HOW SOME CHILDREN PLAYED AT SLAUGHTERING

In a city named Franecker, located in West Friesland, some young boys and girls between the ages of five and six happened to be playing with one another. They chose one boy to play a butcher, another boy was to be a cook, and a third boy was to be a pig. Then they selected one girl to be a cook and another girl to be her assistant. The assistant was to catch the blood of the pig in a little bowl so they could make sausages. As agreed, the butcher now fell upon the little boy playing the pig, threw him to the ground, and slit his throat open with a knife, while the assistant cook caught the blood in her little bowl.

CINDERELLA

Once upon a time there was a rich man who lived happily with his wife for a long time, and they had one little girl together. Then the wife became ill, and as she became deathly ill, she called her daughter and said, "Dear child, I must leave you, but when I am up in heaven, I shall look after you. Plant a little tree on my grave, and whenever you wish for something, shake it, and you'll have what you wish. And whenever you are otherwise in a predicament, then I'll send you help. Just stay good and pure."

A STORY ABOUT A BRAVE TAILOR

Once in the little city of Romandia a tailor was sitting and working, and he had an apple lying nearby. There were also many flies around the apple as was usual during the summer time. The tailor became angry, and he took a piece of cloth. Then he hit the flies on the apple and killed seven of them. When the simple-minded tailor saw this, he thought that he had taken care of the situation quite well, and he soon had a beautiful suit of armor made for himself and also had golden letters inscribed that read:

THE FISHERMAN AND HIS WIFE

Once upon a time there was a fisherman who lived with his wife in a piss pot near the sea. Every day the fisherman went out to fish, and all he did was fish and fish. One day he was sitting with his line and gazing into the clear water. And all he did was sit and sit. Suddenly his line sank deep down to the bottom, and when he pulled it up, he had a large flounder on the line, and the flounder said to him, "Listen here, fisherman, I beg of you, let me live. I'm not a real flounder but an enchanted prince. So what good would it do you to kill me? I certainly wouldn't taste very good. Put me back into the water, and let me go."

THE JOURNEY OF THE STRAW, THE COAL, AND THE BEAN

A straw, a coal, and a bean came together and wanted to take a great journey. They had already gone through many countries when they reached a brook without a bridge and couldn't cross. Finally, straw came up with a good idea. He laid himself across the brook, and the others were to cross over him, first coal, then bean. Coal took wide steps and slowly crossed the straw, while bean toddled after. When coal got to the middle of straw, however, straw began to burn and burned through and through.

THE WHITE SNAKE

Every day at noon a covered dish was placed on the king's table. Then, after everyone left, the king would eat alone from this dish, and nobody in the entire realm knew what kind of food was in it. One of the servants became curious and wanted to know what the dish contained. On one occasion, after the king had ordered him to take the dish away, he could no longer restrain himself. So he took the dish to his room and uncovered it. As he lifted the cover, he found a white snake lying inside, and once he laid his eyes on it, he felt a great desire to taste some of it. So he cut off a piece and began eating it. No sooner did his tongue touch the flesh of the snake than he understood the language of animals and heard what the birds on the window sill were saying to each other.

HERR FIX-IT-UP

Fix-It-Up had been a soldier for a long time. When the war came to an end, however, and there was nothing but the same old things to do every day, he resigned from the army and decided to become a servant for a great lord. There would be clothes trimmed with gold, a lot to do, and always new things happening. So he set out on his way and came to a foreign court, where he saw a lord taking a walk in the garden. Fix-It-Up did not hesitate. He moved briskly over to the lord and said, "Sir, I'm looking for employment with a great lord. If Your Majesty is himself such a person, it would give me great pleasure to serve you. There's nothing I don't know or can't do. I know just how to carry out orders, no matter how they are given."