Part 7

"Since those sausages have escaped me," he said. "I'll have to be satisfied with roast goose."

But when he tried to cut the goose's throat, the knife drew no blood. In his surprise he loosened his hold and the goose slipped from his hands and went cackling off after the hog.

"What's come over things today?" the blacksmith asked himself. "It seems I'm not to have sausage or roast goose. I suppose I'll have to be satisfied with a pair of pigeons."

He went out to the pigeon-house and caught two pigeons. He put them on the chopping-block and with one mighty blow of his ax cut off both their heads.

"There!" he cried in triumph. "I've got you!"

But even as he spoke the little severed heads returned to their bodies, the heads and bodies grew together as if nothing had happened, and cooing happily the two pigeons flew away.

Then at last the truth flashed upon the blacksmith's mind. So long as he kept Death fastened to that stool, nothing could die! Of course not! So no more spicy sausages, no more smoked hams, no more roast goose--not even a broiled pigeon! The prospect was not a pleasing one, for the blacksmith loved good things to eat. But what could he do? Release Death? Never that! He would be her first victim! Well then, if he could have no fresh meat, he would have to be content to live on peas and porridge and wheaten cakes.

This actually was what he had to do and what every one else had to do when their old provisions were exhausted.

Summer passed and winter followed. Then spring came bringing new and unforeseen miseries. With the first breath of warm weather all the pests and insects of the summer before revived, for not one of them had been killed by the winter cold. And the eggs they had laid all hatched out until the earth and the air and the water swarmed with living creatures. Birds and rats and grasshoppers, insects and bugs and vermin of every kind, covered the fields and ate up every green thing. The meadows looked as if a fire had swept them clean. The orchards were stripped bare of every leaf and blossom.

Such hordes of fish and frogs and water creatures filled the lakes and the rivers that the water was polluted and it was impossible for man to drink it.

Water and land alike were swarming with living creatures not one of which could be killed. Even the air was thick with clouds of mosquitoes and gnats and flies.

Men and women walked about looking like tormented ghosts. They had no desire to live on but they had to live on for they could not die.

The blacksmith came at last to a realization of all the misery which his foolish wish was bringing upon the world.

"I see now," he said, "that God Almighty did well when He sent Death to the world. She has her work to do and I am wrong to hold her prisoner."

So he released Death from the stool and made no outcry when she put her bony fingers to his throat.

A GULLIBLE WORLD

THE STORY OF A MAN WHO DIDN'T BEAT HIS WIFE

A GULLIBLE WORLD

There was once a poor farm laborer, so poor that all he owned in the world was a hen. He told his wife to take this hen to market and sell it.

"How much shall I ask for it?" the woman wanted to know.

"Ask as much as they'll pay, of course," the laborer said.

So the woman took the hen by the feet and set out. Near the village she met a farmer.

"Good day," the farmer said. "Where are you going with that hen?"

"I'm going to market to sell it for as much as they'll pay me."

The farmer weighed the hen in his hand, pursed his lips, thought a moment, and said:

"You better sell it to me. I'll pay you three pennies for it."

"Three pennies? Are you sure that's as much as you'll pay?"

"Yes," the farmer said, "three pennies is as much as I'll pay."

So the laborer's wife sold the hen for three pennies. She went on to the village and there she bought a pretty little paper bag with one of the pennies and a piece of ribbon with another penny. She put the third penny into the bag, tied the bag with the ribbon, slipped the ribbon on a stick, put the stick over her shoulder, and then, feeling that she had done a very good day's work, she tramped home to her husband.

When the laborer heard how stupidly his wife had acted, he flew into a great rage and at first threatened to give her a sound beating.

"Was there ever such a foolish woman in the world?" he shouted angrily.

The poor woman, who by this time was snuffling and weeping, whimpered out:

"I don't see why you find so much fault with me! I'm sure I'm not the only gullible person in the world."

"Well," the laborer said, "I don't know. Perhaps there are people in the world as gullible as you. I tell you what I'll do: I'll go out and see if I can find them. If I do, I won't beat you."

