Household Tales by Jacob Grimm (classic books for 12 year olds .txt) 📕

so well.” So the smith made a great fire, and thrust the old woman into it, and she writhed about this way and that, and uttered terrible cries of murder.

“Sit still; why art thou screaming and jumping about so?” cried he, and as he spoke he blew the bellows again until all her rags were burnt. The old woman cried without ceasing, and the smith thought to himself, “I have not quite the right art,” and took her out and threw her into the cooling-tub. Then she screamed so loudly that the smith’s wife upstairs and her daughter-in-law heard, and they both ran downstairs, and saw the old woman lying in a heap in the quenching-tub, howling and screaming, with her face wrinkled and shrivelled and all out of shape. Thereupon the two, who were both with child, were so terrified that that very night two boys were born who were not made like men but apes, and they ran into the woods, and from them sprang the race of apes.

The Lord’s Animals and the Devil’s

The Lord God had created all animals, and had chosen out the wolf to be his dog, but he had forgotten the goat. Then the Devil made ready and began to create also, and created goats with fine long tails. Now when they went to pasture, they generally remained caught in the hedges by their tails, then the Devil had to go there and disentangle them, with a great deal of trouble. This enraged him at last, and he went and bit off the tail of every goat, as may be seen to this day by the stump. Then he let them go to pasture alone, but it came to pass that the Lord God perceived how at one time they gnawed away at a fruitful tree, at another injured the noble vines, or destroyed other tender plants. This distressed him, so that in his goodness and mercy he summoned his wolves, who soon tore in pieces the goats that went there. When the devil observed this, he went before the Lord and said, “Thy creatures have destroyed mine.”

The Lord answered, “Why didst thou create things to do harm?”

The Devil said, “I was compelled to do it: inasmuch as my thoughts run on evil, what I create can have no other nature, and thou must pay me heavy damages.”

“I will pay thee as soon as the oak leaves fall; come then, thy money will then be ready counted out.” When the oak-leaves had fallen, the Devil came and demanded what was due to him. But the Lord said, “In the church of Constantinople stands a tall oak-tree which still has all its leaves.” With raging and curses, the Devil departed, and went to seek the oak, wandered in the wilderness for six months before he found it, and when he returned, all the oaks had in the meantime covered themselves again with green leaves. Then he had to forfeit his indemnity, and in his rage he put out the eyes of all the remaining goats, and put his own in instead.

This is why all goats have devil’s eyes, and their tails bitten off, and why he likes to assume their shape.

The Beam

There was once an enchanter who was standing in the midst of a great crowd of people performing his wonders. He had a cock brought in, which lifted a heavy beam and carried it as if it were as light as a feather. But a girl was present who had just found a bit of four-leaved clover, and had thus become so wise that no deception could stand out against her, and she saw that the beam was nothing but a straw. So she cried, “You people, do you not see that it is a straw that the cock is carrying, and no beam?” Immediately the enchantment vanished, and the people saw what it was, and drove the magician away in shame and disgrace.

He, however, full of inward anger, said, “I will soon revenge myself.”

After some time the girl’s wedding-day came, and she was decked out, and went in a great procession over the fields to the place where the church was. All at once she came to a stream which was very much swollen, and there was no bridge and no plank to cross it. Then the bride nimbly took her clothes up, and wanted to wade through it. And just as she was thus standing in the water, a man, and it was the enchanter, cried mockingly close beside her, “Aha! Where are thine eyes that thou takest that for water?” Then her eyes were opened, and she saw that she was standing with her clothes lifted up in the middle of a field that was blue with the flowers of blue flax. Then all the people saw it likewise, and chased her away with ridicule and laughter.

The Old Beggar-Woman

There was once an old woman, but thou hast surely seen an old woman go a-begging before now? This woman begged likewise, and when she got anything she said, “May God reward you.” The beggar-woman came to a door, and there by the fire a friendly rogue of a boy was standing warming himself.

The boy said kindly to the poor old woman as she was standing shivering thus by the door, “Come, old mother, and warm yourself.” She came in, but stood too near the fire, so that her old rags began to burn, and she was not aware of it. The boy stood and saw that, but he ought to have put the flames out. Is it not true that he ought to have put them out? And if he had not any water, then should he have wept all the water in his body out of his eyes, and that would have supplied two pretty streams with which to extinguish them.

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