Old Time Stories, illustrated by William Heath Robinson
Old Time Stories is a collection of eleven classic French fairy tales: first eight are written by Charles Perrault, the ninth by Madame Leprince de Beaumont, and the last two by Madame d'Aulnoy.
Catharine d'Aulnoy is known by coining the phrase contes de fees, what means fairy tales. Her fairy tales were very popular till the beginning of the 20th century but now most people never heard for them or their author.
Anyway, we decided to present two of them, both published in Old Time Stories published in 1921 by Constable & Co in London.
The first eight fairy tales with illustrations can be seen here.
Here we go with Madame d'Aulnoy's works:
Friendly Frog
The king and the queen were very much in love with each other. Then he got involved in a war and had to leave her. She was already pregnant but none of them didn't know that. Soon she was lost in the forest and found herself in a strange land where everything was controlled by a witch.
By coincidence, she saved the life of a frog.
This frog was a fairy frog. It had magic powers. Very limited, yet still with the ability to help the queen.
And the princess, when she was born.
After a long and dangerous trip, the magic frog found the king who still loved his lost queen, and informed him about the kid. The happy end follows.
Princess Rosette
The kind and the queen got two sons and a baby sister Rosette. At her birth the fairies told the queen she might cause the death of her brothers, so Rosette's parents decided to lock her in a tower.
Years passed, brothers still loved their baby sister, and the king and the queen died. When the brothers became the ruler of the country immediately decided to free their sister.
Rosette was delighted with the view, especially when she saw a peacock. She declared she would marry a peacock king and nobody else.
Not knowing if such a person even exists the brothers decided to find him and left Rosette in the castle. They really found the peacock king, showed him Rosette's portrait and he was immediately in love with her.
But they had to promise she was really as beautiful as her picture. Otherwise, they shall die. They accepted the challenge and sent a letter to Rosette. She had to travel to the land of the peacock king.
Among her companions was a nurse who had her own plans. She arranged Rosette and her dog were thrown into the ocean while sleeping and dressed her own daughter in Rosette's gowns.
The imposter was still ugly and the peacock king was very dissatisfied with his bride-to-be.
Fortunately, before his men killed Rosette's brothers, the sea brought her to the beach.
An old man helped her to get to the castle in time.
The peacock king is delighted when he finds out how beautiful is Rosette in reality.
They all lived happily ever after.
This ends the book Old Time Stories with the pictures by William Hearth Robinson. Have a great time.