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Clever Maids, Fearless Jacks, and Helpful Cat: Open! Open! Green House

Clever Maids, Fearless Jacks, and Helpful Cat

Open! Open! Green House

Open! Open! Green House

Told by Alice Lannon to Martin Lovelace and Barbara Rieti, June 26, 1999, in Southeast Placentia. (MUNFLA 2019-029)

Now, once upon a time, in a faraway land, there was a little girl called Maggie.

She lived with her father, who had become ill.

And Maggie had to . . . run errands.

She used to make lace doilies

and go sell them, to try to keep . . . food on the table.

And . . . one day, when she was passing the town hall,

she saw a notice in the window, saying

a bag of gold was offered to anyone who would spend three nights

in the haunted castle known as Green House.

Now she could see this big castle from her house.

It was up on a hill, the trees had grown up around it

and it was rumored to be haunted.

So she thought, if I could get that bag of gold, I could get proper food

and medicine for my father

and make him well.

And she went in

and said she wanted to spend three nights at Green House.

And they kind of laughed at her first

but one old man said, well, why not give her a try?

And he said, there’re strong men have tried to . . . stay there

and they were scared away

but he said, well, we’ll give her a chance.

She said, I have a request.

Can I have . . . bring my little cat

and dog

and can I take some apples

and nuts to eat?

Oh yes, they said, that’s not people.

So she arranged anyhow for her neighbor to look in on her father.

She didn’t tell him where she was going.

And she went—set off just before dark with her little cat

and her dog

and her apples

and her nuts.

And the caretaker let her in

and he had a big fire going in the fireplace, in a huge, big ballroom.

And he told her . . . he said, don’t let it burn down too low.

You have to put on a log every now and then.

And he was out of there before dark. He wasn’t staying around.

So it was a stormy night

the wind howled

the shutters were banging

and the wind whistled down the chimney.

But she wasn’t scared.

And—not—everything was okay till about midnight.

Then the big knock came on the door

and the voice said, all alone, fair maid?

And she said

All alone, I am not!

I’ve got my apples to eat

my nuts to crack

and little dog and pussycat.

And all alone, I am not! [laughs]

Then the voice said

open, open, green house to let the king’s son in.

And the door swung open

and in trooped the horriblest-looking people you ever saw.

Ugly faces, they were almost like skeletons, some of them.

And they all glared at Maggie

and then the . . . last . . . ones to come in . . . six men, they had, like a bag on their back.

It looked like a log.

And they went to a table

and laid it down

and untied the strings.

And when they did, there was a handsome man there.

And the old . . . crone went over

and touched him with her wand

and up steps the handsome young man

and then the music started

and they all began to dance

and they danced wildly

and oh, swirling and twirling.

And they used to make horrible faces at Maggie.

But she was stand—stood her ground.

She stayed in the chair, the little—the dog crouched in under.

And they used to go past the . . . fireplace so fast

and make the smoke come out in her eyes.

But—and the—the Prince—the young man danced by with the . . . old witch once

and he mouthed to her . . . the old witch’s back was turned . . .

Stay for three

and I’ll be free.

And Maggie was only a young girl

but she was falling in love with him already

so she was more determined now that she was going to stay.

And she stayed

And . . . they tried their best . . . they always bump into the chair

but she moved the chair back.

And they didn’t really hurt her; they were just trying to scare her.

And when the cock crew—crowed in the morning, the . . . old . . . witch touched the man

and he fell just like a piece of board.

The men put in him in the bag

and put him on their shoulders

and went out through the door.

And everything was quiet.

So Maggie curled up and went to sleep then

until nine o’clock, when she had to go to the town hall to report.

And of course she didn’t tell anything what happened.

She said, oh, not much.

And the townspeople were kinda talking about it

that Maggie had spent the night in the haunted castle

and said nothing happened

and that she was going again the next night.

So same thing. The caretaker had the fire going

and he told her that—to keep the fire going.

And she wandered down, around the building

and there was a great big dining room, with beautiful . . . crystal and silverware all set out on white cloths

and somebody had been taking care of it.

And there was beautiful furniture all round.

The beds—rooms were like something out of a fairy tale, they were so nice.

And then she came back and stayed in the room.

So same thing, at midnight, a knock came on the door.

open, open—uh—all alone, fair maid?

All alone, I am not!

I’ve got my apples to eat

my nuts to crack

my little dog and pussycat

and all alone, I am not!

