The Sea-Maiden

There was once a poor old fisherman, and one year he was catching hardly any fish. One day, as he was fishing, a sea-maiden rose up beside his boat.

“Are you catching many fish?” she asked.

“Not I,” said the old man.

“What would you give me for sending you plenty?”

“Ach, I haven’t much to spare.”

“Will you give me your first son?”

“I would give you that, if I ever had a son.”

“Then go home, and remember me when your son is twenty years old, and you will catch plenty of fish from now on.”

Everything happened as the sea-maiden said, and he caught plenty of fish. But as the twenty years drew to an end, the old man grew sadder and heavier at heart, counting each day as it came, and he had no rest day or night. One day his son asked him, “Is someone troubling you?”

“Someone is, but that’s nothing to do with you or anyone else.”

“I must know what it is,” said the lad, and at last his father told him about the sea-maiden.

“Don’t let that worry you,” said the son. “I won’t stand against you.”

“You shall not go, my son, not if I never catch another fish.”

“If you won’t let me go with you, go to the smithy and have the smith make me a great strong sword, and I will go and seek my fortune.”

His father went to the smithy, and the smith made a sturdy sword. The lad took it and gave it a shake or two, and it flew into a hundred splinters. He asked his father to have another made with twice the weight in it, and the same thing happened to that one: it broke in two. Back went the old man to the smithy, and the smith made a great sword, the like of which he had never made.

“There’s your sword,” said the smith, “and it will take a good fist to handle that blade.”

The lad gave it a shake or two. “This will do,” he said. “It’s high time I was on my way.”

The next morning he saddled his father’s black horse and set off to see the world. He had not gone far when he came upon the carcass of a sheep beside the road, and a great black dog, a falcon and an otter were quarrelling over it. They asked him to share it out for them, so he got off his horse and divided it: three shares to the dog, two to the otter and one to the falcon.

“For this,” said the dog, “if swiftness of foot or sharpness of tooth can help you, think of me, and I will be at your side.”

“If swimming to the bottom of a pool can set you free,” said the otter, “think of me, and I will be at your side.”

“If you are ever in trouble where swiftness of wing or the crook of a claw will help,” said the falcon, “think of me, and I will be at your side.”

He rode on until he came to a king’s house, where he took work as a herdsman, with his wages to depend on how much milk the cattle gave. The grazing was poor, and when he brought the cattle home that evening, they gave little milk, and he got little to eat or drink. The next day he drove them farther, and at last he came to a green glen with the richest grass he had ever seen. But just as it was time to drive them home, he saw a great giant coming with a sword in his hand.

“HI! HO! HOGARACH!” said the giant. “Those cattle are mine. They are on my land, and you are a dead man.”

“I wouldn’t say so,” said the herdsman. “Who knows? That may be easier said than done.”

He drew his great sword and went at the giant, and in a twinkling the giant’s head was off. Then he jumped on the black horse and went looking for the giant’s house. Inside there was money in plenty, and wardrobes full of clothes trimmed with gold and silver, each finer than the last. But at nightfall he went back to the king’s house without taking a thing, and when the cattle were milked that night, there was plenty of milk. He was fed well that night, with no stint of food or drink, and the king was very pleased to have found such a herdsman.

This went on for a while, but at last the glen was grazed bare, so he went a little farther into the giant’s land and found a great field of grass, and he brought the cattle there. They had not been grazing long when a great wild giant came at him, full of fury.

“HI! HAW! HOGARAICH!” said the giant. “Nothing but a drink of your blood will quench my thirst tonight.”

“Who knows?” said the herdsman. “That’s easier said than done.”

At each other they went, and what a clashing of blades there was! At last it looked as if the giant would win, so the herdsman called on the dog, and with one spring the black dog seized the giant by the neck, and the herdsman struck off his head. He went home very tired that night, but you may be sure the king’s cattle had milk, and the whole household was delighted with their herdsman.

The next day he went to the giants’ castle, and at the door he was met by a flattering little old woman.

“All hail and good luck to you, fisherman’s son! I’m glad to see you. It’s a great honour for this kingdom that the like of you has come into it, and a great name for this little hut. Go in first; honour to the gentry. Go in and rest yourself.”

“In you go ahead of me, old woman. I don’t like flattery out of doors. Go in, and let’s hear what you have to say.”

In went the old woman, and when her back was to him, he drew his sword and struck off her head. But the sword flew out of his hand, and quick as a flash the old woman caught her head in both hands and put it back on her neck. The dog sprang at her, and she struck the brave dog with her magic club, and there he lay. But the herdsman wrestled the magic club from her, and with one blow on the top of her head, she was on the ground in the twinkling of an eye. He went a little farther in, and what treasure there was! Gold and silver and every precious thing in the old woman’s castle. He went back to the king’s house, and there was great rejoicing.

