There was once a rich man whose wife lay sick,
and when she felt her end drawing near she called
to her only daughter to come near her bed, and said,
"Dear child, be pious and good, and God will always
take care of you, and I will look down upon you from
heaven, and will be with you." And then she closed her
eyes and expired. The maiden went every day to her mother's
grave and wept, and was always pious and good. When the winter
came the snow covered the grave with a white covering, and when
the sun came in the early spring and melted it away, the
man took to himself another wife.
The new wife brought two daughters home with her, and
they were beautiful and fair in appearance, but at
heart were, black and ugly. And then began very evil
times for the poor step-daughter. "Is the stupid creature
to sit in the same room with us?" said they; "those who eat
food must earn it. Out upon her for a kitchen-maid!" They
took away her pretty dresses, and put on her an old grey kirtle,
and gave her wooden shoes to wear. "Just look now at the proud princess,
how she is decked out!" cried they laughing, and then they sent
her into the kitchen. There she was obliged to do heavy work from
morning to night, get up early in the morning, draw water, make the
fires, cook, and wash. Besides that, the sisters did their utmost
to torment her, mocking her, and strewing peas and lentils among
the ashes, and setting her to pick them up. In the evenings, when
she was quite tired out with her hard day's work, she had no bed to
lie on, but was obliged to rest on the hearth among the cinders.
And as she always looked dusty and dirty, they named her Cinderella.