So the laborer went out into the world to see if he could find any one as gullible as his wife. He traveled several days until he reached a countryside where he was unknown. Here he came to a fine castle at the window of which stood the lady of the castle looking out.

"Now then, my lady," the laborer said to himself, "we'll see how gullible you are."

He stood in the middle of the road, looked intently up at the sky, and then reaching out his arms as if he were trying to catch hold of something he began jumping up and down.

The lady of the castle watched him for a few moments and then dispatched one of her servants to ask him what he was doing. The servant hurried out and questioned him and this is the story the clever rascal made up:

"I'm trying to jump back into heaven. You see I live up there. I was wrestling up there with one of my comrades and he pitched me out and now I can't find the hole I fell through."

With his eyes popping out of his head, the servant hurried back to his mistress and repeated the laborer's story word for word.

The lady of the castle instantly sent for the laborer.

"You say you were in heaven?" she asked him.

"Yes, my lady, that's where I live and I'm going back at once."

"I have a dear son in heaven," the lady said. "Do you know him?"

"Of course I know him. The last time I saw him he was sitting far back in the chimney corner looking very sad and lonely."

"What! My son sitting far back in the chimney corner! Poor boy, he must be in need of money! My good man, will you take him something from me? I'd like to send him three hundred golden ducats and material for six fine shirts. And tell him not to be lonely as I'll come to him soon."

The laborer was delighted at the success of his yarn and he told the lady of the castle he'd gladly take with him the ducats and the fine shirting and he asked her to give them to him at once as he had to get back to heaven without delay.

The foolish woman wrapped up the shirting and counted out the money and the laborer hurried off.

Once out of sight of the castle he sat down by the roadside, stuffed the fine shirting into the legs of his trousers, and hid the ducats in his pockets. Then he stretched himself out to rest.

Meantime the lord of the castle got home and his wife at once told him the whole story and asked him if he didn't think she was fortunate to find a man who had consented to deliver to their son in heaven three hundred golden ducats and material for six fine shirts.

"What!" cried the husband. "Oh, what a gullible creature you are! Who ever heard of a man falling out of heaven! And if he were to fall, how could he climb back? The rogue has swindled you! Which way did he go?"

And without waiting to hear the poor lady's lamentations, the nobleman mounted his horse and galloped off in the direction the laborer had taken.

The laborer, who was still resting by the wayside, saw him coming and guessed who he was.

"Now, my lord, we'll try you," he said to himself.

He took off his broad-trimmed hat and put it on the ground beside him over a clod of earth.

"My good fellow," said the nobleman, "I am looking for a man with a bundle over his shoulder. Have you seen him pass this way?"

The laborer scratched his head and pretended to think.

"Yes, master," he said, "seems to me I did see a man with a bundle. He was running over there towards the woods and looking back all the time. He was a stranger to these parts. I remember now thinking to myself that he looked like one of those rogues that come from big cities to swindle honest country folk. Yes, master, that's the way he went, over there."

The laborer seemed such an honest simple fellow that at once the nobleman told him how the stranger had swindled his wife.

"Oh, the rogue!" the laborer cried. "To think of his swindling such a fine lady, too! Master, I wish I could help you. I'd take that horse of yours and go after him myself if I could. But I can't. I'm carrying a bird of great value to a gentleman who lives in the next town. I have the bird here under my hat and I daren't leave it."

The nobleman thought that as the laborer had seen the swindler he might be able to catch him. So he said:

"My good man, if I sat here and guarded your hat, would you be willing to mount my horse and follow that rascal?"

"Indeed I would, my lord, in a minute, for I can't bear to think of that rogue swindling such a fine lady as your wife. But I must beg you to be very careful of this bird. Don't put your hand under my hat or it might escape and then I should have to bear the loss of it."

The nobleman promised to be most careful of the bird and, dismounting, he handed his bridle to the laborer. That one mounted the nobleman's horse and galloped off.

