TRANSLATION.
A tinker stopped one day at a farmer’s house, where the lady gave him meat and milk. While he was eating he saw a kettle all rusty and bent, with a great hole in it, and he asked, “Give it to me and I will take it away for nothing, because you have been so kind and obliging to me.” So she gave it to him, and he went away for three weeks, and he repaired it (the kettle), and made it as bright (white) as silver. Then he went that road again, to the same house, and said, “Look here at this fine kettle! I gave six shillings for it, and you shall have it for the same money, because you have been so good to me.”
That man was like a great many men—very benevolent to himself.