At midnight he dreamed that he saw a tall and aged woman enter his tent, who spoke thus to him:--"I am beholden to you, good man, for your kindness to my daughter, but am unable to reward you as you deserve. Here is a scythe which I place beneath your pillow; it is the only gift I can make you, but despise it not. It will surely prove useful to you, as it can cut down all that lies before it. Only beware of putting it into the fire to temper it. Sharpen it, however, as you will, but in that way never." So saying, she was seen no more.
When the man awoke and looked forth, he found the mist all gone and the sun high in heaven; so getting all his things together and striking his tent, he laid them upon the pack-horses, saddling last of all his own horse. But on lifting his saddle from the ground, he found beneath it a small scythe blade, which seemed well worn and was rusty. On seeing this, he at once recalled to mind his dream, and taking the scythe with him, set out once more on his way. He soon found again the road which he had lost, and made all speed to reach the well-peopled district to which he was bound.
When he arrived at the north country, he went from house to house, but did not find any employment, for every farmer had laborers enough, and one week of hay-harvest was already past. He heard it said, however, that one old woman in the district, generally thought by her neighbors to be skilled in magic and very rich, always began her hay-cutting a week later than anybody else, and though she seldom employed a laborer, always contrived to finish it by the end of the season. When by any chance--and it was a rare one--she did engage a workman, she was never known to pay him for his work.
Now the peasant from the south was advised to ask this old woman for employment, having been warned of her strange habits.
He accordingly went to her house, and offered himself to her as a day laborer. She accepted his offer, and told him that he might, if he chose, work a week for her, but must expect no payment.
"Except," she said, "you can cut more grass in the whole week than I can rake in on the last day of it."
To these terms he gladly agreed, and began mowing. And a very good scythe he found that to be which the woman had given him in his dream; for it cut well, and never wanted sharpening, though he worked with it for five days unceasingly. He was well content, too, with his place, for the old woman was kind enough to him.
One day, entering the forge next to her house, he saw a vast number of scythe-handles and rakes, and a big heap of blades, and wondered beyond measure what the old lady could want with all these. It was the fifth day--the Friday--and when he was asleep that night, the same elf-woman whom he had seen upon the mountains came again to him and said:--
"Large as are the meadows you have mown, your employer will easily be able to rake in all that hay to-morrow, and if she does so, will, as you know, drive you away without paying you. When therefore you see yourself worsted, go into the forge, take as many scythe-handles as you think proper, fit their blades to them, and carry them out into that part of the land where the hay is yet uncut. There you must lay them on the ground, and you shall see how things go."
This said, she disappeared, and in the morning the laborer, getting up, set to work as usual at his mowing.