 POOR
widow once lived in a little cottage with a garden in front of it, in which grew two rose
trees, one bearing white roses and the other red. She had two children, who were just like
the two rose trees; one was called Snow-white and the other Rose-red, and they were the
sweetest and best children in the world, always diligent and always cheerful; but
Snow-white was quieter and more gentle than Rose-red. Rose-red loved to run about the
fields and meadows, and to pick flowers and catch butterflies; but Snow-white sat at home
with her mother and helped her in the household, or read aloud to her when there was no
work to do. The two children loved each other so dearly that they always walked about hand
in hand whenever they went out together, and when Snow- white said, "We will never
desert each other," Rose-red answered: "No, not as long as we live"; and
the mother added: "Whatever one gets she shall share with the other."
They often roamed about in the woods gathering berries and no beast offered to hurt them; on the contrary, they came up to them in the most confiding manner; the little hare would eat a cabbage leaf from their hands, the deer grazed beside them, the stag would bound past them merrily, and the birds remained on the branches and sang to them with all their might.
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