Roman Legends: A collection of the fables and folk-lore of Rome. Rachel Harriette Busk

      FAVOLE.

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      FILAGRANATA.

       Table of Contents

Once upon a time1 there was a poor woman who had a great fancy for eating parsley. To her it was the greatest luxury, and as she had no garden of her own, and no money to spend on anything not an absolute necessity of life, she had to go about poaching in other people’s gardens to satisfy her fancy.

      Near her cottage was the garden of a great palace, and in this garden grew plenty of fine parsley; but the garden was surrounded by a wall, and to get at it she had to carry a ladder with her to get up by, and, as soon as she had reached the top of the wall, to let it down on the other side to get down to the parsley-bed. There was such a quantity of parsley growing here that she thought it would never be missed, and this made her bold, so that she went over every day and took as much as ever she liked.

But the garden belonged to a witch,2 who lived in the palace, and, though she