The Green Fairy Book Part 41

'Wonders will never cease,' cried Simon. 'I certainly never thought the old cat would ever catch another mouse.'

But Susan answered, 'There, you see, I always said our cat was a most excellent creature--but you men always think you know best.'

In the meantime the fox said to the dog, 'Our friend Simon has just killed a pig; when it gets a little darker, you must go into the courtyard and bark with all your might.'

'All right,' said the dog, and as soon as it grew dusk he began to bark loudly.

Susan, who heard him first, said to her husband, 'Our dog must have come back, for I hear him barking l.u.s.tily. Do go out and see what's the matter; perhaps thieves may be stealing our sausages.'

But Simon answered, 'The foolish brute is as deaf as a post and is always barking at nothing,' and he refused to get up.

The next morning Susan got up early to go to church at the neighbouring town, and she thought she would take some sausages to her aunt who lived there. But when she went to her larder, she found all the sausages gone, and a great hole in the floor. She called out to her husband, 'I was perfectly right. Thieves have been here last night, and they have not left a single sausage. Oh! if you had only got up when I asked you to!'

Then Simon scratched his head and said, 'I can't understand it at all. I certainly never believed the old dog was so quick at hearing.'

But Susan replied, 'I always told you our old dog was the best dog in the world--but as usual you thought you knew so much better. Men are the same all the world over.'

And the fox scored a point too, for he had carried away the sausages himself!

Grimm.

_THE STORY OF THE FISHERMAN AND HIS WIFE_

There was once a fisherman and his wife who lived together in a little hut close to the sea, and the fisherman used to go down every day to fish; and he would fish and fish. So he used to sit with his rod and gaze into the s.h.i.+ning water; and he would gaze and gaze.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Now, once the line was pulled deep under the water, and when he hauled it up he hauled a large flounder with it. The flounder said to him, 'Listen, fisherman. I pray you to let me go; I am not a real flounder, I am an enchanted Prince. What good will it do you if you kill me--I shall not taste nice? Put me back into the water and let me swim away.'

'Well,' said the man, 'you need not make so much noise about it; I am sure I had much better let a flounder that can talk swim away.' With these words he put him back again into the s.h.i.+ning water, and the flounder sank to the bottom, leaving a long streak of blood behind. Then the fisherman got up, and went home to his wife in the hut.

'Husband,' said his wife, 'have you caught nothing to-day?'

'No,' said the man. 'I caught a flounder who said he was an enchanted prince, so I let him swim away again.'

'Did you wish nothing from him?' said his wife.

'No,' said the man; 'what should I have wished from him?'

'Ah!' said the woman, 'it's dreadful to have to live all one's life in this hut that is so small and dirty; you ought to have wished for a cottage. Go now and call him; say to him that we choose to have a cottage, and he will certainly give it you.'

'Alas!' said the man, 'why should I go down there again?'

'Why,' said his wife, 'you caught him, and then let him go again, so he is sure to give you what you ask. Go down quickly.'

The man did not like going at all, but as his wife was not to be persuaded, he went down to the sea.

When he came there the sea was quite green and yellow, and was no longer s.h.i.+ning. So he stood on the sh.o.r.e and said:

'Once a prince, but changed you be Into a flounder in the sea.

Come! for my wife, Ilsebel, Wishes what I dare not tell.'

Then the flounder came swimming up and said, 'Well, what does she want?'

'Alas!' said the man, 'my wife says I ought to have kept you and wished something from you. She does not want to live any longer in the hut; she would like a cottage.'

'Go home, then,' said the flounder; 'she has it.'

So the man went home, and there was his wife no longer in the hut, but in its place was a beautiful cottage, and his wife was sitting in front of the door on a bench. She took him by the hand and said to him, 'Come inside, and see if this is not much better.' They went in, and inside the cottage was a tiny hall, and a beautiful sitting-room, and a bedroom in which stood a bed, a kitchen and a dining-room all furnished with the best of everything, and fitted up with every kind of tin and copper utensil. And outside was a little yard in which were chickens and ducks, and also a little garden with vegetables and fruit trees.

'See,' said the wife, 'isn't this nice?'

'Yes,' answered her husband; 'here we shall remain and live very happily.'

'We will think about that,' said his wife.

With these words they had their supper and went to bed. All went well for a week or a fortnight, then the wife said:

'Listen, husband; the cottage is much too small, and so is the yard and the garden; the flounder might just as well have sent us a larger house.

I should like to live in a great stone castle. Go down to the flounder, and tell him to send us a castle.'

'Ah, wife!' said the fisherman, 'the cottage is quite good enough; why do we choose to live in a castle?'

'Why?' said the wife. 'You go down; the flounder can quite well do that.'

'No, wife,' said the man; 'the flounder gave us the cottage. I do not like to go to him again; he might take it amiss.'

'Go,' said his wife. 'He can certainly give it us, and ought to do so willingly. Go at once.'

The fisherman's heart was very heavy, and he did not like going. He said to himself, 'It is not right.' Still, he went down.

When he came to the sea, the water was all violet and dark-blue, and dull and thick, and no longer green and yellow, but it was still smooth.

So he stood there and said:

'Once a prince, but changed you be Into a flounder in the sea.

Come! for my wife, Ilsebel, Wishes what I dare not tell.'

'What does she want now?' said the flounder.

'Ah!' said the fisherman, half-ashamed, 'she wants to live in a great stone castle.'

'Go home; she is standing before the door,' said the flounder.