Long, long ago, there lived in the province of Shinshin in Japan, a traveling monkey-man, who earned his living by taking round a monkey and showing off the animal’s tricks. One evening the man came home in a very bad temper and told his wife to send for the butcher the next morning. The wife…
THE ENCHANTED CAVE OF CESH CORRAN (IRISH FAIRY TALES) by James Stephens
CHAPTER I Fionn mac Uail was the most prudent chief of an army in the world, but he was not always prudent on his own account. Discipline sometimes irked him, and he would then take any opportunity that presented for an adventure; for he was not only a soldier, he was a poet also, that…
Koshchei the Deathless (Russian Fairy Tales) by W. R. S. RALSTON
In a certain country there once lived a king, and he had three sons, all of them grown up. All of a sudden Koshchei the Deathless carried off their mother. Then the eldest son craved his father’s blessing, that he might go and look for his mother. His father gave him his blessing, and he…
The Old Woman and the Physician (Aesop’s fables) by Aesop
AN OLD WOMAN having lost the use of her eyes, called in a Physician to heal them, and made this bargain with him in the presence of witnesses: that if he should cure her blindness, he should receive from her a sum of money; but if her infirmity remained, she should give him nothing. This…
FARMER BENNETT (REYNARD THE FOX, 1920) by JOHN MASEFIELD
Old Farmer Bennett followed these Upon his big-boned savage black Whose mule-teeth yellowed to bite back Whatever came within his reach. Old Bennett sat him like a leech. The grim old rider seemed to be As hard about the mouth as he. The beaters nudged each other’s ribs With “There he goes, his bloody Nibs….
THE MAGIC BUNDLE (The Indian Fairy Book, 1869) BY CORNELIUS MATHEWS
A poor man, called Iena, or the Wanderer, was in the habit of roaming about from place to place, forlorn, without relations, and almost helpless. He had often wished for a companion to share his solitude; but who would think of joining their fortunes with those of a poor wanderer, who had no shelter but…