The Greek Princess and the Young Gardener

The Greek Princess and the Young Gardener is an Irish fairy tale collected by Patrick Kennedy in Fireside Stories of Ireland.Joseph Jacobs included it in More Celtic Fairy Tales.

The tale is similar to Aarne-Thompson's type 550, "the quest for the golden bird/firebird", the Scottish How Ian Direach got the Blue Falcon and the German The Golden Bird . Other fairy tales of this type include The Bird 'Grip', Tsarevitch Ivan, the Fire Bird and the Gray Wolf, and The Nunda, Eater of People.

A king with one daughter grew old and sick, but the doctors found that the best medicine for him were apples from his own orchard. One night, he saw a bird stealing them. He blamed the gardener for neglecting the orchard, and the gardener promised that his sons, the land's best archers, would stop the thieving bird. The first night the oldest son came to the garden, but fell asleep; the king saw him and the thieving bird again, and though he shouted, the boy did not wake quickly enough. The same thing happened with the second son. But on the third night, the youngest son stayed awake and shot off a feather, thus frightening the bird away.

The king admired the feather greatly and said his daughter would marry whomever brought him the bird. The gardener's oldest son set out to do it. When a fox came to beg some of his lunch, the son shot an arrow at him. There were two inns, one merry, and one quiet in which to stay and when the oldest son found the inns, he chose the merrier one, and never came out again. Soon after, the second son set out, and ended up the same.

Finally, the youngest set out. He shared his lunch with the fox and out of respect, the fox warned him against a merry inn with dancing, and to stay in a quiet inn. The youngest followed the fox's advice and stayed in the quiet inn. The next day, the fox told him the bird was at the castle of the King of Spain and carried him there. Then it said that he could go in and carry out the bird and its cage. He went in, but he saw three golden apples with the bird, and a golden cage. He went to put the bird in the golden cage, and it awoke, and the boy was captured. The king gave him one chance to save his life: to steal the King of Morocco's bay filly.

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