And then the voice said

open, open, green house, and let the king’s son in.

And in they trooped again.

They were even worse looking than they were the—the night before.

They were sinister looking.

But Maggie figured she was going to stay.

And so when the . . . old witch touched the man, up he hopped

and he was . . . lively

and when he passed Maggie, he whispered thanks

and, stay for three

and I’ll be free.

So the same thing happened that night.

They tried their best to—with their ugly faces

and threatening gestures at her.

And anyhow, she stood her ground.

And when the . . . the cock crowed, same thing happened again.

She touched the man with her wand

and he fell like a piece of stiff—like a piece of board.

They put him in the bag, tied it up

and went on with him on their back.

And the third night, uh, at midnight, same thing happened.

The knock came on—at the door

and that night, it was worst night, because the storm was—wind was really blowing through the trees

and some of the branches were scraping along

and made weird noises.

And the wind whistled down the chimney

and howled around, the shutters banged.

But anyhow, she was determined.

She had stayed two

she was going to stay the third one.

And midnight, when they all came in again, trooped in

and the—the band start playing fast and furious

and they danced and twirled and whirled.

And the old witch was trying her best to scare . . . Maggie. She didn’t want her there.

And all her crew.

But she was so intent on trying to scare her, that when the cock crowed, she didn’t hear him.

And she was still trying to scare Maggie.

So the sun started to come up

and when they saw the sun coming up, she scrabbled

and touched the man with her wand

and nothing happened.

Her power was gone, ’cause she had stayed too long.

And they all trooped out the door, went up in a poof of smoke.

The whole works of them.

And he ran to Maggie

and said, I’m free, I’m free.

I’m a—I’m a Prince, he said.

I own this castle.

And he said, we’re going to get married.

You’re too young now.

But he said, we’re going to . . . I’m going to court you

and we’re going to get married.

And they—Maggie had to go down to the town hall

and they reported—she got her bag of gold.

Then they went to see the father

and he was so delighted

and Maggie was so delighted to have the money to . . . get medicine for him to make him well

and in no time, he was well.

And after three years, she and the Prince got married

and they all lived happily ever after. [laughs] (see also Lannon and McCarthy 1991, 3–9)

Compare ATU 480 The Kind and the Unkind Girls

Compare ATU 444* Enchanted Prince Disenchanted

Compare AT 425J Service in Hell to Release Enchanted Husband

Motifs:

  • P 234. Father and daughter.
  • H 1411. Fear test: staying in haunted house.
  • E 282. Ghosts haunt castle.
  • E 293. Ghosts frighten people (deliberately).
  • G 263. Witch injures, enchants, or transforms.
  • D 1964.2. Magic sleep induced by disappointed suitor.
  • D 620. Periodic transformation.
  • Compare G 269.3. Witch harnesses man and leads him to dance.
  • G 273.3. Witch powerless at cockcrow.
  • D 750. Disenchantment by faithfulness of others.
  • G 278. Death of witch.
  • Compare Q 82. Reward for fearlessness.
  • L 162. Lowly heroine marries prince.

Comments

Alice’s tale resists classification. Hans-Jörg Uther terms ATU 444* Enchanted Prince Disenchanted, a “miscellaneous type” because “especially difficult to classify” (2004, 11). Its echoes appear in several tale types. A vigil in a haunted house appears in ATU 326A* Soul Released from Torment; ATU 480A Girl and Devil in a Strange House; and ATU 410* The Petrified Kingdom. But the closest parallels to “Open! Open!” are in versions of ATU 480 The Kind and the Unkind Girls, despite there being no other girl than Alice’s young hero Maggie. In particular, Alice’s verbal formulas resemble those in “Kate Crackernuts” (Philip 1995, 49–51) and “The Corpse Watchers” (Kennedy 1866, 54–57): the youngest daughter sits up to watch an apparently dead man, follows him on a dangerous journey, and eventually marries him. Tales in this group also include animal companions, apples, and nuts.

Stories called “The Girl and the Dead Man” (Campbell 1890, 220–22) and “The Woman Who Went to Hell” (Radner 1989, 109–17) also share the young woman’s vigil and perilous quest. Joan N. Radner identifies the Irish versions she discusses as ATU 425 The Search for the Lost Husband, which also offers motifs about testing courage and endurance, duty to parents, curing sick relatives, and winning a romantic partner who has fallen under a curse or enchantment. Alice’s “The Big Black Bull,” below, is ATU 425 and in that tale, as in “Open! Open!” the young woman’s opponent is an “old witch” who wants to keep the young man for herself.