He went on herding like this for a time. But one night, when he came home, instead of “All hail” and “Good luck” from the dairymaid, everyone was weeping and wailing. He asked what was wrong.

“There is a great beast with three heads in the loch,” said the dairymaid, “and every year it must be given someone, and this year the lot has fallen on the king’s daughter. At midday tomorrow she must meet the Laidly Beast at the top end of the loch. But there is a great suitor over there who is going to rescue her.”

“What suitor is that?”

“Oh, he’s a great general, and when he kills the beast, he will marry the king’s daughter, for the king has said that whoever saves her shall have her for his wife.”

The next day, when the time came, the king’s daughter and the general went to meet the beast at the black rock at the top end of the loch. They had not been there long when the beast stirred in the middle of the loch, and when the general saw that terror of a beast with three heads, he took fright and slunk away and hid. The king’s daughter was left trembling with fear and nobody to save her.

Suddenly she saw a strong, handsome young man riding up on a black horse, splendidly dressed and fully armed, with a black dog following him.

“There is gloom on your face, girl,” said the young man. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh, never mind that. I won’t be here long, at any rate.”

“I wouldn’t say so.”

“A champion just as likely as you ran off not long ago.”

“A champion is one who stands and fights,” said the young man, and he went to meet the beast with his sword and his dog.

What a spluttering and splashing there was between him and the beast! The dog did all he could, and the king’s daughter was frozen with fear at the noise of the beast. One of them would be under, and then on top. But at last he cut off one of its heads. It gave one roar, and the echo of the rocks answered its shriek, and it drove the loch into spray from end to end, and in a twinkling it was gone.

“Good luck and victory go with you, lad!” said the king’s daughter. “I am safe for one night, but the beast will keep coming back until its other two heads are off.”

He took the beast’s head and drew a cord through it in a knot, and told her to bring it with her the next day. She gave him a gold ring and went home with the head on her shoulder, and he went back to the cows. But she had not gone far when the general saw her. “I’ll kill you if you don’t say it was I who cut the head off the beast,” he said.

“Oh, I’ll say it,” she said. “Who else cut off the beast’s head but you?”

They came to the king’s house with the head on the general’s shoulder, and how everyone rejoiced that she had come home safe and sound, and that the great captain had the beast’s bloody head in his hand!

The next day they went off, and nobody doubted that the hero would save the king’s daughter. They came to the same place, and soon the dreadful Laidly Beast stirred in the middle of the loch, and the hero slunk away as he had done the day before. Not long after, the man on the black horse came, in different clothes. No matter; she knew he was the same lad.

“I am glad to see you,” she said. “I hope you will swing your great sword today as you did yesterday.”

They had not been there long when they saw the beast steaming in the middle of the loch. He went to meet it at once, and what a thrashing and splashing, raving and roaring there was! They kept at it a long time, and at nightfall he cut off a second head. He put it on the knot and gave it to her, and she gave him one of her earrings, and he jumped on his black horse and went back to his herding. The general met her on the way, took the heads from her and told her she must say it was he who had cut off the beast’s head this time too.

“Who else cut off the beast’s head but you?” she said. They came to the king’s house with the heads, and there was joy and gladness.

At the same time the next day, the two went off. The general hid as usual, and the king’s daughter went to the bank of the loch. The hero on the black horse came, and if the beast had roared and raved on the other days, today it was horrible. But no matter, he cut off the third head, drew it onto the knot and gave it to her. She gave him her other earring and went home with the heads.

When they reached the king’s house, everyone was smiling, and the general was to marry the king’s daughter the next day. The wedding preparations were under way, and everyone in the castle was waiting for the priest. But when the priest came, she said she would marry only the man who could take the heads off the knot without cutting it.

“Who should take the heads off the knot but the man who put them on?” said the king.

The general tried, but he could not loosen them, and in the end everyone in the house had tried, and nobody could. The king asked whether there was anyone else who had not tried, and they said the herdsman had not. They sent for him, and it did not take him long to toss the heads this way and that.

“But wait a moment, my lad,” said the king’s daughter. “The man who cut the heads off the beast has my ring and my two earrings.”

The herdsman put his hand in his pocket and threw them on the table.

“You are my man,” said the king’s daughter.

The king was not so pleased to see that his daughter was to marry a herdsman, and he ordered that he be given better clothes. But his daughter said the herdsman had clothes as fine as any in the castle, and so it proved, for he put on the giant’s golden suit, and they were married that same day.

Everything went well for them, until one day, on the anniversary of the day his father had promised him to the sea-maiden, they were strolling by the loch, and lo and behold, she rose up and carried him off into the water without so much as a by-your-leave.

