THERE was a certain village where lived many rich farmers and only one
poor one, whom they called the Little Farmer. He had not even a cow, and
still less had he money to buy one; and he and his wife greatly wished
for such a thing. One day he said to her,
"Listen, I have a good idea; it is that your godfather the joiner shall
make us a calf of wood and paint it brown, so as to look just like any
other; and then in time perhaps it will grow big and become a cow."
This notion pleased the wife, and godfather joiner set to work to saw
and plane, and soon turned out a calf complete, with its head down and
neck stretched out as if it were grazing.
The next morning, as the cows were driven to pasture, the Little Farmer
called out to the drover,
"Look here, I have got a little calf to go, but it is still young and
must be carried."
"All right!" said the drover, and tucked it under his arm, carried it
into the meadows, and stood it in the grass. So the calf stayed where it
was put, and seemed to be eating all the time, and the drover thought to
himself,
"It will soon be able to run alone, if it grazes at that rate!"
In the evening, when the herds had to be driven home, he said to the
calf, "If you can stand there eating like that, you can just walk off on
your own four legs; I am not going to lug you under my arm again!"
But the Little Farmer was standing by his house-door, and waiting for
his calf; and when he saw the cow-herd coming through the village
without it, he asked what it meant. The cow-herd answered, "It is still
out there eating away, and never attended to the call, and would not
come with the rest."
Then the Little Farmer said,
"I will tell you what, I must have my beast brought home."
And they went together through the fields in quest of it, but some one
had stolen it, and it was gone. And the drover said,
"Most likely it has run away."
But the Little Farmer said "Not it!" and brought the cow-herd before the
bailiff, who ordered him for his carelessness to give the Little Farmer
a cow for the missing calf.
So now the Little Farmer and his wife possessed their long-wished-for
cow; they rejoiced with all their hearts, but unfortunately they had no
fodder for it, and could give it nothing to eat, so that before long
they had to kill it. Its flesh they salted down, and the Little Farmer
went to the town to sell the skin and buy a new calf with what he got
for it. On the way he came to a mill, where a raven was sitting with
broken wings, and he took it up out of pity and wrapped it in the skin.
The weather was very stormy, and it blew and rained, so he turned into
the mill and asked for shelter. The miller's wife was alone in the
house, and she said to the Little Farmer,
"Well, come in and lay thee down in the straw," and she gave him a piece
of bread and cheese. So the Little Farmer ate, and then lay down with
his skin near him, and the miller's wife thought he was sleeping with
fatigue. After a while in came another man, and the miller's wife
received him very well, saying,
"My husband is out; we will make good cheer."
The Little Farmer listened to what they said, and when he heard good
cheer spoken of, he grew angry to think he had been put off with bread
and cheese. For the miller's wife presently brought out roast meat,
salad, cakes, and wine.
Now as the pair were sitting down to their feast, there came a knock at
the door.
"Oh dear," cried the woman, "it is my husband!" In a twinkling she
popped the roast meat into the oven, the wine under the pillow, the
salad in the bed, the cakes under the bed, and the man in the
linen-closet. Then she opened the door to her husband, saying,
"Thank goodness, you are here! what weather it is, as if the world were
coming to an end!"
When the miller saw the Little Farmer lying in the straw, he said,
"What fellow have you got there?"
"Oh!" said the wife, "the poor chap came in the midst of the wind and
rain and asked for shelter, and I gave him some bread and cheese and
spread some straw for him."
The husband answered, "Oh well, I have no objection, only get me
something to eat at once."