Unlike other versions, Alice’s makes her heroine too young for marriage. When asked how old Maggie was, Alice replied firmly that she was about twelve or thirteen. The tale is thus a hybrid of child-centered and adult-centered. At the beginning Maggie’s only love relationship is with her father, her mother being dead. But by the end she is being courted by the Prince, wisely patient enough to wait for her. A comparison with the printed version (Lannon and McCarthy 1991) shows the contrast between Alice’s feminine perspective and that of her brother. Mike edited Alice’s longhand script as he word-processed the story for printing. In Mike’s version, the wedding follows immediately. As in most masculine fairy tales, there is nothing about a courtship. Alice made no complaint, even though he “changed it on me” (Lannon 2001). The tales were as much his to tell as hers, but the published versions show Mike’s idea of how a fairy tale should read, and lack the verve of Alice’s oral performance.

The sister and brother heard the story from their grandmother as children, which may explain Maggie’s youthfulness. Like her, Kitty in “Black Bull” is tomboyish, as Alice said of herself. We can never know how much of Alice’s story reflects Mary Strang McCarthy’s, and Aunt Ellen Flannigan’s telling is even further back in time. Ellen would have been in her mid-forties when she told the story to the child Mary Strang. Ellen was unmarried and may well have served as a housemaid. Mary certainly did, in a lawyer’s family on the French island of St. Pierre, close to Lawn by sea. The description of Green House may owe something to her housemaid’s eye and experience:

and there was a great big dining room, with beautiful . . . crystal and silverware all set out on white cloths

and somebody had been taking care of it.

And there was beautiful furniture all round.

The beds—rooms were like something out of a fairy tale, they were so nice.

It was common in Newfoundland in the nineteenth century, as in England and Ireland, for young girls to be “shipped out” to live and serve in another family’s household in return for their keep and a small wage. In the published version the witch notices Maggie’s attraction to the young man and says: “If you want to keep those eyes you’d better keep them to yourself” (Lannon and McCarthy 1991, 7), a hyperbolic statement of a domestic servant’s general charge to know her place and keep her employers’ secrets. Alice chuckled at the suggestion that the dance scenes, with the old witch intent on scaring Maggie away from the Prince, might have reflected romantic liaisons between maids and young masters, to the dismay of the men’s mothers: “That’s happened lots of times in real life!” Alice said (2001).

Though the tale came to Alice through oral transmission, Aunt Ellen could have heard it read aloud from Patrick Kennedy’s Legendary Fictions of the Irish Celts, first published in 1866. An Irish priest might have carried such a book to his Newfoundland parish to sustain him on long winter nights. Kennedy prided himself on recording stories directly from oral sources, largely in his native Wexford. A version of “Open! Open!” could have circulated orally in the southeast Irish counties from which Newfoundland Irish settlers, including Ellen Flannigan, came. “The Corpse Watchers,” said Kennedy, was “one which was repeated oftenest in our hearing during our country experience”; he believed it “owed its popularity to the bit of a rhyme, and the representation of the adventures of the three sisters, nearly in the same words” (1866, 48).

Another reason for its popularity, however, may have been its representation of a character identified near the end of the tale: “It was a witch that had a spite to the young man, because he wouldn’t marry her, and so she got power to keep him in a state between life and death till a young woman would rescue him by doing what she had just done” (Kennedy 1866, 51). If Holbek’s thesis is correct, that magic tales allow problems in real-life relationships to be contemplated through fantastic characters and events, then it is not far-fetched to understand the old witch as a young man’s mother, seen by his bride. The old woman wants to keep her son under her control. Alice declared that her own mother-in-law had been “a lovely woman,” and Holbek’s idea does not mean that every teller is referencing their personal circumstance. More broadly, however, such tales would have resonated in agricultural areas such as southern Ireland where, with limited land available, younger generations had to wait for parents to relinquish their control of a farm, and where it was expected that the elders would live on at the farmstead afterward being cared for by the son and his wife who had replaced them. Radner’s exploration of the coded significance of the “The Woman Who Went to Hell” is a persuasive example of how such contentious situations could be considered through fairy tales (1989, 109–15).

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