“Do-as-well-as-you-can.” “My man Do-as-well-as-you-can, your man Do-as-well-as-you-can; my cradle Hippodadle, your cradle Hippodadle; my child Grild, your child Grild; my husband Cham, your husband Cham; I to Walpe, you to Walpe; so, so, together we go.”
The Flail which came from the Clouds
A countryman once drove his plow with a pair of oxen, and when he came about the middle of his fields the horns of his two beasts began to grow, and grow, till they were so high that when he went home he could not get them into the stable-door. By good luck just then a Butcher passed by, to whom he gave up his beasts, and struck a bargain, that he should take to the Butcher a measure-full of turnip-seed, for every grain of which the Butcher should give him a Brabant dollar. That is what you may call a good bargain! The Countryman went home, and came again, carrying on his back a measure of seed, out of which he dropped one grain on the way. The Butcher, however, reckoned out for every seed a Brabant dollar; and had not the Countryman lost one he would have received a dollar more. Meanwhile the seed which he dropped on the road had grown up to a fine tree, reaching into the clouds. So the Countryman thought to himself he might as well see what the people in the clouds were about. Up he climbed, and at the top he found a field with some people thrashing oats; but while he was looking at them he felt the tree shake beneath him, and, peeping downward, he perceived that some one was on the point of chopping down the tree at the roots. “If I am thrown down,” said the Countryman to himself, “I shall have a bad fall;” and, quite bewildered, he could think of nothing else to save himself than to make a rope with the oat straw, which lay about in heaps. He then seized hold of a hatchet and flail which were near him, and let himself down by his straw rope. He fell into a deep, deep hole in the earth, and found it very lucky that he had brought the hatchet with him; for with it he cut steps, and so mounted again into the broad daylight, bringing with him the flail for a sign of the truth of his tale, which nobody, on that account, was able to doubt!
There is a wonderful adventure!!!
The Sole’s Mouth
The Fishes once grew very discontented because no order was kept in their dominions. None turned aside for the others, but each swam right or left just as it pleased him, sometimes between those who wished to be together, or else pushed them to one side, and the stronger ones gave the weaker blows with their tails, which made them get out of the way as fast as they could, or else they devoured them without more ceremony. “How nice it would be,” thought the Fishes, “if we had a king who should exercise the power of judging between us!” And so at last they assembled together to choose a lord, who should be he who could swim the quickest and render help best to the weaker fishes.
So they laid themselves all in rank and file by the shore, and the Pike gave a signal with his tail, on which they started off. Like an arrow darted away the Pike, closely followed by the Herring, the Gudgeon, the Perch, the Carp, and the rest. Even the Sole swam among them, hoping to gain the prize.
All at once a cry was heard, “The Herring is first, the Herring is first!” “Who is first?” asked the flat, envious Sole in a vexed tone. “Who is first?”
“The Herring, the Herring!” was the reply. “The nak-ed Herring, the nak-ed Herring!” cried the Sole disdainfully.
And ever since that time the Sole’s mouth has been all awry as a punishment for his wicked envy.