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MAID VAE

THERE was once a wedding and a great entertainment at Oesterhaesinge. The party did not break up till morning, and the guests took their departure with a great deal of noise and bustle. While they were putting their horses to their carriages, previous to setting out home, they stood talking about their respective bridal-presents. And while they were talking loudly, and with the utmost earnestness, there came from a neighbouring moor a maiden clad in green, with plaited rushes on her head; she went up to the man who was loudest, and bragging most of his present, and said to him: "What wilt thou give to maid Vae?" The man, who was elevated with all the ale and brandy he had been drinking, snatched up a whip, and replied: "Ten cuts of my whip;" and that very moment he dropt down dead on the ground. [a]

[a] Thiele, 1. 109. (communicated). Such legends, as Mr. Thiele learned directly from the mouths of the peasantry, he terms oral; those he procured from his friends, communicated. Oesterhaesinge, the scene of this legend, is in the island of Funen.