Further along the road he came to a farm, with barns and cattle and plenty of stock about, and a large well at which a woman was drawing water. Instead of dipping in the pail, she had got the well-rope knotted into a huge knot, which she kept dipping into the water and squeezing out into the pail, and she kept crying as she did so: ‘Oh, how long shall I be filling the pail! The pail will never be full!’
‘Shall I show you how to fill it?’ asked the pilgrim-husband, drawing near.
‘Oh, yes, do show me if you can. I will give you a hundred scudi if you will only show me.’
Then he took all the knots out of the rope and let down the pail by it, and filled it in a minute.
‘Here’s a second woman as stupid as my people at home,’ said the pilgrim-husband, as the farmer’s wife asked him in to dinner in reward for his great services; ‘if I go on at this rate I shall have to return to her at last, in spite of my protestations.’
After that the farmer’s wife counted out the hundred scudi of the promised reward, and he went on further, having first packed six eggs into his hollow staff as provision for the journey.
Towards nightfall he arrived at a lone cottage. Here he knocked and asked a bed for his night’s lodging.
‘I can’t give you that,’ said a voice from the inside; ‘for I am a lone widow. I can’t take a man in to sleep here.’
‘But I am a pilgrim,’ replied he; ‘let me in at least to cook a bit of supper.’
‘That I don’t mind doing,’ said the good wife, and she opened the door.