The day was spent in procuring and preparing provisions for the feast. The whole sum was expended on the best sorts of food, and the poor were made acquainted with the rich treat the woodcutter and his wife were cooking for their benefit. The food being cooked, allotments were made to each hungry applicant, and the couple reserved to themselves one good substantial meal, which was to be eaten only after the poor were all served and satisfied. It happened at the very moment they were seated to enjoy this their last meal, as they believed, a voice was heard, saying: "O friend! I have heard of your feast; I am late, yet it may be that you have still a little to spare, for I am hungry to my very heart. The blessing of God be on him who relieves my present sufferings from hunger!" The woodcutter and his wife agreed that it would be much better for them to go to Paradise with half a meal than to leave one fellow creature famishing on earth. So they shared their own portion with him who had none, and he went away from them rejoicing. "Now," said the happy pair, "we shall eat of our half-share with unmixed delight, and with thankful hearts. By to-morrow evening we shall be transferred to Paradise." They had scarcely raised the savoury food to their mouths when a bewailing voice arrested their attention, and stayed the hands already charged with food. A poor creature who had not tasted food for two days moaned his piteous tale, in accents which drew tears from the woodcutter and his wife; their eyes met and the sympathy was mutual: they were more willing to depart for Paradise without the promised benefit of one earthly enjoyment, than suffer the hungry man to die from want of that meal they had before them. The dish was promptly tendered to the unfortunate one, and the woodcutter and his wife consoled each other with reflecting that, as the time of their departure was now so near at hand, the temporary enjoyment of a meal was not worth one moment's consideration: "To-morrow we die; then of what consequence is it to us whether we depart with full or empty stomachs?"