They took her pretty clothes away from her, put an old gray bedgown on her and gave her wooden shoes. “Just look at the proud Princess, how decked out she is!” they cried, and laughed, and led her into the kitchen.
There she had to do hard work from morning till night, get up before daybreak, carry water, light fires, cook and wash. Besides this, the sisters did her every imaginable injury--they mocked her and emptied her peas and lentils into the ashes, so that she was forced to sit and pick them out again.
In the evening, when she had worked till she was weary, she had no bed to go to, but had to sleep by the fireside in the ashes. And as on that account she always looked dusty and dirty, they called her Ash-Maiden.
It happened once that the father was going to the Fair, and he asked the two daughters what he should bring back for them.
“Beautiful dresses,” said one. “Pearls and jewels,” said the second.
“And you, Ash-Maiden,” said he, “what will you have?”
“Father, break off for me the first branch which knocks against your hat on your way home.”
So he bought beautiful dresses, pearls and jewels for the two daughters, and on his way home, as he was riding through a green thicket, a hazel twig brushed against him and knocked off his hat. Then he broke off the branch and took it with him.
When he reached home he gave the two daughters the things which they had wished for, and to Ash-Maiden he gave the branch from the hazel-bush. Ash-Maiden thanked him, went to her mother’s grave and planted the branch on it, and wept so much that the tears fell down on it and watered it.
It grew, however, and became a handsome tree. Thrice a day Ash-Maiden went and sat beneath it, and wept and prayed, and a little White Bird always came on the tree. And if Ash-Maiden expressed a wish, the bird threw down to her what she had wished for.
It happened that the King gave a feast, which was to last three days. To it all the beautiful young girls in the country were invited, in order that his son might choose himself a Bride. When the two sisters heard that they too were to appear among the number, they were delighted.
They called Ash-Maiden and said, “Comb our hair, brush our shoes, and fasten our buckles, for we are going to the feast at the King’s palace.”