Snow White in the Woods

"Looking-glass, Looking-glass, on the wall, Who in this land is the fairest of all?"

the looking-glass answered—

"Thou, O Queen, art the fairest of alll"

Then she was satisfied, for she knew that the looking-glass spoke the truth.

But Snow-white was growing up, and grew more and more beautiful; and when she was seven years old she was as beautiful as the day, and more beautiful than the Queen herself. And once when the Queen asked her looking-glass—

"Looking-glass, Looking-glass, on the wall, Who in this land is the fairest of all?"

it answered

"Thou art fairer than all who are here, Lady Queen, But more beautiful still is Snow-white, as I ween."

Then the Queen was shocked, and turned yellow and green with envy. From that hour, whenever she looked at Snow-white, her heart heaved in her breast, she hated the girl so much.

And envy and pride grew higher and higher in her heart like a weed, so that she had no peace day or night. She called a huntsman, and said, "Take the child away into the forest; I will no longer have her in my sight. Kill her, and bring me back her heart as a token." The huntsman obeyed, and took her away; but when he had drawn his knife, and was about to pierce Snow-white's innocent heart, she began to weep, and said, "Ah, dear huntsman, leave me my life! I will run away into the wild forest and never come home again."

And as she was so beautiful the huntsman had pity on her and said, "Run away, then, you poor child." "The wild beasts will soon have devoured you," thought he, and yet it seemed as if a stone had been rolled from his heart since it was no longer needful for him to kill her. And as a young boar just then came running by he stabbed it and cut out its heart and took it to the Queen as a proof that the child was dead. The cook had to salt this, and the wicked Queen ate it, and thought she had eaten the heart of Snowwhite.

But now the poor child was all alone in the great forest, and so terrified that she looked at every leaf of every tree, and did not know what to do. Then she began to run, and ran over sharp stones and through thorns, and the wild beasts ran past her, but did her no harm.

This Image (or other media file) is in the public domain because its copyright has expired. This applies to the United States, where Works published prior to 1923 are copyright protected for a maximum of 75 years. See Circular 1 "COPYRIGHT BASICS" PDF from the U.S. Copyright Office. Works published before 1923 are now in the public domain.

This file is also in the public domain in countries that figure copyright from the date of death of the artist (post mortem auctoris) in this case Franz Jüttner (1865–1925), and that most commonly runs for a period of 50 to 70 years from December 31 of that year.

IMAGE CREDIT: Franz Jüttner (1865–1925): Illustration from Schneewittchen, Scholz' Künstler-Bilderbücher, Mainz 1910

TEXT CREDIT: Folk-lore and Fable Volume 17 of The Harvard classics Volume 17 of Folk-lore and Fable: Æsop, Grimm, Andersen, Wilhelm Grimm. Authors: Aesop, Wilhelm Grimm, Jacob Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen. Publisher: P. F. Collier & Son, 1909. Length 383 pages. Subjects: Fables, Fairy tales, Tales.