It is needless to say the nobleman never saw either man or horse again. He waited and waited. At last when he could wait no longer he decided that he would have to take the bird home with him and let the laborer follow. So he lifted the edge of the hat very carefully, slipped in his hand, and clutched--the dry clod of earth!

Deeply chagrined he went home and had to bear the smiles of his people as they whispered among themselves that my lord as well as my lady had been swindled.

The laborer as he neared his cottage called out to his wife:

"It's all right, wife! You won't get that beating! I find that the world is full of people even more gullible than you!"

THE CANDLES OF LIFE

THE STORY OF A CHILD FOR WHOM DEATH STOOD GODMOTHER

THE CANDLES OF LIFE

There was once a poor man named Martin. He was so very poor that when his wife gave birth to a little boy, he could find no one who would stand godmother to the child.

"No," he told his wife, "there's no one that I've asked who is willing to hold this infant at the christening."

The poor mother wept and moaned and he tried to comfort her as best he could.

"Don't be discouraged, my dear wife. I promise you your son will be christened. I'll carry him to church myself and if I can find a godmother no other way I'll ask some woman I meet on the road."

So Martin bundled up the baby and carried him to church. On the way he met a woman whom he asked to be godmother. She took the baby in her arms at once and held it during the christening.

Now Martin supposed that she was just an ordinary woman like any other. But she wasn't. She was Death who walks about among men and takes them when their time has come.

After the christening she invited Martin home with her. She showed him through the various rooms of her house and down into great cellars. They went a long way underground through cellar after cellar to a place where thousands upon thousands of candles were burning. There were tall candles just lighted, candles burned halfway down, and little short ones nearly burned out. At one end of the place there was a heap of fresh candles that had not yet been lighted.

"These," Death said, "are the candles of all the people in the world. When a man's candle burns out, then it is time for me to go for him."

"Godmother," Martin said, pointing to a candle that was burning low, "whose may that be?"

"That, my friend, is your candle."

Martin was frightened and begged Death to lengthen his candle, but Death shook her head.

"No, my friend," she said, "I can't do that."

She reached for a fresh candle to light it for the baby just christened. While her back was turned, Martin snatched a tall candle, lighted it, and then pressed it on the stub of his own candle that was nearly burned out.

When Death turned and saw what he had done, she frowned reprovingly.

"That, my friend, was an unworthy trick. However, it has lengthened your life, for what is done is done and can't be undone."

Then she handed Martin some golden ducats as a christening present, took the baby again in her arms, and said:

"Now let us go home and give this young man back to his mother."

At the cottage she made the sick woman comfortable and talked to her about her son. Martin went out to the tavern and bought a jug of ale. Then he spread the table with food, the best he could afford, and Godmother Death sat down on the bench and they ate and drank together.

"Martin," she said to him at last, "you are very poor and I must do something for you. I tell you what I'll do: I'll make you into a great physician. I will spread sickness in the world and you will cure it. Your fame will go abroad and people will send for you and pay you handsomely. This is how we'll work together: when you hear of a person taken sick, go to his house and offer to cure him. I will be there invisible to every one but you. If I stand at the foot of the sick man's bed, you will know that he's going to get well. So then you can prescribe salves and medicines, and when he recovers he'll think you have cured him. But if I stand at the head of the sick man's bed, you will know that he has to die. In that case you must look grave and say that he is beyond help. When he dies people will say how wise you were to know beforehand."

She gave him further instructions and then, after bidding her godchild and its mother a kind farewell, she left.

Time went by and Martin's fame as a great physician spread far and wide. Wherever Godmother Death caused sickness, there Martin went and made marvelous cures. Dukes and princes heard of him and sent for him. When he rubbed them with salve or gave them a dose or two of bitter medicine and they recovered, they felt so grateful to him that they gave him anything he asked and often more than he asked.

He always remembered Death's warning not to treat a sick man if she stood at his head. Once, however, he disobeyed. He was called to prescribe to a duke of enormous wealth. When he entered the room he saw Death standing at the duke's head.

