The sick man would tell him, and swear by his almighty God to hold his tongue.
“Know,” said Ulenspiegel, “that I mean to reduce one of you to powder by means of fire, that of this dust or powder I shall concoct a marvellous mixture and give it to all the sick to drink. The one that cannot walk shall be burned. To-morrow I shall come here and standing in the street with the master hospitaller, I shall summon you all crying, ‘Let him that is not sick take up his duds and come!’”
In the morning, Ulenspiegel came and called out as he had said. All the sick, the lame, the rheumy, the coughing, the fever stricken, would fain come out together. All were in the street, even some that for ten years had not left their bed.
The master hospitaller asked them if they were cured and could walk.
“Aye,” replied they, imagining that one of them was burning in the courtyard.
Ulenspiegel then said to the master hospitaller:
“Pay me, since they are all outside, and declare themselves cured.”
The master paid him two hundred florins. And Ulenspiegel departed.
But on the second day the master beheld his sick folk coming back in a worse state than before, save one who, being cured in the open air, was found drunk and singing through the streets: “Noel to the great physician Ulenspiegel!”