Once upon a time, a man and his wife lived in a little house next to a beautiful walled garden. The garden belonged to a powerful witch, and no one dared enter it.

But the wife was expecting a baby, and she could see a patch of rapunzel lettuce growing in the witch's garden. She wanted it so badly that she couldn't eat or sleep.

"I will die if I don't have some of that rapunzel," she told her husband.

Her husband loved her dearly. That night, he climbed over the wall and crept into the garden. He grabbed a handful of rapunzel and hurried back.

His wife ate it hungrily. But the next day, she wanted more. So the husband climbed the wall again.

This time, the witch was waiting.

"How dare you steal from my garden!" she thundered.

"Please," begged the man. "My wife is ill. She needed the rapunzel."

The witch's eyes narrowed. "Very well. Take all the rapunzel you want. But when your child is born, you must give her to me."

The man was so frightened that he agreed.

When the baby girl was born, the witch appeared and took her away. She named the girl Rapunzel.

Rapunzel grew into the most beautiful child in the world, with golden hair that grew and grew and never stopped growing. When she was twelve years old, the witch locked her in a tall tower in the middle of a forest. The tower had no door and no stairs — only one small window at the very top.

When the witch wanted to visit, she stood below and called, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!"

And Rapunzel would let her long golden braid tumble down from the window — twenty feet of shining hair — and the witch would climb up.

One day, a prince was riding through the forest. He heard someone singing. The voice was so beautiful that he followed it to the tower. He hid among the trees and watched as the witch came, called out, and climbed the golden hair.

After the witch left, the prince stood beneath the window and called, "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!"

The golden braid came tumbling down. The prince climbed up.

Rapunzel was startled — she had never seen anyone but the witch. But the prince was kind, and they talked for hours. He came back the next day, and the day after that. They fell in love.

"Bring me a skein of silk each time you come," said Rapunzel. "I'll weave a ladder, and when it's long enough, I'll climb down and we can leave together."

But one day, Rapunzel made a mistake. She said to the witch, "Why are you so much heavier to pull up than the prince?"

The witch flew into a rage. She grabbed Rapunzel's braid and cut it off with a pair of shears. Then she sent Rapunzel away to a lonely place in the wilderness.

That evening, the witch fastened the cut braid to a hook by the window and waited. When the prince called and climbed up, he found the witch instead of Rapunzel.

"Your little songbird is gone!" cackled the witch. "You will never see her again!"

In his despair, the prince leaped from the tower. He survived the fall, but thorns scratched his eyes, and he wandered the countryside, blind and heartbroken, for many months.

One day, he heard a voice singing — that same beautiful voice. He stumbled toward it. It was Rapunzel.

She ran to him and wept. Her tears fell on his eyes, and his sight returned.

He could see again. And the first thing he saw was Rapunzel, smiling at him through her tears.

He took her home to his kingdom, where they were married and lived happily for the rest of their days.