Little Red-Cap

Once upon a time there was a dear little girl who was loved by everyone who so much as looked at her, but most of all by her grandmother, who could never think of enough to give the child. Once she gave her a little cap of red velvet, and because it suited her so well, and she would never wear anything else, she came to be called simply Little Red-Cap.

One day her mother said to her, "Come, Little Red-Cap, here is a piece of cake and a bottle of wine. Take them out to your grandmother, for she is ill and weak, and they will do her good. Set out before it grows hot, and when you go, walk nicely and quietly, and do not run off the path, or you may fall and break the bottle, and then your grandmother will have nothing. And when you come into her room, don't forget to say good morning, and don't go peeping into every corner first."

"I will do everything just right," said Little Red-Cap to her mother, and she gave her hand on it.

Now the grandmother lived out in the wood, half an hour from the village. And just as Little Red-Cap came into the wood, a wolf met her. But Little Red-Cap did not know what a wicked creature he was, and was not at all afraid of him.

"Good day, Little Red-Cap," said he.

"Thank you kindly, wolf."

"Where are you off to so early, Little Red-Cap?"

"To my grandmother's."

"What have you got there under your apron?"

"Cake and wine. Yesterday was baking-day, so my poor sick grandmother is to have something good, to make her stronger."

"Little Red-Cap, where does your grandmother live?"

"A good quarter of an hour farther on in the wood, under the three big oak trees. Her house stands there, with the nut hedges just below it. You surely must know it," said Little Red-Cap.

The wolf thought to himself, "What a tender young thing! A plump little mouthful—she will taste even better than the old woman. I must go about it cleverly, so I can snap up both." So he walked along beside Little Red-Cap for a while, and then he said, "Little Red-Cap, just look at the pretty flowers all around you. Why don't you look about? I don't think you even hear how sweetly the little birds are singing. You walk straight ahead as if you were going to school, and it is so merry out here in the wood."

Little Red-Cap lifted her eyes, and when she saw the sunbeams dancing here and there through the trees, and everything full of pretty flowers, she thought, "If I take grandmother a fresh bunch of flowers, that will please her too. It is still so early in the day that I will get there in good time." So she ran off the path into the wood to look for flowers. And whenever she had picked one, she thought she saw a prettier one a little farther on, and ran after it, and so she went deeper and deeper into the wood.

But the wolf went straight to the grandmother's house and knocked at the door.

"Who is there?"

"Little Red-Cap," answered the wolf, "bringing cake and wine. Open the door."

"Just lift the latch," called out the grandmother. "I am too weak, and cannot get up."

The wolf lifted the latch, the door swung open, and without a word he went straight to the grandmother's bed and swallowed her down. Then he put on her clothes, set her cap upon his head, lay down in her bed, and drew the curtains.

Meanwhile Little Red-Cap had been running about after the flowers, and when she had gathered so many that she could carry no more, she remembered her grandmother again and set out on the way to her. She was surprised to find the door standing open, and when she stepped into the room, it all felt so strange that she thought, "Oh dear, how uneasy I feel today, and I usually love being with grandmother so much." She called out, "Good morning," but received no answer. So she went to the bed and drew back the curtains. There lay her grandmother, with her cap pulled down over her face, looking very strange.

"Oh, grandmother, what big ears you have!"

"The better to hear you with."

"Oh, grandmother, what big eyes you have!"

"The better to see you with."

"Oh, grandmother, what big hands you have!"

"The better to grab you with."

"But, grandmother, what a dreadful great mouth you have!"

"The better to eat you with!"

And scarcely had the wolf said this than he sprang out of bed in one bound and swallowed up poor Little Red-Cap.

When the wolf had satisfied his hunger, he lay down in the bed again, fell asleep, and began to snore very loudly. A huntsman happened to be passing by the house and thought, "How the old woman is snoring! I had better see if anything is wrong with her." So he stepped into the room, and when he came to the bed, he saw that the wolf was lying in it. "So I find you here, you old sinner," said he. "I have been looking for you a long time." He was just about to raise his gun when it occurred to him that the wolf might have swallowed the grandmother, and that she might still be saved. So he did not fire, but took a pair of scissors and began to cut open the belly of the sleeping wolf. After two snips he saw the little red cap shining, and after two more snips the little girl sprang out, crying, "Oh, how frightened I was! How dark it was inside the wolf!" And then the old grandmother came out too, still alive, though she could hardly breathe. But Little Red-Cap quickly fetched great stones, and they filled the wolf's body with them, and when he woke and tried to spring away, the stones were so heavy that he dropped down at once and fell dead.

Then all three were glad. The huntsman drew off the wolf's skin and went home with it; the grandmother ate the cake and drank the wine that Little Red-Cap had brought, and grew strong again; and Little Red-Cap thought to herself, "As long as I live, I will never again run off the path alone into the wood, when my mother has forbidden it."

It is also told that once, when Little Red-Cap was again bringing baked things to the old grandmother, another wolf spoke to her and tried to lead her from the path. But Little Red-Cap was on her guard and went straight along her way, and told her grandmother that she had met the wolf, and that he had wished her good day, but had looked at her so wickedly out of his eyes that, if it had not been on the open road, he would surely have eaten her up. "Come," said the grandmother, "we will lock the door, so he cannot get in." Soon afterward the wolf knocked and called, "Open up, grandmother. It is Little Red-Cap, and I am bringing you baked things." But they kept quite still and did not open the door. So the grey-head slunk around the house a few times, and at last sprang up onto the roof, meaning to wait until Little Red-Cap went home in the evening, and then to creep after her and eat her up in the dark. But the grandmother saw what he had in mind. Now in front of the house stood a great stone trough, and she said to the child, "Take the pail, Little Red-Cap. Yesterday I boiled some sausages, so carry the water they were cooked in out to the trough." Little Red-Cap carried it until the great, great trough was quite full. Then the smell of the sausages rose up to the wolf's nose. He sniffed and peered down, and at last he stretched his neck so far that he could no longer keep his footing and began to slide—and so he slid off the roof, straight down into the great trough, and drowned. But Little Red-Cap went home happy, and no one ever did her any harm.