Аугуст Якобсон - Two Estonian Fairy Tales

On a cold and bleak Christmas Eve there came a poor beggar to a wealthy farmstead and asked for some bread and lodging for the night. He was so tired of his long day’s journey that he could scarcely move.

“God bless you, my good lady, let me warm myself at your hearth, allow me to have a bite,” he begged the mistress of the house.

The rich farmer’s wife, however, was an incredibly close-fisted person who grudged the farm-hands and servants even the food they ate. No wonder she was loath to share her delicious black Christmas pudding with a wretch of a tramp. She flew into a rage and called him a good-for-nothing loafer and idler, and set her dogs at him, driving him out of her yard.

The beggar heaved a sigh and, submissively leaving the rich farm, made for the hut of the poor cotter on the same farm.

“God bless you, my good woman,” he said with a deep bow, “give me shelter for the night, let me warm myself at your hearth, allow me to have a bit of bread off your table... You see, I’m hungry and shivering with cold,“ he said to the cotter’s wife.

“What decent shelter, what bread can you hope for here? I and my children, we can hardly keep body and soul together, and we can never eat our fill. Perhaps you’d better go to the rich farmer, they’ve got enough of everything. You’ll find it more comfortable there, and they’ll feed you better.”

“God bless me, my good woman, if I didn’t try the farm already. Those people haven’t so much kindness as to give a poor wretch like me a flat stone to rest his head on,” the beggar replied sadly.

“Well, if this is the case, and if you don’t mind the way we live here, you might as well stay overnight. We’ll make room for you at the hearth, and you are welcome to sit at our table and share the little to be found in my larder.”

“Thank you, good woman, thank you,” the beggar cheered up.

“No need to thank me... You can’t very well go to any other place with the night falling... And as for bread, I’ve got a whole chunk to feed you and ourselves tonight, on Christmas Eve,” said the cotter’s wife.

When the beggar entered the house and saw the crowd of children he stared, shook his head and asked,

“Well, well... God bless you, good woman, why on earth are your children so terribly dirty and soiled?”

The woman sighed,

“No wonder they are dirty. The reason is easy to see: they have only one shirt each of them, and this shirt has to go a long way without washing. But if kids have soiled things on how can they keep themselves clean and washed inside them?”

“Then why don’t you get one more shirt for each child?” the beggar demanded to know.

“Where could I possibly get them from? I was left a widow several years ago, I don’t have a soul to support me,” the woman answered.

Now the beggar stopped silent. He ate a bit of bread, thanked the cotter’s widow again and lay down to rest in the corner. Lay down and, falling asleep at once, snored peacefully the whole night. In the morning he opened his haversack, fished out a chunk of barley bread and put it on the table saying,

“Well, good woman, I must be off now. Here, take this scone, feed your children, eat yourself and lay a morsel aside in your larder. And whatever job you tackle in the morning shall keep you busy until the evening.”

So saying the beggar took his leave.

The cotter’s widow was left puzzling over the last words of the beggar. Yet she had enough sense to follow his instructions—she fed her children, broke a morsel for herself and laid aside the rest. As she still had in her chest a piece of rough linen cloth in store she thought to herself,

“The beggar’s words were plain enough. Of course, that small piece isn’t enough to make a shirt for each child, but at least one shirt I can sew. One large enough to fit any of them whose shirt happens to be in the wash.”

Deliberating like this the poor woman went to the farm, asked the mistress of the house to lend her the ellstick and then made for the outbuilding where she kept her chest with the last piece of cloth she had to her soul. And—wonder of wonders—the outbuilding was full of rolls of cloth, piled up to the ceiling. Rolls upon rolls of woollen cloth and cotton cloth, print and linen, plain fabric and twilled. The cotter’s widow wasted no time. She began measuring the cloth at once; she measured and measured all through the day until evening came. She got ready with the last roll only when the upper edge of the sun’s disk sank below the horizon. And only then did she grasp the full meaning of the old man’s words.

When on the next day the cotter’s widow went to return the ellstick to its owner she couldn’t keep from telling the stingy woman how for a mere one night’s lodging and a bit of bread the beggar had thanked her with such a heap of good cloth she needed so badly. Enough to last her large household for years to come!

Hearing that miraculous story the farmer’s wife grew very sad; envy gnawed at her so that more than once she had to retire into the darkness of her larder where she shed tears of anger. As soon as the cotter’s widow was gone she invited the most faithful of her farm-hands to her back room and said to him,

“Now, Martin, my man, harness the best of our stallions, fill the best of our sleighs with the softest of cushions and blankets and search all the roads and paths, driving as fast as you can. And if you come upon a lame beggar with a matted beard, bring him to our place—you see, it’s our duty to help the poor and feeble!”

The farm-hand did as he was told: he harnessed the best of the stallions, piled up the softest of the cushions and blankets in the sleigh, searched all the roads and paths. Searched all the roads and paths and found the beggar at last. The poor wretch was squatting in the shelter of a juniper bush. He was resting his legs tired of walking knee-deep in the snow and trying to warm his numb fingers with his breath.