STORY THE TWELFTH — THE CALF. [12]
By Monseigneur de la Roche
Of a Dutchman, who at all hours of the day and night ceased not to dally with his wife in love sports; and how it chanced that he laid her down, as they went through a wood, under a great tree in which was a labourer who had lost his calf. And as he was enumerating the charms of his wife, and naming all the pretty things he could see, the labourer asked him if he could not see the calf he sought, to which the Dutchman replied that he thought he could see a tail.
In the borders of Holland there formerly lived a foolish fellow, who determined to do the worst thing he could—that is, get married. And so entranced was he with the joys of wedlock, that although it was winter, he was so heated that the night—which at that season was nine or ten hours—was not sufficiently long to enable him to appease the ardent desires which he felt.
Wherever he met his wife he put her on her back; whether it was in the chamber, or in the stable, or any other place, he always attacked her. And this did not last only one or two months, but longer than I care to tell, for it would not be convenient that many women should hear of the zeal of this insatiable worker. What more shall I say? He performed so often that his memory has never been forgotten, or will be, in that country. And in truth the woman who formerly complained to the Bailli of Amiens had not such good cause as this man’s wife, but, notwithstanding that she could often have dispensed with this pleasant task she was always obedient to her husband, and never restive under the spur.
It chanced one day, after dinner, when the weather was very fine, and the sun shot its rays over the flower-embroidered earth, that the fancy came to this man and his wife that they two would go alone to the woods, and they started on their road.
Now, in order that you may learn my story, let me tell you that exactly at the same time as these good folk went forth to play in the wood, it chanced that a labourer had lost his calf, which he had put to graze in a field at the edge of the wood; but when he came to search for his calf he could not find it, at which he was sad at heart.