ONCE upon a time there lived, in a little straw hut, a poor
cheese-maker and his wife. They made good cheeses, and sold them
whenever they could; but they lived in a lonely spot, and few people
passed by that way, so that they made but a slender living. Now it
chanced one day that when the good wife came to count the cheeses she
found that there were six missing, although she had not sold any or
given them away.