"Can you cure him?" they asked Martin.

"I can't promise," Martin said, "but I'll do what I can."

He had the servants turn the duke's bed around until the foot instead of the head was in front of Death. The duke recovered and rewarded Martin richly.

But Death when next she met Martin reproved him:

"My friend, don't try that trick on me again. Besides, it is not a real cure. The duke's time has come; he must go to his appointed place; and it is my duty to conduct him thither. You think you have saved him from me and he thinks so, but you are both mistaken. All you have given him is a moment's respite."

The years went by and Martin grew old. His hair whitened and his muscles stiffened. The infirmities of age came upon him and life was no longer a joy.

"Dear Godmother Death," he cried, "I am old and tired! Take me!"

But Death shook her head.

"No, my friend, I can't take you yet. You lengthened the candle of your life and now you must wait until it burns down."

At last one day as he was riding home after visiting a sick man, Death climbed into the carriage with him. She talked with him of old times and they laughed together. Then jokingly she brushed his chin with a green branch. Instantly Martin's eyes grew heavy. His head slipped lower and lower and soon he fell asleep on Death's lap.

"He's dead," the people said, when they looked in the carriage. "The famous Doctor Martin is dead! Oh, what a great and good man he was! Alas, who can take his place!"

He was buried with great pomp and all the world mourned his death.

His son, whose name was Josef, was a stupid fellow. One day as he was going to church, his godmother met him.

"Well, Josef," she asked, "how are you getting on?"

"Oh, pretty well, thank you. I can live along for a while on what my father saved. When that's gone, I don't know what I'll do."

"Tut! Tut!" said Death. "That's no way to talk. If you only knew it, I'm your godmother who held you at your christening. I helped your father to wealth and fame and now I'll help you. I tell you what I'll do: I'll apprentice you to a successful doctor and I'll see to it that soon you'll know more than he knows."

Death rubbed some salve over Josef's ears and led him to a doctor.

"I wish you to take this youth as an apprentice," she said. "He's a likely lad and will do you credit. Teach him all you know."

The doctor accepted Josef as an apprentice and when he went out into the fields to gather herbs and simples, he took the youth with him.

Now the magic salve with which Godmother Death had anointed Josef enabled him to hear and understand the whisperings of the herbs. Each one as he picked it, whispered to him its secret properties.

"I cure a fever," one whispered.

"And I a rash."

"And I a boil."

The doctor was amazed at his apprentice's knowledge of herbs.

"You know them better than I do," he said. "You never make a mistake. It is I should be apprentice, not you. Let us go into partnership. I will work under you and together we will make wonderful cures."

And so, owing to his godmother's gift, Josef became a great physician of whom it was said that there was no illness for which he could not find a remedial herb.

He lived long and happily until at last his candle burned down and Death, his kind godmother, took him.

THE DEVIL'S GIFTS

THE STORY OF A MAN WHOM THE DEVIL BEFRIENDED

THE DEVIL'S GIFTS

There were once two men, a shoemaker and a farmer, who had been close friends in youth. The shoemaker married and had many children to whom the farmer stood godfather. For this reason the two men called each other "Godfather." When they met it was "Godfather, this," and "Godfather, that." The shoemaker was an industrious little man and yet with so many mouths to fill he remained poor. The farmer on the other hand soon grew rich for he had no children to eat into his savings.

Years went by and money and possessions began to change the farmer's disposition. The more he accumulated, the more he wanted, until people were whispering behind his back that he was miserly and avaricious. His wife was like him. She, too, saved and skimped although, as I have told you, they had neither chick nor child to provide for.

The richer the farmer grew, the less he cared for his poor friend and his poor friend's children. Now when they called him "Godfather," he frowned impatiently, and whenever he saw any of them he pretended to be very busy for fear they should ask him a favor.

One day when he had slaughtered beef, the poor shoemaker came to him and said:

"My dear Godfather, you have just made a killing. Won't you please give me a little piece of meat? My wife and children are hungry."

