Once upon a time, a long time ago, there was a clan living beside Frog River. The Chief of the clan had seven pretty daughters, but the youngest of them was the most beautiful.

One day, the youngest daughter was playing with her silver ball at the riverbank. She was careless and the ball dropped into the river. When Chief's Daughter started to cry beside the bank for her beautiful ball, a frog came up to her.

The frog asked,

"What are you crying for, you pretty Chief's Daughter?"

"I'm crying for my silver ball," answered the girl. "It dropped into the river."

"Don't cry," said the frog. "I can get your ball back, but what will you give me for this service?"

"You will get my clothes, my jewellery, all my riches, dear frog, if you bring back my ball ", Chief's Daughter eagerly answered.

"I don't care about these," the frog croaked, "but if you take me as your companion, and if you share everything - food, drink, bed - with me, then I'll dive and fetch your ball back."

"I promise everything, if you only bring my beloved ball to me," the girl swore.

When the frog heard the promise, it dived into the water and soon rose to the surface with the silver ball in its mouth. The frog dropped the ball at the bank in front of the girl. Chief's Daughter caught the ball and joyfully ran away. In vain, the frog shouted for the girl to wait for him.

Next day, the Chief and his daughters were eating in their longhouse, when they heard knocking at the door. The father asked the youngest girl to open the door, and there was the frog behind the door. The girl quickly closed the door, and went back to the table. The Chief saw his daughter was very frightened.

"Who was it?" the Chief asked his daughter. "A troll? Or even a giant?"

"No," the girl answered. "It was only an ugly frog."

"What does it want?" asked the Chief raising his eyebrows.

"When playing yesterday, I dropped my ball in the river and I cried a lot," the girl answered. "Then the frog got the ball back, and I was foolish enough to promise that I would let it be my companion."

Again, they heard knocking from the door, and the sound of the frog shouting to the girl to come and open the door. The Chief said to his daughter:

"Because you have so sworn, you have to fulfil your promise."

The girl complained most bitterly, but she obeyed her father, and opened the door. The frog came in, and followed the girl to the table. It asked the girl to put him next to her. The girl hesitated, until her father asked her to do it. So the girl had to eat with the frog next to her, and from the same plate too!

When the household had eaten, the frog asked Chief's Daughter to carry him to bed. The girl didn't want to but again her father, the Chief, asked her.

The girl placed the frog on the floor next to her bed and laid herself down. The frog, however, demanded that she put it on the bed, and threatened to tell to the girl's father. She had no choice but to put the disgusting frog to bed with her. The girl tried to lie as far away from the frog, watching and detesting it.

Before the girl could fall asleep, the frog asked even more. Now, the frog demanded that she should give him a goodnight kiss. The frog again threatened to tell to the girl's father that she wouldn't keep her promise.

The girl was frightened, because she hated even to touch the frog, let alone to kiss it. However, the girl was afraid of his father's anger, too, as he would punish her badly, if she didn't obey. So the frog bounced closer to the girl's face, almost touching. Then the girl closed her eyes and put her lips against the cold and damp skin of the frog.

At that very moment, the frog changed his shape and there was a handsome young boy lying in the bed, instead of the ugly frog. He was a son of a chief, who had been transformed into a frog by an evil and soulless sorcerer. The Chief's Daughter's kiss, however, had broken the spell.

So the boy took the Chief's youngest daughter as his wife. He became a great chief and king after his father died, and the girl became his queen. They lived happily to the end of their days.

Author: Matti Järvinen
Proofreading: Simon Phipp