The Wonder Clock; or, four & twenty marvellous Tales: being one for each hour of the dayPyle, Howard
Science
The Wonder Clock; or, four & twenty marvellous Tales: being one for each hour of the day
Pyle, Howard
Children's poetry; Fairy tales
“Ugh!” says the good wife, and then fell down and lay quite still, just
for all the world as though she were dead.
When the three cronies saw this, they gaped like fish out of water. Just
look now! Master Jacob had gone and killed his good wife, and all for
nothing at all. Dear, dear! what a hasty temper the man had. Now he had
gotten himself into a pretty scrape, and would have to go before the
judge and settle the business with him.
“Tut! tut!” says Master Jacob, “the broth is not all in the ashes yet.
Perhaps I am a bit hasty, but we will soon mend this stocking.”
So he went to the closet in the corner of the room, and brought out a
little tin horn. He blew a turn or two over his wife, whereat she
sneezed, and then sat up as good and as sound as ever.
As for the priest and the provost and the mayor, they thought that they
had never seen anything so wonderful in all of their lives before. They
must and would have that tin horn if it was to be had; now, how much
would Master Jacob take for it, money down?
Oh, Master Jacob did not want to part with his horn; all the same, if he
had to sell it, he would just as lief that they should buy it as
anybody. So they bargained and bargained, and the end of the matter was
that they paid down another fifty dollars and marched off with the
little tin horn, blowing away at it for dear life.
By and by they came home, and there stood the goat, nibbling at the
grass in front of the house and thinking of no harm at all. “So!” says
the provost, “was it you that would do nothing for us without our
saying, ‘By the great horn spoon?’ Take that then!” And he fetched the
goat a thwack with his heavy walking-staff so that it fell down, and lay
with no more motion than a stone. “There,” says he, “that business is
done; and now lend me the horn a minute, brother, till I fetch him back
again.”
Well, he blew and he blew, and he blew and he blew, till he was as red
in the face as a cherry, but the goat moved never so much as a single
hair. Then the priest took a turn at the horn, but he had no better luck
than the provost. Last of all the mayor had a try at it; but he might as
well have blown the horn over a lump of dough for all the answer he had
for his blowing.
Then it began to work into their heads that they had been befooled
again. Phew! what a passion they were in. I can only say that I am glad
that I was not in Master Jacob’s shoes. “We’ll put him in prison right
away,” said they, and off they went to do as they said.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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