THERE was once upon a time a poor fellow who was troubled with a wife,
with whom he lived on the worst terms imaginable. She paid not the
slightest attention to what he told her, but was always contrary. If he
told her to get up early, she was sure to lie in bed later than ever, or
perhaps even for three days at a time. If he asked her to make some
cakes, she would say—
“Cakes, you villain! What do you want with cakes? Do you think you
deserve them?”
“All right,” the man would say; “don’t make them, then.”
Then off would go his wife, make three times as many cakes as could be
eaten, and plumping them down before her husband—
“Eat,” she would cry—“eat, you gluttonous fellow! They must be finished
up.”
The man spent most of his time disputing with her; but his wife used to
wear him out and get the better in the end.
One day, wearied by his wife’s jangle, and utterly dispirited, he went
off to the wood to look for some berries. As he went on he came at last
to a wild currant-bush, and looking at it he saw beside it a deep hole.
He looked down, but could discover no bottom to it.
“Dear me!” said he, “I wish my wife were down there! What is the use of
living as I do in continual misery? I will see if I can get her down the
hole.”
Off he went home. There he found his wife.
“Wife,” said he, “I want you to keep out of the wood. Don’t go looking
about there for berries.”
“You want me!” said she. “Indeed, I shall go where I please.”
“Well,” said the man, “I have found a currant-bush there, and I want to
keep the currants. Don’t eat them.”
“Won’t I?” said his wife. “I will eat them all. You shall not have a
single one.”
The man went out, and his wife came after him to find the currant-bush.
On they went till the man came to the place where the bush was, when his
wife, hurrying past him, got to it first.
“Now don’t you come near,” said she. “I warn you to stand off.”
On she went; all at once her husband heard a crack and a crash. He
looked about, but could not see his wife. Sure enough, she had fallen
down the hole.
The man returned home rejoicing at the success of his plan. For some
days he lived in peace. Then he became curious to know where his wife
had really gone to. So he got a very long cord, and set off with it to
the forest. He came to the currant-bush and found the hole, and, letting
down one end of his cord, tried to touch the bottom. The cord went down
and down—the hole seemed to have no bottom at all. Then the man drew the
cord up. As he pulled out the last piece of it, he fell back astounded,
for there, clinging to it, was a little devil. After the first surprise,
the man was about to lay his hands on the imp in order to throw him down
the hole again; but it addressed him in a pitiful tone, saying—
“My good man, I beseech you do not throw me down the hole again. No
tongue can tell what I have suffered there. A few days since there came
a woman amongst us, and she has led us such a time of it that our lives
are not worth living. Let me stay aboveground, and I will reward you for
it.”
The peasant, when he heard the imp’s tale, felt sorry for him, and had
not the heart to send him back again. So he let him go where he would.
No sooner was the imp at liberty than he began to torment the wives and
daughters of the wealthy folk, entering into them, and making them so
whimsical and sick that they seemed beside themselves. While they were
in this condition the peasant would present himself as a physician and
undertake to cure the afflicted persons. As soon as he was called in,
before he had almost stepped across the threshold of the house in which
the sick person lay, the imp would scuttle away as fast as he could, the
patient recovered, and the whole place rang with the marvellous cure
effected by the doctor. So they went on for some time. The peasant was
now rich. Money and all good things were heaped upon him by the
relations of those whom he restored to health.