“Ah,” said the father, sorrowfully, “I can give you no more,
and in these hard times I cannot earn a farthing more than will suffice
for our daily bread.” “Dear father,” answered the son, “don’t trouble
yourself about it, if it is God’s will, it will turn to my advantage I
shall soon accustom myself to it.” When the father wanted to go into
the forest to earn money by helping to pile and stack wood and also
chop it, the son said, “I will go with you and help you.” “Nay, my
son,” said the father, “that would be hard for you; you are not
accustomed to rough work, and will not be able to bear it, besides I
have only one axe and no money left wherewith to buy another.” “Just go
to the neighbour,” answered the son, “he will lend you his axe until I
have earned one for myself.” The father then borrowed an axe of the
neighbour, and next morning at break of day they went out into the
forest together. The son helped his father and was quite merry and
brisk about it. But when the sun was right over their heads, the father
said, “We will rest, and have our dinner, and then we shall work as
well again.” The son took his bread in his hands, and said, “Just you
rest, father, I am not tired; I will walk up and down a little in the
forest, and look for birds’ nests.” “Oh, you fool,” said the father,
“why should you want to run about there? Afterwards you will be tired,
and no longer able to raise your arm; stay here, and sit down beside
me.” The son, however, went into the forest, ate his bread, was very
merry and peered in among the green branches to see if he could
discover a bird’s nest anywhere. So he went up and down to see if he
could find a bird’s nest until at last he came to a great
dangerous-looking oak, which certainly was already many hundred years
old, and which five men could not have spanned. He stood still and
looked at it, and thought, “Many a bird must have built its nest in
that.” Then all at once it seemed to him that he heard a voice. He
listened and became aware that someone was crying in a very smothered
voice, “Let me out, let me out!” He looked around, but could discover
nothing; nevertheless, he fancied that the voice came out of the
ground. Then he cried, “Where art thou?” The voice answered, “I am down
here amongst the roots of the oak-tree. Let me out! Let me out!” The
scholar began to loosen the earth under the tree, and search among the
roots, until at last he found a glass bottle in a little hollow. He
lifted it up and held it against the light, and then saw a creature
shaped like a frog, springing up and down in it. “Let me out! Let me
out!” it cried anew, and the scholar thinking no evil, drew the cork
out of the bottle. Immediately a spirit ascended from it, and began to
grow, and grew so fast that in a very few moments he stood before the
scholar, a terrible fellow as big as half the tree by which he was
standing. “Knowest thou,” he cried in an awful voice, “what thy wages
are for having let me out?” “No,” replied the scholar fearlessly, “how
should I know that?” “Then I will tell thee,” cried the spirit; “I must
strangle thee for it.” “Thou shouldst have told me that sooner,” said
the scholar, “for I should then have left thee shut up, but my head
shall stand fast for all thou canst do; more persons than one must be
consulted about that.” “More persons here, more persons there,” said
the spirit. “Thou shalt have the wages thou hast earned. Dost thou
think that I was shut up there for such a long time as a favour. No, it
was a punishment for me. I am the mighty Mercurius. Whoso releases me,
him must I strangle.” “Softly,” answered the scholar, “not so fast. I
must first know that thou really wert shut up in that little bottle,
and that thou art the right spirit. If, indeed, thou canst get in
again, I will believe and then thou mayst do as thou wilt with me.” The
spirit said haughtily, “that is a very trifling feat,” drew himself
together, and made himself as small and slender as he had been at
first, so that he crept through the same opening, and right through the
neck of the bottle in again. Scarcely was he within than the scholar
thrust the cork he had drawn back into the bottle, and threw it among
the roots of the oak into its old place, and the spirit was betrayed. And now the scolar was about to return to his father, but the spirit
cried very piteously, “Ah, do let me out! ah, do let me out!” “No,”
answered the scholar, “not a second time! He who has once tried to take
my life shall not be set free by me, now that I have caught him again.”
“If thou wilt set me free,” said the spirit, “I will give thee so much
that thou wilt have plenty all the days of thy life.” “No,” answered
the boy, “thou wouldst cheat me as thou didst the first time.” “Thou
art playing away with thy own good luck,” said the spirit; “I will do
thee no harm but will reward thee richly.” The scholar thought, “I will
venture it, perhaps he will keep his word, and anyhow he shall not get
the better of me.” Then he took out the cork, and the spirit rose up
from the bottle as he had done before, stretched himself out and became
as big as a giant. “Now thou shalt have thy reward,” said he, and
handed the scholar a little bag just like a plaster, and said, “If thou
spreadest one end of this over a wound it will heal, and if thou
rubbest steel or iron with the other end it will be changed into
silver.” “I must just try that,” said the scholar, and went to a tree,
tore off the bark with his axe, and rubbed it with one end of the
plaster. It immediately closed together and was healed. “Now, it is all
right,” he said to the spirit, “and we can part.” The spirit thanked
him for his release, and the boy thanked the spirit for his present,
and went back to his father. “Where hast thou been racing about?” said the father; “why hast thou
forgotten thy work? I said at once that thou wouldst never get on with
anything.” “Be easy, father, I will make it up.” “Make it up indeed,”
said the father angrily, “there’s no art in that.” “Take care, father,
I will soon hew that tree there, so that it will split.” Then he took
his plaster, rubbed the axe with it, and dealt a mighty blow, but as
the iron had changed into silver, the edge turned; “Hollo, father, just
look what a bad axe you’ve given me, it has become quite crooked.” The
father was shocked and said, “Ah, what hast thou done? now I shall have
to pay for that, and have not the wherewithal, and that is all the good
I have got by thy work.” “Don’t get angry,” said the son, “I will soon
pay for the axe.” “Oh, thou blockhead,” cried the father, “wherewith
wilt thou pay for it? Thou hast nothing but what I give thee. These are
students’ tricks that are sticking in thy head, but thou hast no idea
of wood-cutting.” After a while the scholar said, “Father, I can really
work no more, we had better take a holiday.” “Eh, what!” answered he,
“Dost thou think I will sit with my hands lying in my lap like thee?