Storys of Prince Lupin, Yellow Dwarf, and the Three Wishes.

Yellow Dwarf

The Three Wishes

Story of Prince Lupin and the White Cat

Glasgow: Printed for the Booksellers

1840-1850 per University of Glasgow Union Catalogue of Scottish Chapbooks

24 pages

15 cm

7 printed at the bottom of the title-page

fairytale/folk lore

supernatural & ghost stories

This chapbook contains three popular fairy tales, including Prince Lupin and the White Cat, The Yellow Dwarf, and the Three Wishes. The first tale follows the adventures of the youngest son of a king who has instructed his sons to find him various fantastical objects in order to determine who should inherit the kingdom, including a beautiful dog, a web of cloth fine enough to pass through the eye of a needle, and a beautiful young woman. The youngest son finds help in procuring these objects, as well as his own happiness, at the court of a white cat who is actually an enchanted queen herself. The Yellow Dwarf, tells the fantastical tale of All-Fair, a beautiful princess who won’t settle down, so her mother decides to seek the advice of the Desert Fairy. On the way, she loses the cakes she had brought to distract the lions guarding the fairy, but a Yellow Dwarf appears and promises to save her in exchange for All-Fair’s hand in marriage. She agrees but becomes melancholy after these events, which causes All-Fair to follow the same path as her mother, falling into the same trap with the Dwarf, whom she agrees to marry. When she repents her choice, she decides to agree to marry the King of the Golden Mines instead, but the Desert Fairy and the Yellow Dwarf arrive suddenly on supernatural steeds and battle with the King who is defeated. The Dwarf takes the princess home, and the Desert Fairy takes the king, who she has fallen in love with, but the King escapes with the help of a Mermaid. Bearing a magical sword given to him by the mermaid, the King defeats a variety of foes in an attempt to rescue All-Fair, but is ultimately defeated and killed. All-Fair dies of grief and the mermaid changes both of their bodies into a pair of palm trees. The Three Wishes is a short tale at the end of the chapbook that reminds the readers to ‘be careful what you wish for.’ In this tale, a fairy promises a married couple that the next three things that they wish for will be granted. After arguing about what to wish for, they agree to wait ‘til morning to decide. Forgetting the specific nature of the fairy’s instructions, they end up accidentally using up their wishes in a series of ridiculous requests, which eventually leads them to realize that it is best to be happy with what you have in life.

Courtship and Marriage

Chapbooks - Scotland - Glasgow

Archival & Special Collections, University of Guelph Library, Guelph, Ontario

University of Glasgow Union Catalogue of Scottish Chapbooks http://special.lib.gla.ac.uk/chapbooks/search/

JPEGs and PDF derived from master file, which was scanned from the original book in 24-bit color at 600 dpi in TIFF format using an Epson Expression 10000XL scanner.

In the public domain; For high quality reproductions, contact Archival & Special Collections, University of Guelph. libaspc@uoguelph.ca, 519-824-4120, Ext. 53413

Archival and Special Collections, University of Guelph Library, Guelph, Ontario, Canada