"Snowdrop"

Illustration by Arthur Rackham

This illustration from Rackham was revised and coloured for the 1909 Edition of "The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm".

It accompanies the tale 'Snowdrop' - which has become popularized with other titles, including 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'.

The broader context for the illustration is set within that portion of the tale that follows:

Now the apple was so cunningly painted that the red half alone was poisoned. Snowdrop longed

for the apple, and when she saw the Peasant Woman eating she could hold out no longer, stretched

out her hand and took the poisoned half. Scarcely had she put a bit into her mouth than she fell

dead to the ground.

The Queen looked with a fiendish glance, and laughed aloud and said, "White as snow, red as blood,

and black as ebony, this time the Dwarfs cannot wake you up again." And when she got home and

asked the Looking-glass -

"Mirror, Mirror on the wall,

Who is fairest of us all?"

it answered at last -

"Queen, thou 'rt fairest of them all."

Then her jealous heart was at rest, as much at rest as a jealous heart can be. The Dwarfs, when they

came at evening, found Snowdrop lying on the ground and not a breath escaped her lips, and she

was quite dead. They lifted her up and looked to see whether any poison was to be found, unlaced

her dress, combed her hair, washed her with wine and water, but it was no use; their dear child

was dead. They laid her on a bier, and all seven sat down and bewailed her and lamented over

her for three whole days. Then they prepared to buy her, but she looked so fresh and living, and

still had such beautiful rosy cheeks, that they said, "We cannot bury her in the dark earth." And so

they had a transparent glass coffin made, so that she could be seen from every side, laid her inside

and wrote on it in letters of gold her name and how she was a King's daughter. Then they set the

coffin out on the mountain, and one of them always stayed by and watched it. And the birds came

too and mourned for Snowdrop, first an owl, then a raven, and lastly a dove.