When Jesus went up to Golgotha, the Virgin Mother followed, crying. There she saw in the procession also a tortoise, and she could not help laughing. She then reproached herself, and said, “O evil mouth, thou art only good for worms.” There and then she spat on the ground in disgust, and worms came out of the spittle. But having come from a holy mouth the worms which grew out of the spittle became the silkworms, which have remained so to this very day.
A peculiar variant in which, however, the second part—the origin of the silkworm—is omitted, is found among the Kutzovlachs of Macedonia as “The Story of St. Mary and the Tortoise.”
Once upon a time the Virgin Mary sat sadly at the door of the school, waiting for her son, who was learning within, to come out so that she might give him a piece of cake which she had brought with her. Whilst she was sitting there she said to herself, “I will wait and see whether all the creatures recognise my son to be the most beautiful child in the world.”
A tortoise just then came along. In order to put her to the test, St. Mary said to her, “Would you like to give this cake to the most beautiful child here in this school?”
“Willingly,” replied the tortoise, and taking the cake she went into the school room. It so happened then that her own child was also among the pupils. She went straight up to it, and without a moment’s hesitation gave it the cake destined for the most beautiful child in the school. When St. Mary saw what the tortoise had done, instead of being angry she laughed heartily, and said to her:
“Thou hast acted as every mother would act, for to a mother no one could be more beautiful than her own child. And because thou hast driven away my sadness, the finest and softest grass shall henceforth be thy food, and when thou diest thy bones shall not rot away.”
And so it has remained to this very day, and the shell of the tortoise remains sound.