The king’s daughter was heartbroken and wept day and night for her husband, always with her eye on the loch. An old fortune-teller met her, and she told him what had happened, and he told her what to do to save her husband. She did it. She took her harp down to the shore and sat and played, and the sea-maiden came up to listen, for sea-maidens love music more than any other creature. But as soon as the princess saw the sea-maiden, she stopped.

“Play on!” said the sea-maiden.

“No, not until I see my husband.”

So the sea-maiden lifted his head out of the loch. The princess played on, and then stopped until the sea-maiden brought him up to the waist. Then she played and stopped once more, and this time the sea-maiden brought him all the way out of the loch, and he called on the falcon and became a falcon and flew to the shore. But the sea-maiden took the princess, his wife.

That night everyone in the town was sorrowful. Her husband wandered weeping up and down the banks of the loch by day and night. The old fortune-teller met him and told him there was only one way to kill the sea-maiden. “On the island in the middle of the loch is a white-footed hind, with the slenderest legs and the swiftest step. Even if she is caught, a hooded crow will spring out of her, and even if the crow is caught, a trout will spring out of it. In the trout’s mouth is an egg, and the sea-maiden’s soul is in the egg, and if the egg breaks, she dies.”

There was no way to reach the island, for the sea-maiden sank every boat and raft that went on the loch. So he decided to try to jump the strait on the black horse, and the black horse leaped it. He saw the hind and set his black dog after her, but whenever the dog was on one side of the island, the hind was on the other.

“Oh, if only the black dog of the sheep’s carcass were here!” No sooner had he said it than the grateful dog was at his side, and off he went after the hind, and before long they had brought her down. But the moment he caught her, a hooded crow sprang out of her.

“If only the grey falcon of sharpest eye and swiftest wing were here!” No sooner said than the falcon was after the crow, and it was not long before she brought it down, and as the crow fell on the bank of the loch, out of it jumped the trout.

“Oh, otter, if only you were by me now!” No sooner said than the otter was at his side, and out into the loch she leaped and brought the trout from the middle of it. And no sooner was the otter ashore with the trout than the egg came out of its mouth. He sprang forward and put his foot on it.

Then the sea-maiden appeared. “Don’t break the egg,” she said, “and you shall have whatever you ask.”

“Give me back my wife!”

In the wink of an eye she was by his side. When he had her hand held fast in both of his, he brought his foot down on the egg, and the sea-maiden died.

About this story

Joseph Jacobs took “The Sea-Maiden” for Celtic Fairy Tales from Campbell’s Popular Tales of the West Highlands. He left out the births of the three animal friends and moved the old woman’s episode to the middle of the tale. He also notes that the book’s illustrator, John D. Batten, “considerately idealised” the sea-maiden, since in one version she brings the husband back up out of her own mouth.

Jacobs calls the story a favourite among the Celts, though its main events turn up often in tales from mainland Europe. The sea-maiden’s soul kept outside her body, in an egg inside a trout inside a crow inside a hind, is an idea he says scholars such as Mr. Frazer in The Golden Bough had studied.

This telling retains beheadings, a threatened human sacrifice, abduction and the sea-maiden’s death; brief descriptions do not remove those events.

Read the original: Joseph Jacobs, Celtic Fairy Tales (Project Gutenberg #7885, The Sea-Maiden)

For older readers: includes a child promised away before birth, repeated beheadings, death threats, abduction and a fatal hidden-soul episode.

Rescue changes hands

The fisherman promises another person’s future before that person can agree. His later refusal to surrender his son matters, but it cannot undo the sea-maiden’s claim. The general likewise uses power to control someone else’s story: he threatens the princess into calling him her rescuer. Her knot test and the three jewels let her expose him without first relying on an accusation he could deny.

The princess then becomes the rescuer, using music to bargain her husband out of the water. Her capture reverses their roles again. The animal helpers complete a chain of different abilities—running, flying and swimming—that his enormous sword cannot supply. Yet the hero is not uniformly gentle: he attacks the old woman before she attacks him. Gratitude and rescue coexist with troubling violence.

Map who frees whom

Draw arrows between the son, princess, animals and sea-maiden. Label each successful rescue with its tool: sword, knot and jewels, music, transformation or animal skill. Which acts require force, which knowledge, and which cooperation? Discuss why neither parent nor rescuer gains a right to own someone’s choices.

Talk about it

• How did the young man earn the help of the dog, the otter and the falcon?
• How did the princess prove who had really killed the beast?
• How did each animal friend help to reach the sea-maiden’s soul?

More stories like this

• The Shee an Gannon and the Gruagach Gaire — another Celtic tale that begins the same way, as Jacobs notes
• The Battle of the Birds — another Highland hero tale from Campbell
• The Lad with the Goat-Skin — another Celtic tale of a poor lad who wins a princess