The Golden Goose

All the King’s servants and advisers were far too high and mighty to understand what would make a young girl laugh – or indeed to allow anything amusing to happen at all.

As the boy, known as Dummy, went past the palace, he still held the golden goose under his arm; and he was followed by the innkeeper’s three daughters, the bishop, the police sergeant, and the mayor. The princess looked out and saw the important people in their uniforms being tugged along behind three girls and a boy with a goose. She thought that it was the first thing she had seen in her life that was truly funny. She burst out laughing and ran, still giggling, to her father to tell him all about what she had seen. When the King looked out of his window and saw the procession, he couldn’t help laughing himself. He sent for his guards and told them to bring the boy and his followers directly to him. When the boy entered the King’s chamber, with the followers behind him; the mayor, the bishop and the policeman all called out angrily that he should pay for his crime with his head. The king, still laughing, said that on the contrary – he would be rewarded with the hand in marriage of his daughter, the princess.

For an entire week after that, the innkeeper’s three daughters, the bishop, the policeman, and the mayor were all stuck to the golden goose and to one another. While they were stuck, all the townspeople and the whole court laughed and laughed at them. The boy whose family called him Dummy married the princess and inherited the kingdom. He lived with his beautiful wife and they had six happy smiling children, and the palace was often filled with laughter.