“Now then, wife,” perhaps he would say, “I feel quite sorry for you; don’t go toiling and moiling, and don’t go out to the hay cutting.”
“No, no, you thief!” she would reply, “I shall go, and do you follow after me!”
One day, after having had his trouble and bother with her he went into the forest to look for berries and distract his grief, and he came to where there was a currant bush, and in the middle of that bush he saw a bottomless pit. He looked at it for some time and considered, “Why should I live in torment with a bad wife? can’t I put her into that pit? can’t I teach her a good lesson?”
So when he came home, he said:
“Wife, don’t go into the woods for berries.”
“Yes, you bugbear, I shall go!”
“I’ve found a currant bush; don’t pick it.”
“Yes I will; I shall go and pick it clean; but I won’t give you a single currant!”
The husband went out, his wife with him. He came to the currant bush, and his wife jumped into it, crying out at the top her voice:
“Don’t you come into the bush, you thief, or I’ll kill you!”