"Sure, I'd need to be a grand cook with the grand company I have,"
Grannie answered politely, "and with the fine son I have in America to
be sending me a fortune in every letter! 'Tis a great thing to have a
good son, and do you be that same to your Mother, the both of you, for
'tis but one Mother that you'll get in all the world, and you've a right
to be choice of her."
"Sure, I'll never at all be a good son to my Mother," laughed Eileen.
"Well, then," said Grannie, "you can be a good daughter to her, and
that's not far behind. Whist now, till I tell you the story of the
Little Cakeen, and you'll see that 'tis a good thing entirely to behave
yourselves and grow up fine and respectable, like the lad in the tale.
It goes like this now:--"
"It was once long ago in old Ireland, there was living a fine, clean,
honest, poor widow woman, and she having two sons [Note 1], and she
fetched the both of them up fine and careful, but one of them turned out
bad entirely. And one day she says to him, says she:--
"`I've given you your living as long as ever I can, and it's you must go
out into the wide world and seek your fortune.'
"`Mother, I will,' says he.
"`And will you take a big cake with my curse, or a little cake with my
blessing?' says she.
"`A big cake, sure,' says he.
"So she baked a big cake and cursed him, and he went away laughing! By
and by, he came forninst a spring in the woods, and sat down to eat his
dinner off the cake, and a small, little bird sat on the edge of the
spring.
"`Give me a bit of your cake for my little ones in the nest,' said she;
and he caught up a stone and threw at her.
"`I've scarce enough for myself,' says he, and she being a fairy, put
her beak in the spring and turned it black as ink, and went away up in
the trees. And whiles he looked for a stone for to kill her, a fox went
away with his cake!
"So he went away from that place very mad, and next day he stopped, very
hungry, at a farmer's house, and hired out for to tend the cows.
"`Be wise,' says the farmer's wife, `for the next field is belonging to
a giant, and if the cows get into the clover, he will kill you dead as a
stone.'
"But the bad son laughed and went out to watch the cows; and before
noontime he went to sleep up in the tree, and the cows all went in the
clover. And out comes the giant and shook him down out of the tree and
killed him dead, and that was the end of the bad son.
"And the next year the poor widow woman says to the good son:--
"`You must go out into the wide world and seek your fortune, for I can
keep you no longer,' says the Mother.
"`Mother, I will,' says he.
"`And will you take a big cake with my curse or a little cake with my
blessing?'
"`A little cake,' says he.
"So she baked it for him and gave him her blessing, and he went away,
and she a-weeping after him fine and loud. And by and by he came to the
same spring in the woods where the bad son was before him, and the
small, little bird sat again on the side of it.
"`Give me a bit of your cakeen for my little ones in the nest,' says
she.
"`I will,' says the good son, and he broke her off a fine piece, and she
dipped her beak in the spring and turned it into sweet wine; and when he
bit into his cake, sure, it was turned into fine plum-cake entirely; and
he ate and drank and went on light-hearted. And next day he comes to
the farmer's house.
"`Will ye tend the cows for me?' says the farmer.
"`I will,' says the good son.
"`Be wise,' says the farmer's wife, `for the clover-field beyond is
belonging to a giant, and if you leave in the cows, he will kill you
dead.'
"`Never fear,' says the good son, `I don't sleep at my work.'
"And he goes out in the field and lugs a big stone up in the tree, and
then sends every cow far out in the clover-fields and goes back again to
the tree! And out comes the giant a-roaring, so you could hear the
roars of him a mile away, and when he finds the cow-boy, he goes under
the tree to shake him down, but the good little son slips out the big
stone, and it fell down and broke the giant's head entirely. So the
good son went running away to the giant's house, and it being full to
the eaves of gold and diamonds and splendid things.
"So you see what fine luck comes to folks that is good and honest! And
he went home and fetched his old Mother, and they lived rich and
contented, and died very old and respected."
"Do you suppose your son Michael killed any giants in America, the way
he got to be an Alderman?" asked Eileen, when Grannie had finished her
story.
"I don't rightly know that," Grannie answered. "Maybe it wasn't just
exactly giants, but you can see for yourself that he is rich and
respected, and he with a silk hat, and riding in a procession the same
as the Lord-Mayor himself!"
"Did you ever see a giant or a fairy or any of the good little people
themselves, Grannie Malone?" Larry asked.
"I've never exactly seen any of them with my own two eyes," she
answered, "but many is the time I've talked with people and they having
seen them. There was Mary O'Connor now,--dead long since, God rest her.
She told me this tale herself, and she sitting by this very hearth.
Wait now till I wet my mouth with a sup of tea in it, and I'll be
telling you the tale the very same way she told it herself."
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Note 1. Adapted from "Marygold House," in _Play-Days_, by Sarah Orne
Jewett.