"No!" roared the rich man. "Why should I feed your family? You ought to save as I do and then you wouldn't have to ask favors of any one."

Humiliated by the refusal, the shoemaker went home and told his wife what his friend had said.

"Go back to him," his wife insisted, "and tell him again that his godchildren are hungry. I don't think he understood you."

So the poor little shoemaker returned to the rich man. He cleared his throat apologetically and stammered:

"Dear Godfather, you--you don't want your poor godchildren to go hungry, do you? Give me just one small piece of meat--that's all I ask."

In a rage, the rich man picked up a hunk of meat and threw it at his poor friend.

"There!" he shouted. "And now go to hell, you and the meat with you, and tell the Devil I sent you."

The shoemaker picked up the piece of meat. It was all fat and gristle.

"No use carrying this home," he thought to himself. "I think I better do as Godfather says. Yes, I'll go to hell and give it to the Devil."

So he tramped down to hell and presented himself at the gate. The little devil who stood on guard greeted him merrily.

"Hello, shoemaker! What do you want here?"

"I have a present for the Devil, a piece of meat that Godfather gave me."

The little devil of a guard nodded his head understandingly.

"I see, I see. Very well then, come with me and I'll lead you to Prince Lucifer. But I'll give you a bit of advice first. When the Prince asks you what present you'd like in return, tell him you'd like the tablecloth off his own table."

The little devil of a guard then conducted the shoemaker into Prince Lucifer's presence and the Prince received him with every mark of consideration. The shoemaker told him what Godfather had said and presented him the hunk of meat. Lucifer received it most graciously. Then he said:

"Now, my dear shoemaker, let me make you a little present in return. Do you see anything here that you'd like?"

"If it pleases your Highness," the shoemaker said, "give me that cloth that is spread over your table."

Lucifer at once handed him the cloth and dismissed him with many wishes for a pleasant journey back to earth.

As the shoemaker was leaving the friendly little devil of a guard said to him:

"I just want to tell you that's no ordinary tablecloth that the Prince has given you. No, indeed! Whenever you're hungry, all you've got to do is spread out that cloth and say: 'Meat and drink for one!' or, for as many as you want, and instantly you will have what you ask."

Overjoyed at his good fortune the little shoemaker hurried back to earth. As night came on he stopped at a tavern. He thought this was a good place to try the tablecloth. So he took it out of his bag, spread it over the table, and said:

"Meat and drink for one!"

Instantly a fine supper appeared and the shoemaker ate and drank his fill.

Now the landlord of the tavern was an evil, covetous fellow and when he saw how the tablecloth worked his fingers itched to own it. He called his wife aside and told her in guarded whispers what he had seen.

Her eyes, too, filled with greed.

"Husband," she whispered back, "we've got to get possession of that tablecloth! Think what a help it would be to us in our business! I tell you what we'll do: tonight when the shoemaker is asleep we'll steal his tablecloth and slip in one of our own in its place. He's a simple fellow and will never know the difference."

So that night while the shoemaker was asleep, they tip-toed in, stole the magic tablecloth out of the bag, and substituted one of their own.

The next morning when the shoemaker awoke and spread out the cloth which he found in his bag and said: "Meat and drink for one!" of course nothing happened.

"That's strange," he thought to himself. "I'll have to take this back to the Devil and ask him to give me something else."

So instead of going home he went back to hell and knocked at the gate.

"Hello, shoemaker!" the little devil of a guard said. "What do you want now?"

"Well, you see it's this way," the shoemaker explained: "this tablecloth of the Devil's worked all right last night but it doesn't work this morning."

The little devil grinned.

"Oh, I see. And you want Prince Lucifer to take it back and give you something else, eh? Well, I'm sure he will. If you want my advice, I should say to ask him for that red rooster that sits in the chimney corner."

The Prince received the shoemaker as kindly as before and was perfectly willing to exchange the tablecloth for the red rooster.

When the shoemaker got back to the gate, the little devil of a guard said: