A man had three sons, and the youngest was called Dummling. While his brothers could split logs straight, count sacks of grain, and speak quickly whenever their father asked a question, Dummling was slower with words. When he stood thinking, the others often went on without him. One morning, the father looked toward the forest and said, “We need wood before the weather turns.” At once, the eldest son took up an axe.
His mother packed him a fine cake and a bottle of wine. He strode into the forest and soon came to a place where thick moss lay around the roots, and there sat a small old man in a gray coat. “Good day,” said the little man. “Will you share a bit of your cake and a drink from your bottle?” The eldest son drew the food closer under his arm. “I have only enough for myself,” he said, and went on. He swung his axe at a tree, but the blade glanced aside, and before long he had to wrap his hand in cloth and go home with his work unfinished.
The next day, the second brother asked to try. He too was given good cake and wine, and he found the same little man beside the same root. Yet he too kept his meal for himself. When he lifted his axe, the wood turned the blade aside. He came home with his arm hanging stiffly, and there was still no wood stacked by the door.
6 chapters
