Once upon a time there was a fagot-maker and his wife, who had seven
children, all boys. The eldest was but ten years old, and the youngest
only seven.
They were very poor, and their seven children were a great source of
trouble to them because not one of them was able to earn his bread. What
gave them yet more uneasiness was that the youngest was very delicate,
and scarce ever spoke a word, which made people take for stupidity that
which was a sign of good sense. He was very little, and when born he was
no bigger than one's thumb; hence he was called Little Thumb.
The poor child was the drudge of the household, and was always in the
wrong. He was, however, the most bright and discreet of all the
brothers; and if he spoke little, he heard and thought the more.
There came a very bad year, and the famine was so great that these poor
people resolved to rid themselves of their children. One evening, when
they were in bed, and the fagot-maker was sitting with his wife at the
fire, he said to her, with his heart ready to burst with grief:--
"You see plainly that we no longer can give our children food, and I
cannot bear to see them die of hunger before my eyes; I am resolved to
lose them in the wood to-morrow, which may very easily be done, for,
while they amuse themselves in tying up fagots, we have only to run away
and leave them without their seeing us."
"Ah!" cried out his wife, "could you really take the children and lose
them?"
In vain did her husband represent to her their great poverty; she would
not consent to it. She was poor, but she was their mother.
However, having considered what a grief it would be to her to see them
die of hunger, she consented, and went weeping to bed.
Little Thumb heard all they had said; for, hearing that they were
talking business, he got up softly and slipped under his father's seat,
so as to hear without being seen. He went to bed again, but did not
sleep a wink all the rest of the night, thinking of what he had to do.
He got up early in the morning, and went to the brookside, where he
filled his pockets full of small white pebbles, and then returned home.
They all went out, but Little Thumb never told his brothers a word of
what he knew.
[Illustration: "SLIPPED UNDER HIS FATHER'S SEAT." p. 30.]
They went into a very thick forest, where they could not see one
another at ten paces apart. The fagot-maker began to cut wood, and the
children to gather up sticks to make fagots. Their father and mother,
seeing them busy at their work, got away from them unbeknown and then
all at once ran as fast as they could through a winding by-path.
When the children found they were alone, they began to cry with all
their might. Little Thumb let them cry on, knowing very well how to get
home again; for, as he came, he had dropped the little white pebbles he
had in his pockets all along the way. Then he said to them, "Do not be
afraid, my brothers,--father and mother have left us here, but I will
lead you home again; only follow me."
They followed, and he brought them home by the very same way they had
come into the forest. They dared not go in at first, but stood outside
the door to listen to what their father and mother were saying.
The very moment the fagot-maker and his wife reached home the lord of
the manor sent them ten crowns, which he had long owed them, and which
they never hoped to see. This gave them new life, for the poor people
were dying of hunger. The fagot-maker sent his wife to the butcher's at
once. As it was a long while since they had eaten, she bought thrice as
much meat as was needed for supper for two people. When they had eaten,
the woman said:--
"Alas! where are our poor children now? They would make a good feast of
what we have left here; it was you, William, who wished to lose them. I
told you we should repent of it. What are they now doing in the forest?
Alas! perhaps the wolves have already eaten them up; you are very
inhuman thus to have lost your children."
The fagot-maker grew at last quite out of patience, for she repeated
twenty times that he would repent of it, and that she was in the right.
He threatened to beat her if she did not hold her tongue. The
fagot-maker was, perhaps, more sorry than his wife, but she teased him
so he could not endure it. She wept bitterly, saying:--
"Alas! where are my children now, my poor children?"
She said this once so very loud that the children, who were at the door,
heard her and cried out all together:--
"Here we are! Here we are!"