Once upon a time there was a gentleman and lady. They had a child. The father was captain of a ship. The mother regularly sent her son to school, and when the father came back from his voyages he asked his child if he had learnt much at school. The mother answered, “No, no! not much.”
The father went off for another voyage. He comes home the second time. “My child, what have you learnt at school?”
The child answers his father, “Nothing.”
“You have learnt nothing?”
The captain goes to find the schoolmaster, and asks him if his child does not learn anything.
“I cannot drive anything into that child’s head.”
The boy comes up, and the father, asks him again what he has learnt at school.
“This is all. (To understand) the song of the birds.”
“O, my son, the song of the birds! the song of the birds! Come, come on board ship with me.”
And he carries him off. While they were on the voyage a bird comes and settles on the end of the ship, singing, “Wirittitti, kirikiriki.”