The Junior Classics, Volume 5: Stories that never grow old
General
The Junior Classics, Volume 5: Stories that never grow old
Children's literature
meaning; for, lifting up the lappet of his coat, he put me gently
into it, and immediately ran along with me to his master, who was
a substantial farmer, and the same person I had first seen in the
field.
The farmer having (as I suppose by their talk) received such an
account of me as his servant could give him, took a piece of a
small straw, about the size of a walking-staff, and therewith
lifted up the lappets of my coat, which, it seems, he thought to
be some kind of covering that nature had given me. He blew my hair
aside to take a better view of my face. He called his hinds about
him, and asked them, as I afterward learned, whether they had ever
seen in the fields any little creature that resembled me? He then
placed me softly on the ground on all fours, but I immediately got
up, and walked slowly backward and forward, to let those people
see I had no intent to run away. They all sat down in a circle
about me, the better to observe my motions. I pulled off my hat,
and made a low bow toward the farmer. I fell on my knees, and
lifted up my hands and eyes, and spoke several words as loud as I
could; I took a purse of gold out of my pocket, and humbly
presented it to him. He received it on the palm of his hand, and
then applied it close to his eye to see what it was, and afterward
turned it several times with the point of a pin (which he took out
of his sleeve), but could make nothing of it. Whereupon I made a
sign that he should place his hand on the ground. I then took the
purse, and opening it, poured all the gold into his palm. There
were six Spanish pieces of four pistoles each, besides twenty or
thirty smaller coins. I saw him wet the tip of his little finger
upon his tongue, and take up one of my largest pieces, and then
another; but he seemed to be wholly ignorant what they were. He
made me a sign to put them again into my purse, and the purse
again into my pocket, which, after offering it to him several
times, I thought it best to do.
The farmer, by this time, was convinced I must be a rational
creature. He spoke often to me, but the sound of his voice pierced
my ears like that of a watermill, yet his words were articulate
enough.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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