[1] Once upon a time there was a King who was very rich and he wished to get married. That was, however, very difficult, for there were three women as pretty as could be who wished to marry him. Finally, not knowing what to do, he sent for them and asked each one what she would do for him if he married her.

The first woman said: "I am so smart that I can make fine corn grow, and you will eat a great deal of hominy."

"That is good," said the king.

The second woman said: "I plant cotton, and you will have fine shirts, and beautiful pantaloons of yellow cottonade and of all colors."

"That is very good also," said the King; "and you, what can you do?"

The third woman said: "I know neither how to cook nor to weave, but I will be the mother of a son who will be your very picture, and moreover he will have the devil for his cousin."

No one knows whether it was the promise of a son or the wish to be related to the devil which decided the King, but he married the third woman. There was a great wedding to which everybody was invited, even the two women whom the King had refused to marry.

They were so angry that they swore to avenge themselves.

For a time everything went on well; the King had his son, who was very bad, but when one is the cousin of the devil one cannot help being bad. One day the little prince was not in his bed, which was a cot. They looked for him everywhere, but they could not find him. The mother and the father were weeping so much that nobody knew what to do, and you may imagine if the two women were glad. But lo! the devil came and asked, Why all those tears?"

When they told him he promised to look for his little cousin, and he gave the job to hundreds of little devils. He himself was searching, but he found that his wife was acting strangely and he began to watch her.

You all know that the devil and his wife are often fighting, for when it rains and the sun shines at the same time, it is a sure sign that Madame Diable is getting a beating. Now the devil's wife, to bother her husband and to please the two women, had stolen the little prince and had hidden him at her house. The devil found this out, but he did not get angry and he did not beat his wife as was his custom, because he was afraid she would kill the child, who would not be able to return to his father's house with his body but only as a ghost.

He went then slyly and gave the little boy an egg, a comb, a pebble, and a mirror, and told him to run fast and to read on the paper in which the things were wrapped what he was to do with them.

The little boy read while running, and soon he saw Madame Diable behind him. Quickly he threw his egg: a lake was formed, and Madame Diable had to get a boat to cross over. She soon caught up with the boy, who threw his pebble: quickly a stone wall rose in the road, and Madame Diable had to get an axe to break the wall.

She ran again after the boy, who threw down his comb; a great wood grew up, and Madame Diable had some trouble to pass through it.

The little boy reached his father's house just when Madame Diable was stretching her hand to catch him. He turned his mirror toward her, and when she saw her horns, her red skin, her black teeth, and her green eyes, she was so much afraid and found herself so ugly, because there are no mirrors in hell, that she ran away and disappeared forever from the earth. From that time the King, his wife, and their little boy were perfectly happy.