Valiant Vicky, the Brave Weaver

Once there lived a little weaver named Victor Prince—whom people called Vicky. He loved to talk for hours about bravery and the great deeds he would do someday, waving his wooden shuttle like a general’s baton while all the village children laughed and pointed at him.

One day at the loom a mosquito settled on his left hand just as he threw the shuttle from the right. By chance the shuttle smashed the mosquito flat. Vicky stared, then swelled with pride: he had killed with a single blow! The more he thought, the more sure he felt that a man who could shoot a mosquito dead with a shuttle should no longer sit weaving for scraps. “I will go into the world!” he told himself. “Such skill belongs on a wider stage.”

He journeyed until he reached a city plagued by a dreadful elephant that came daily to eat the inhabitants. Many mighty warriors had gone out against it and never come home. Nevertheless Vicky was nothing daunted. He refused sword and bow, taking only his loom-shuttle tucked in his sash. “It is a weapon I thoroughly understand, good people,” he boasted to those who urged proper arms, and he swaggered as if the shuttle were a royal spear.

Townsfolk flocked to the walls to watch little Vicky swagger out. The elephant charged with a scream. Vicky’s courage failed at the sight of those tusks; he turned to run as fast as he could. As luck had it, his wife had packed bread sweetened with tasty spices that morning, and the heavy loaf bounced from his bundle, rolled under the elephant’s feet, and made the great beast slip. It crashed down in the dust and broke its neck. Spectators could scarcely believe their eyes—then cheered louder still when Vicky climbed onto the carcass and explained, “I had to pretend to run away, or the coward would never have engaged me. Then I gave him a little push, and he fell.”

Amazed at how carelessly he spoke of the feat, the people led him to the king. Asked why he had come, Vicky answered, “For pleasure, for service, or for conquest!” laying such stress on the last word that the king, in a hurry, made him a fine warrior of the court and dressed him in shining armour. Alone, Vicky would murmur, “I knew it!” whenever he saw himself in full fig with waving plumes.

After some time a savage tiger ravaged the country. The city folk petitioned that mighty Prince Victor go out against it. “Do not distress yourselves,” he told the crowd. “I shall settle this beast as I settled the elephant.” Secretly he shook. When the tiger lashed its striped tail and charged from the cane-brake, Vicky fled up the nearest tree so fast his armour rattled. “There let him stay!” said the king, secretly relieved, for he was jealous of the weaver’s fame and did not want him for a son-in-law.

Vicky sat cowering while the tiger sharpened its claws on the trunk and circled below. Night came. At last the tiger, tired, lay down under the tree. In the dark Vicky lost his hold, shrieked, and swung desperately onto a higher branch—but the sword at his belt slipped from its place and fell point-first through the leaves. By pure chance the blade struck the sleeping tiger and killed it where it lay. At dawn Vicky could scarcely believe his luck. He poked the body with a branch, found it still, and concluded he had slain another monster in single combat.

When searchers found him standing over the dead tiger he stormed at them: “You and your warriors are a nice set of cowards! Here have I been fighting half the night while you snored!” They begged pardon and carried him home in triumph. The king, trapped by public joy, had to reward him further—even marrying him to a princess and granting wealth.

Between these adventures Vicky practiced fierce faces in polished shields and told anyone who would listen how mosquito, elephant, and tiger had all fallen to his unmatched skill. Courtiers smiled behind their hands; the common folk, who had watched each “battle” from the walls, learned not to argue with a man the king kept rewarding. The rewards made his public reputation harder to question, though the reader had seen how each success happened.

By and by a neighbouring prince who bore a grudge brought a huge army. The king ordered Valiant Vicky to lead the defence. Vicky’s heart sank. In the dead of night he bade his wife rise, pack her golden dishes, and follow him—“Not that you will want golden dishes at my humble home,” he muttered, “but we must not leave them for the enemy.” They slipped toward the border through a dark wood.

In the very middle of that wood a big cockchafer flew straight into Vicky’s face and clung there buzzing. “Run!” he yelled to his wife. “The enemy is upon us!” He crashed forward in panic, beating the air, shouting war cries to keep his courage up, golden dishes clattering behind him. As it happened, the invading army was camped just beyond those trees. Hearing the uproar of shouts and crashing brush, they thought a vast host was attacking by night, panicked in the dark, and fled in all directions, leaving tents and treasure behind.

Morning light showed empty enemy lines and abandoned banners. The king, astonished at this latest “victory,” gave Vicky half the kingdom as reward. He ruled that half with great dignity afterward and refused ever to take the field again, claiming that kings should send others to do the dangerous work. Thus he spent his remaining years without battle, and when he died everyone said Valiant Vicky was the greatest hero the world had ever seen.

About this story

“Valiant Vicky, the Brave Weaver” is from Flora Annie Steel’s Tales of the Punjab (1894). R. C. Temple notes that the original title was “Fatteh Khân, the valiant weaver.” Temple calls “Victor Prince” a fair translation of the name, and says the hero’s pet name Fattû matches “Vicky” for Victor exactly.

The tale is close to the Grimms’ “Valiant Little Tailor,” whose hero boasts of killing seven at one blow after swatting flies. In both, luck does most of the work. This adaptation changes several violent details: the source’s poisoned loaf becomes an accidental trip, the tiger episode is shortened and changes a falling dagger to a sword, and the invading army flees instead of destroying itself. The source also contains domestic violence omitted here. These are changes to the action, not merely modernized wording.

Read the original: Flora Annie Steel, Tales of the Punjab, 1894 (Project Gutenberg #6145)

Reading guidance: For ages 9–12 with an adult. The adapted narrative includes a man-eating elephant and fatal animal encounters; the source note identifies harsher material omitted from this telling.

A closer reading

The mosquito creates Vicky’s original mistake: he treats a chance hit as proof of a general ability. Every later success is fitted into that explanation. Spectators see the fallen animal or deserted camp, while the narrator lets us see the fear and accident that produced the result.

The rewards also change his choices. He talks most boldly when boasting brings status, but calculates the risk differently when he must face an army. His final refusal to fight protects him while leaving others to carry out dangerous work. The satire concerns reputation and unequal risk, not his body or the dignity of weaving.

Try this with the story

For mosquito, elephant, tiger and army, write two short captions: what happened and what Vicky says happened. Circle the evidence available to a distant spectator. Decide which caption a responsible reporter could defend.

Think about it

• Why did killing one mosquito make Vicky think he was a great hero?
• Each time Vicky won, it was really luck. Why did everyone believe he was so brave?
• Vicky refused to fight once he became a king. Was that wise or cowardly? Why?

Related stories

• The Valiant Little Tailor — the Grimm tailor who kills seven flies at a blow and wins a kingdom
• Harisarman — an Indian fake wise man who is saved by one lucky guess after another
• Doctor Knowall — a Grimm peasant whose lucky guesses make everyone think he knows everything