The thought pleased the good shoemaker very much; and one evening, when all the things were ready, they laid them on the table instead of the work that they used to cut out, and then went and hid themselves to watch what the little elves would do. About midnight they came in and were going to sit down to their work as usual; but when they saw the clothes lying for them, they laughed and were greatly delighted. Then they dressed themselves in the twinkling of an eye, and danced and capered and sprang about as merry as could be, till at last they danced out at the door and over the green; and the shoemaker saw them no more; but everything went well with him from that time forward, as long as he lived. 176 In a note regarding "The Fisherman and His Wife," Taylor calls attention to the interesting fact that this tale became a great favorite after the battle of Waterloo "during the fervor of popular feeling on the downfall of the late Emperor of France." The catastrophe attendant upon Napoleon's ambitious efforts seemed to the popular mind to be paralleled by the penalty following the final wish of the wife "to be like unto God." But observe that Taylor, unlike more recent translators, felt under the necessity of softening "the boldness of the lady's ambition." The versions of the verse charm used in summoning the fish differ strikingly in the various translations. That of Taylor's first edition, used here, seems to fit the story better than any other, though tellers of the story may, properly enough, not agree. Taylor's revised version of 1837 reads: "O man of the sea! Hearken to me! My wife Ilsabill Will have her own will, And hath sent me to beg a boon of thee!" Mrs. Hunt's version runs: "Flounder, flounder in the sea, Come, I pray thee, come to me; For my wife, good Ilsabil, Wills not as I'd have her will." The moral of the story is plain for those who need it: Greed overreaches itself. Who grasps too much loses all. Don't ride a free horse to death. THE FISHERMAN AND HIS WIFE There was once a fisherman who lived with his wife in a ditch, close by the sea-side. The fisherman used to go out all day long a-fishing; and one day, as he sat on the shore with his rod, looking at the shining water and watching his line, all on a sudden his float was dragged away deep under the sea: and in drawing it up he pulled a great fish out of the water. The fish said to him, "Pray let me live: I am not a real fish; I am an enchanted prince. Put me in the water again, and let me go."