“Oh, he wanted to go, and asked me if he might stay six weeks, he is
well taken care of there.” “Ah,” said the man, “I feel so unhappy lest
all should not be right. He ought to have said good-bye to me.” With
that he began to eat and said, “Marlinchen, why art thou crying? Thy
brother will certainly come back.” Then he said, “Ah, wife, how
delicious this food is, give me some more.” And the more he ate the
more he wanted to have, and he said, “Give me some more, you shall have
none of it. It seems to me as if it were all mine.” And he ate and ate
and threw all the bones under the table, until he had finished the
whole. But Marlinchen went away to her chest of drawers, and took her
best silk handkerchief out of the bottom drawer, and got all the bones
from beneath the table, and tied them up in her silk handkerchief, and
carried them outside the door, weeping tears of blood. Then the
juniper-tree began to stir itself, and the branches parted asunder, and
moved together again, just as if some one was rejoicing and clapping
his hands. At the same time a mist seemed to arise from the tree, and
in the centre of this mist it burned like a fire, and a beautiful bird
flew out of the fire singing magnificently, and he flew high up in the
air, and when he was gone, the juniper-tree was just as it had been
before, and the handkerchief with the bones was no longer there.
Marlinchen, however, was as gay and happy as if her brother were still
alive. And she went merrily into the house, and sat down to dinner and
ate.
But the bird flew away and lighted on a goldsmith’s house, and began to
sing,
“My mother she killed me,
My father he ate me,
My sister, little Marlinchen,
Gathered together all my bones,
Tied them in a silken handkerchief,
Laid them beneath the juniper-tree,
Kywitt, kywitt, what a beautiful bird am I!”
The goldsmith was sitting in his workshop making a gold chain, when he
heard the bird which was sitting singing on his roof, and very
beautiful the song seemed to him. He stood up, but as he crossed the
threshold he lost one of his slippers. But he went away right up the
middle of the street with one shoe on and one sock; he had his apron
on, and in one hand he had the gold chain and in the other the pincers,
and the sun was shining brightly on the street. Then he went right on
and stood still, and said to the bird, “Bird,” said he then, “how
beautifully thou canst sing! Sing me that piece again.” “No,” said the
bird, “I’ll not sing it twice for nothing! Give me the golden chain,
and then I will sing it again for thee.” “There,” said the goldsmith,
“there is the golden chain for thee, now sing me that song again.” Then
the bird came and took the golden chain in his right claw, and went and
sat in front of the goldsmith, and sang,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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