare
Hall.
At last the great doors were flung open,
there was a blast of trumpets, and the messenger
appeared.
He was tall and fair, and held himself
proudly. His eyes were bright and shining
and there was a smile upon his face. He was
completely dressed in bright green and the
Council noted with astonishment that he was
without armour of any kind. He wore neither
breastplate, shield nor helmet; he had neither
sword by his side, nor spurs on his feet. He
was bare-headed, and in his right hand he
carried something green, horny and prickly, with
little red dots on it.
Looking neither to the right nor to the left,
he walked with firm and steady step up the
long Hall between the rows of armed warriors.
As he passed the Youngest Princess she
blushed deeply, but he did not seem to notice
her.
When he reached the throne he bowed low
before the King and Queen, and laid the
prickly object on the table before them.
“Your Majesty,” said he in a clear, ringing
voice. “From the King of Zowega, greeting!
He sends you this token. It is the symbol of
the Secret of Happiness.”
The King stared, so did the Queen.
They had expected a Pearl of Great Price,
accompanied by a scroll on which was written
the Secret of Happiness, and the King of
Zowega had sent them this!
Amid dead silence the King took the token
up in his hands in order to examine it more
carefully.
He dropped it hastily, for it pricked him,
and little drops of blood were seen starting
from his hand.
“Highty-tighty!” said he. “’Tis surely
some kind of beast and a symbol of war, for
it pricked me right smartly. Truly the King
of Zowega deals in riddles which I for one
cannot read! Take it, my dear,” added he to
the Queen and pointing to the token; “perchance
your quick wits may be able to understand
this mystery.”
She picked up the token and examined it
carefully.
It rather resembled the branch of a tree, but
the leaves were thick and resisting and edged
with very sharp spikes, and there was on it a
cluster of round, bright red objects like tiny
balls. But even as it had pricked the King
so did it prick her, and she dropped it hastily
into the lap of the Eldest Princess, who was
sitting beside her.
“Paradighty!” exclaimed the Queen in her
own language. “It is certainly a beast. See,
it has horns!” and she pointed to the spikes.
“But I certainly cannot read the riddle—if
riddle it be.”
Then it was passed to all the Princesses in
turn, but they could not read the token any
more than could the King and Queen. At
last it reached the Youngest Princess, and,
though it pricked her little hands sorely, she
took it up tenderly and kissed it.
“’Tis a token of love,” said she.
The messenger turned his shining eyes full
upon her.
“The Princess has read the riddle of the
token aright,” said he, and he stepped forward
as though to kiss her hand.
“Stay!” said the King imperiously springing
to his feet. “A token of love, forsooth!
But I sent the King of Zowega a Declaration
of War! What does he mean by sending me a
token of love? The Princess must certainly
be mistaken—and as for you,” he continued,
turning fiercely to the messenger, “you shall be
marched off to prison until we have had time
to consult with our Wise Men as to the real
meaning of this extraordinary token.”
So there and then the messenger was
marched off to spend the night in prison, and
all the Wise Men in the kingdom were bidden
to appear in the Council Chamber the very
next day, especially one very old Wise Man
from the East who was reputed to be wiser
than all the others put together.
The next day, of course, was Christmas
Day, but, as these people had never heard of
Christmas, there were no bells ringing, no
carols were sung, and there was neither holly,
ivy nor mistletoe upon the walls.
Slowly and painfully the Wise Men began
to arrive.
They were all dressed alike, in black flowing
robes, and on their heads they wore
long pointed black caps covered with weird
devices.
The very old Wise Man from the East wore
a red pointed cap, but in all other respects was
dressed just like the others.
They assembled round a large circular table
at one end of the Hall. In the middle of the
table was placed the token.
At the other end of the Hall were gathered
the warriors, and above them on a double
throne sat the King and Queen with the Princesses
grouped on either side of the dais.
The Wise Men examined the token in
silence.
“’Tis a curious beast,” said one of them at
last.
“Of a new and quite unheard-of species,”
said another.
“It has neither legs nor tail,” said a third.
