Hungarian Folk Tales: The Foolish Man
Many many years ago, in a land far far away, there lived a man and his wife.
And I'm sorry to tell you that the man was not very clever.
In fact, the man was a fool.
And every day his wife had to tell him what to do and how to do it.
The man and his wife had a cow, one day his wife said:
Why don't you take the cow to market to sell it?
So the woman dressed her foolish husband in his best clothes and
he left for the market with the cow.
It was a very hot summer's day and a cloud of flies began to bother the cow
and make it run back and forth all over the place.
And as they were walking they met a man with a pig.
Kind sir, wouldn't you prefer to swap your troublesome cow for this pig?
Oh, but of course, I would! – he said and they made the exchange.
So now the foolish man had a pig, but the pig was harder to control than the cow had been
and the foolish man did not like it at all.
And as they were walking they met a man carrying a goose.
Kind sir, wouldn't you prefer to swap your troublesome pig for this goose?
Oh, but of course, I would!
Well the goose was no better, it made a terrible mess.
His feather stuck to the foolish man's clothes and he soon grew tired of carrying it.
As they walked, they passed a man by the side of the road
who were selling sharpening stones.
And the man said:
Kind sir, wouldn't you prefer to swap your troublesome goose for this sharpening stone?
Oh, but of course I would.
So the foolish man was now left with nothing more than a sharpening stone,
and he turned around and set off back home.
And as he walked he passed a pond with ducks swimming on it.
The foolish man thought he would like to take the duck home for his wife.
So he threw the sharpening stone, it sank into the pond
and all the ducks flew away.
Now what am I going to do?
No cow, no pig, no goose, no sharpening stone, no nothing.
So he took off all his clothes and waded into the pond to find the sharpening stone.
He searched the pond but could not find it anywhere.
And when he came out of the water,
he discovered that someone had stolen all of his clothes.
So the foolish man was forced to walk home naked.
The foolish man was very hungry when he got home, and so he put himself a slice of bread
and went down into the cellar to have a drink of wine.
So he put the bread on the step and looked around to see
that the dog had made off with it.
He then threw the wine top at the dog so all the wine spilled out of the barrel onto the floor.
A goose sat in the corner hatching eggs, and the goose said:
Gaggle, gaggle, gaggle!
You're going to tell my wife?
Gaggle, gaggle, gaggle!
Hiss, hiss!
And the goose went on making a terrible din.
So the foolish man grabbed the goose, wrung its neck and threw it out into the yard.
Then he poured a bag of flour into the wine and some feathers.
Rolled around in it and sat on the eggs.
His wife then came down into the cellar and said:
What on earth is going on here?
She looked around at the spilled wine, the flour and the feathers
and saw something sitting on the eggs.
What kind of monster is this?
You had better say something before I knock your head off!
It's me, dear wife, don't hurt me!
Where's the cow?
I swapped it for a pig.
So where's the pig?
I swapped it for a goose.
So where's the goose?
I swapped it for a sharpening stone.
So where's the sharpening stone?
I throw it into the pond.
I wanted to hit the duck so I could bring it home to you.
And where are your clothes?
Somebody stole them while I was looking for the sharpening stone.
Oh, you foolish man!
And she pulled him off the eggs and gave him the beating of his life.
The foolish man's wife never sent him anywhere again after that
and did everything herself because it was safer that way.
And that is the end of my story.