The Russian Grandmother's Wonder Tales. Louise Seymour Houghton
asked:
“What’s that you’re singing, cousin?”
“Nothing, nothing, dear Isegrim; they are only the fantasies of illness!” and he kept up his song:
The sick is carrying the well!
The sick is carrying the well!
So it went on till they came to a house where a wedding was being celebrated. When the wedding-guests heard Reinecke’s song they came out of the house and praised his singing. Thereupon he said that he could sing a better song than that if they would let him go into the house and up into the loft. To this they agreed.
When Isegrim, with all the trouble in the world, had carried Reinecke up into the loft, which was floored only with loose planks, then Reinecke opened all the places he had plugged up, and the water ran out of Isegrim’s eyes and ears and nose and poured down through the cracks upon the wedding-guests below. The guests ran nimbly up into the loft, but Reinecke still more nimbly made his escape through the window, while Isegrim was half-beaten to death by the enraged wedding-guests and his body thrown out into the road.
Then Reinecke came creeping back and taunted Isegrim. “This long time I have been wearing out shoe-leather to get the best of you, because you ate up my colt!”
And with these words away he went, leaving Isegrim to his fate.
“That served Isegrim right,” said the little boy. “He had no business to eat up Reinecke’s little colt.”
CHAPTER VII
THE SNOWY DAY
The grandmother sat in her room spinning, and singing a sad little song. Grandmother’s songs were always sad, for that is the way with the songs of the Russian peasant women, whose lives are very hard. But the little boy had never heard any other kind, and he was very fond of hearing his grandmother sing. He was lying on the stove, watching her spin, for it was still snowing, and he was tired of playing alone in the court. The snow was so deep now that none of the mothers would let their little children go into the street. The big children were all at work. Only little children play every day in Russia. The big children work, except on holidays.
“Do you know any more stories about Master Reinecke, little grandma?” the little boy finally asked.
“Perhaps I do,” replied the grandmother. “Let me see; did I ever tell you about
“THE BIRD, THE FOX, AND THE DOG?”
“No,” said the little boy. “Do tell that, please!”
So the grandmother began:
Once upon a time there was a Bird which built her nest in a hedge, laid her eggs there, and began to brood over them. Now a little Fox got wind of the matter, and he thought to himself, “Aha! there’s a fine breakfast for me!” So he left the Bird to brood over her eggs, waiting for the time when the young ones should hatch out.
When that time came he paid a visit to the Bird, which was singing gayly in the hedge, and said to her:
“Good-morning, dear cousin. Oh, how beautiful you are and how sweet is your song! But still more enticing are your young ones in the nest, and I mean to eat them up!”
The little Bird answered, smiling, “Ah, ah, you are not as clever as I thought you, if you are thinking of eating these tiny birds! They would not make you a mouthful. Just wait awhile till they are grown; then come, and you may eat both them and me.”
So the Bird appointed a day, and Reinecke went off in high glee, whistling merrily.
In the meantime the Bird went to a Dog and promised him a delicious meal—nothing other than Reinecke, in fact—telling him that he had nothing to do but hide in the bushes on the appointed day, and he could easily master the Master. The Dog smiled blissfully at the news, saying:
“This is what I call a stroke of luck! I’ll tell you what, little Bird, I’ll hide in the bushes, and when Reinecke comes, do you beg him to let you sing one last song. Then perch yourself on a twig and sing out loud and clear. That shall be the signal for me, and I will spring out of my ambush, and—snap!—all will be over with Master Reinecke.”
When the appointed day arrived Reinecke came gleefully along, trolling this lay:
“Fat little birds are right good cheer,
So here I am, my Gossip dear!
Well, Gossip, how goes it?”
“As well as possible,” answered the little Bird. “What I have promised I will perform; I have only one last boon to crave: let me sing my favorite song just once more!”
“Sing away, for all I care,” answered Reinecke; “only make it short.”
So the little Bird perched herself upon a twig and began her song. In a twinkling the Dog rushed out upon Reinecke, but the Master was on the alert and took to flight, with the Dog close upon his heels. At last Reinecke took refuge in a hole, while the Dog hid himself at the entrance, keeping up a sharp lookout.
Then Reinecke began to talk to himself, and said to his feet:
“Well, my fine feet, how have you got on?”
“Finely,” answered the feet; “we did our very best to outrun the Dog.”
“Good, good! You deserve all praise! And you, my good ears, how did you behave yourselves?”
“Very well; we listened most intently to know whether that dreadful Dog was close behind us.”
“Good! That was gallant! And how did you behave, my dear, sweet eyes?”
“Oh, we spied around in every direction to discover the first hole!”
“Bravo! That was good of you.” Then Reinecke looked at his long tail and asked:
“And how is it with you, my beautiful, long, bushy tail?”
And the tail answered, “Very badly; I am your steering rudder, and you rushed along so unmercifully, dragging me through bush and brier, that I am miserably scratched and torn. Really, I should not have been worse off if the Dog had caught me.”
“Aha!” cried Reinecke, in high displeasure, “so you are my open enemy, are you? All the others are faithful; you alone would willingly have betrayed me. Out with you, out, my declared foe! You shall no longer stay under the same roof with me!”
So Reinecke thrust his tail out of the hole. Snap!—the Dog had it between his teeth, dragged the Fox out of his retreat, tore him in pieces, and was thus rewarded for all his trouble. And the little birds were rid of their enemy.
“It was not nice of Reinecke to want to eat little birds,” said the little boy. “I think he deserved to be punished.”
“He got off without punishment another time,” observed the grandmother.
“How was that?” asked the little boy eagerly. “Won’t you tell me that story? Do! It is not supper-time.”
“No, it is not supper-time, and the story is a short one,” said the grandmother. “So I will tell you about
“THE FOX AND THE DOVE”