“Yet it has a number of globular red eyes,”
said a fourth.
“And it certainly has horns,” said a fifth.
And so said they all, until it came to the turn
of the very old Wise Man from the East.
He looked long at the token.
“It has horns,” said he at last, “but it is not a
beast.”
“Not a beast!” said they, one to the other.
“But what is it then?”
“It is a token of love,” said he.
“Highty-tighty,” interrupted the King.
“Read us then the full meaning of the token.”
“I cannot,” said the very old Wise Man;
“but let the youth be brought hither who carried
it. He will be able to explain it more
fully than I.”
“Paradighty!” said the Queen in her own
language. “Why did we not think of that
before! Fetch him back again at once!”
So two of the warriors fetched the youth
from prison, and he was soon standing before
the Assembly, with his head held as high and
his eyes as bright and shining as before.
“Read us the token!” commanded the King.
The youth bowed low. “The Princess read
it aright yesterday. It is a token of love.”
“Explain yourself!” said the King. “How
can a beast with horns be a token of love?”
The youth drew himself up to his full
height.
“It is not a beast,” said he. “It is the branch
of a holly-tree. On this day of the year, which
in my country we call Christmas Day, our
people decorate their houses with branches of
this holly or holy tree as a token of love and
peace and good-will. This is the message that
I have brought to you—a message that we in
our country know very well, but which you
have never heard before.”
The King and the Warriors, the Wise Men,
the Queen and Princesses all listened to his
words in silence.
When he had ended there was a long
pause.
“And in what particular way does your
message affect us?” said the King at last.
“Thus, your Majesty,” answered the youth,
approaching the Youngest Princess and taking
both her hands in his, “on this day I, Prince
Moldo, would have peace and good-will between
my kingdom and your kingdom; and
I would seal it for ever by taking the Youngest
Princess home with me as my bride. You,
O King, recognized me not, for I have much
changed since I lived here with her for playfellow,
but in all my wanderings I found a
Pearl of no greater price than this, and I
would proclaim to all the world that the
Secret of Happiness is Love.”
So on that very Christmas Day they were
married, amid great rejoicings, and war
ceased throughout the kingdom. And on
every Christmas Day for ever after, the people
of that country decorated their houses with
holly, the symbol of love and peace and good-will,
and wished each other a Merry Christmas,
even as I do now to you.
*******************
This
is part of a series of postings of stories under the category,
"Keeping the Public in Public Domain." The idea
behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the
authors and their immediate heirs were compensated. I feel
strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the
20th century. My
own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public
Domain I decided to share stories from them. I hope you enjoy
discovering new stories.
At
the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates
projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an
audience. Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing
of Public Domain stories will not occur that week. This is a return to
my regular posting of a research project here. (Don't worry, this
isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future
storytelling to an audience.) Response has convinced me that "Keeping
the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other
postings as often as I can manage it.
Other
Public Domain story resources I recommend-
There
are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for
folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's
database, Yashpeh,
the International Folktales Collection. I have long
recommended it and continue to do so. He has loaded
Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so
you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression
you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm
You may have noticed I'm no
longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his
offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking
specific types of stories. There's another site, FairyTalez
claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales,
folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for
phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
Between those two sites, there
is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait,
there's more!"
The
email list for storytellers, Storytell,
discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional
suggestions:
-
Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible
through the Wayback Machine, described below, but the late Jackie Baldwin's
wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google
search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ . It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for December 22 2016 and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.
- Zalka Csenge Virag - http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com
doesn't give the actual stories, but her recommendations, working her
way through each country on a continent, give excellent ideas for
finding new books and stories to love and tell.
You're
going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT
go to the Internet Archive
Wayback Machine to find some of these old links. Tim's
site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a
full-time job. In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that
Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she
could no longer maintain it. Possibly searches maintained it.
Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim
Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old
Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library
(something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine. It
took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally
in December of 2006 it appears!
Somebody
as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website
is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.
I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can
be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that
becomes the only way to find them.
You
can see why I recommend these to you.
Have fun
discovering even more stories
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