It is a great mistake to think that fairies, witches, magicians, and
such people lived only in Eastern countries and in such times as those
of the Caliph Haroun Al-Raschid. Fairies and their like belong to every
country and every age, and no doubt we should see plenty of them now--if
we only knew how.
In a large town in Germany there lived, some couple of hundred years
ago, a cobbler and his wife. They were poor and hard-working. The man
sat all day in a little stall at the street corner and mended any shoes
that were brought him. His wife sold the fruit and vegetables they grew
in their garden in the Market Place, and as she was always neat and
clean and her goods were temptingly spread out she had plenty of
customers.
The couple had one boy called Jem. A handsome, pleasant-faced boy of
twelve, and tall for his age. He used to sit by his mother in the market
and would carry home what people bought from her, for which they often
gave him a pretty flower, or a slice of cake, or even some small coin.
One day Jem and his mother sat as usual in the Market Place with plenty
of nice herbs and vegetables spread out on the board, and in some
smaller baskets early pears, apples, and apricots. Jem cried his wares
at the top of his voice:
‘This way, gentlemen! See these lovely cabbages and these fresh herbs!
Early apples, ladies; early pears and apricots, and all cheap. Come,
buy, buy!’
As he cried an old woman came across the Market Place. She looked very
torn and ragged, and had a small sharp face, all wrinkled, with red
eyes, and a thin hooked nose which nearly met her chin. She leant on
a tall stick and limped and shuffled and stumbled along as if she were
going to fall on her nose at any moment.
In this fashion she came along till she got to the stall where Jem and
his mother were, and there she stopped.
‘Are you Hannah the herb seller?’ she asked in a croaky voice as her
head shook to and fro.
‘Yes, I am,’ was the answer. ‘Can I serve you?’
‘We’ll see; we’ll see! Let me look at those herbs. I wonder if you’ve
got what I want,’ said the old woman as she thrust a pair of hideous
brown hands into the herb basket, and began turning over all the neatly
packed herbs with her skinny fingers, often holding them up to her nose
and sniffing at them.
The cobbler’s wife felt much disgusted at seeing her wares treated like
this, but she dared not speak. When the old hag had turned over the
whole basket she muttered, ‘Bad stuff, bad stuff; much better fifty
years ago--all bad.’