By W. S. Karajich
There once lived a poor man in a miserable hovel, who had no one with him save an only daughter. But she was very wise, and went about everywhere seeking alms, and taught her father also to speak in a becoming manner when he begged. It happened once that the poor man came to the king and asked for a gift. The king demanded whence he came, and who had taught him to speak so well. The man said whence he came, and that it was his daughter who had taught him.
“And who taught your daughter?” asked the king.
The poor man answered: “God, and our great poverty.”
Then the king gave him thirty eggs, saying—
“Take these eggs to your daughter, and tell her to hatch chickens out of them, and I will reward her handsomely; but if she cannot hatch them, it will go ill with you.”
The poor man went crying back to his hovel, and related to his daughter what had passed. The maiden saw at once that the eggs had been boiled, but she told her father to go to rest, and assured him that she would see that all went well. The father followed her advice, and went to sleep; the maiden took a pot, filled it with water and beans, and set it on the fire. On the following morning, the beans being quite boiled, she told her father to take a plow and oxen, and to plow along the road where the king would pass.
“And,” she added, “when you see the king, take the beans, sow them, and cry, ‘Hi! go on, oxen mine! Heaven be with me, and make my boiled beans take root and grow!’ And when the king asks you how it is possible for boiled beans to grow, answer him, that it is quite as possible as for boiled eggs to yield chickens.”
The poor man hearkened to his daughter, went away, and began to plow. When he saw the king coming he began to cry—
“Hi, go on, oxen mine! God help me, and make my boiled beans take root and grow!”