Folk Tales of France, Part Eleven — six more tales from Sébillot's Tome II (1881), freshly translated; what the scan kept back is declared below.
Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices.
The Houle of Beauçais. The fairies' eleven black sheep graze with a farm's flock; the shepherd's threat is answered from the earth: leave them in peace, and ask, and you shall have. Next morning a sack of clothes stands in the pasture, and his wishes wait in the field.
The Houle of Saint-Briac. The fairies' foals run the countryside, chased from the fields — until a voice from under the stable promises their harm will be amply paid, and the horse-lad finds a parcel in the stable: a whole suit, fitted as if measured.
The Changed Child. Fairies below the hearthstone swap a woman's pretty girl for an ancient-looking changeling. Boiling eggshells astonish it into speech — never so many shells boiling. Told whole, as printed: the mother takes a knife and is about to strike when the fairy lifts the hearthstone: here is your daughter; give me back mine. The blow never falls.
The Fairies' Child. Margot, the Fairy of the Brousse, has changed a child; it does not grow. Boiling eggshells draw out its verse. Told whole, as printed: the mother cries she will kill and burn it; Margot calls down from the chimney-top that she must not — she will bring back the true child. The appended chant is carried.
The Porpoise. A capsized boat, a sailor swimming a fish-basket to the drowning men, the basket sinking under them — and rescue comes from the sea itself: a porpoise that tows them by its tail to its own houle under the cliffs and keeps them three years, until they dig out to a village that took them for drowned.
The Dance of the Fairies. Seven fairies dance at the Sounding Stones, one always sitting out — until a little hunchback, sharp as a needle, makes the eighth and loses his hump. Told whole, as printed: the mocker is rushed to Bordeaux and back over the sea, half dead with fright, and wakes wearing the hump for good.
Tellers, as printed: Jacquemine Nicolas, Saint-Cast, about 60 (Beauçais and Saint-Briac); Adèle Durand, Saint-Cast, seamstress, about 25 (The Changed Child; The Dance of the Fairies, from her grandfather); François Mallet, of Le Gouray, labourer, about 60; François Depays, Saint-Cast, fisherman, about 60 — all told in 1880.
What stands around these six is accounted for, not hidden. Three tales ahead of them wait on the book: La Houle du Grouin (census: passes whole), L'Homme de mer and Les Fées de Lula lack leaves in the only lawful scan — opening and closing; first and a legible last; two hinge leaves — and stand artifact-blocked, with La Houle du Châtelet, La Fleur du Rocher, La Poule noire, Les Fées du Guildo, Le Meneur de loups and Le Bélier courant in part. Eleven stand stopped, held for the owner's ruling: La Mort des fées, La Princesse Félicité, Les Petites Coudées, Le Corps sans âme, Petite Baguette, Le Présent de la fée, La Fille aux bras coupés, La Chèvre blanche, Moitié de Coq, Les Boucs de Saint-Brieuc des Iffs, and La Biquette et ses petits biquets. Two are excluded: Les Trois Petites Poules, and the second printed telling of Les Sept Garçons et leur sœur. No completeness is claimed.
Chapters
00:10 The Houle of Beauçais
02:58 The Houle of Saint-Briac
04:34 The Changed Child
06:13 The Fairies' Child
08:00 The Porpoise
13:32 The Dance of the Fairies
From Paul Sébillot, Contes populaires de la Haute-Bretagne, Tome II (Paris: G. Charpentier, 1881), public domain; told in a fresh in-house rendering from the French.
Folk Tales of France is one shelf of the KacheliTV world folk tale library.
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