Fables and fairy tales
The villagers of Kugaon village in North India were divided over cast. There were a large segment of upper cast and a smaller section of lower caste living on the opposites sides of the village, having their own independent farms, wells, schools, etc. However, there was a common hill not too far from the village which was a gateway to another state.
An eight year old girl called Sita belonging to another village came to live with her uncle for a few years, because her father had gone to the city in search of better financial prospects. Her uncle was one of the members of the village panchayat and by default belonging to upper caste. She loved exploring the countryside. She was strictly warned from venturing into the other side by her uncle.
Sita, once went to play with a few neighboring kids on the hill, after some time, all the children left and Sita remained on the hill playing on a large tree. She was unaware that her friends had abandoned her and she waited for someone to catch her, while they played hide and seek. It was a long time and Sita grew worried, suddenly she heard a sound and saw a girl, whom she had never met before carrying a bundle of wild twigs, who rested below the very tree Sita was hiding.
The villagers of Kugaon village in North India were divided over cast. There were a large segment of upper cast and a smaller section of lower caste living on the opposites sides of the village, having their own independent farms, wells, schools, etc. However, there was a common hill not too far from the village which was a gateway to another state.
An eight year old girl called Sita belonging to another village came to live with her uncle for a few years, because her father had gone to the city in search of better financial prospects.
Her uncle was one of the members of the village panchayat and by default belonging to upper caste. She loved exploring the countryside. She was strictly warned from venturing into the other side by her uncle.
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This is the first story in my series "Oliver and Jumpy". Oliver is a black tomcat with a white top hat. His best friend is Jumpy, a kangaroo lady and later on in the series her son Joey. They live in a place called Sillandia, the silly country, and experience all sorts of adventures.
Do you like cats? Yes? I am glad, because I am a black cat with a white top hat. I have a few white spots on my fur too. Mum iswhite, you see! My name is Oliver. I am a very elegant tomcat with the shiniest coat in the world. I brush my fur every morningand always keep my nails trim! Of course, my hat is really refined too, which is another word for elegant.
Whenever you put on your new clothes, you can annouce to everybody: I am refined! And all those everybodies will think what an elegant person you are. Well, enough of all that talk about me, although I can never talk too much about myself. I really think I am a cool cat. I love myself! You think this is naughty? You are probably right. But I can't help it.
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There once was a Winter so fierce and freezing that even the air was turning to ice.
The snow was so deep that it buried barns, farms and entire forests and the wind wailed as fierce as fire and burned the skin. And worst of all, April was almost over and there seemed to be no end to this blast of icy misery.
Despite the pressure of tons of prayers for Spring to come and melt the snow, Winter persisted.
The animals in the woods were running out of food. Some had frozen to death when they had gone out and tried to find food for their young. The situation was so grim that there was nothing left to do but cry, but the tears froze as they left the eyes.
This was the way it was for a fairly long time; until the geese started to fly north again as they always do when it's springtime.
There was once a poor widow who lived in a lonely cottage. In front of the cottage was a garden wherein stood two rose-trees, one of which bore white and the other red roses. She had two children who were like the two rose-trees, and one was called Snow-white, and the other Rose- red.
They were as good and happy, as busy and cheerful as ever two children in the world were, only Snow-white was more quiet and gentle than Rose-red. Rose-red liked better to run about in the meadows and fields seeking flowers and catching butterflies; but Snow-white sat at home with her mother, and helped her with her housework, or read to her when there was nothing to do.
The two children were so fond of one another that they always held each other by the hand when they went out together, and when Snow- white said: "We will not leave each other," Rose-red answered: "Never so long as we live," and their mother would add: "What one has she must share with the other."
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Once upon a time there lived a queen who had been the mother of a great many children, and of them all only one daughter was left. But then she was worth at least a thousand.
Her mother, who, since the death of the King, her father, had nothing in the world she cared for so much as this little Princess, was so terribly afraid of losing her that she quite spoiled her, and never tried to correct any of her faults. The consequence was that this little person, who was as pretty as possible, and was one day to wear a crown, grew up so proud and so much in love with her own beauty that she despised everyone else in the world.
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There was once a king who had three sons, all remarkably handsome in their persons, and in their tempers brave and noble.
Some wicked courtiers made the king believe that the princes were impatient to wear the crown, and that they were contriving a plot to deprive him of his sceptre and his kingdom.
The king felt he was growing old; but as he found himself as capable of governing as he had ever been, he had no inclination to resign his power; and therefore, that he might pass the rest of his days peaceably, he determined to employ the princes in such a manner, as at once to give each of them the hope of succeeding to the crown, and fill up the time they might otherwise spend in so undutiful a manner.
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From the time that Tom was old enough to handle pick and shovel, he had worked in the tin mines. And very lucky he was, always finding rich lodes of tin, or stumbling on heaps of Cornish diamonds that some unknown hands had piled up to carry off.
One night Tom was working hard in an old mine - a very ancient mine indeed - when he heard sounds like those, of tiny shovels and picks.
"It is the Knockers!" said Tom to himself, and he listened quietly. Then he heard, as if only two or three yards away, little miners doing all sorts of underground work. Some were wheeling barrows, others were shovelling; and he could distinguish even the sounds of boring, swabbing the holes, and blasting.
The noises came nearer and nearer, and Tom heard distinctly many squeaky voices all talking at once, and strange cackling laughter. He grew quite savage listening to all this clatter, and to the squeaking and tee-hee-ing; and being a rash fellow, he struck the wall before him violently with his pick, and threw a handful of stones in the direction where the Knockers seemed to be working.
"Scat!" he shouted, "or I'll beat your brains out, I will, if you don't leave here!" The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when a shower of stones fell all around him, and on him, and frightened him nearly out of his senses.
Late one Hallowe'en an old woman was sitting up spinning. There came a soft knock at the door.
"Who's there?" asked she.
There was no answer, but another knock.
"Who's there?" she asked a second time.
Still no answer, but a third knock. At that the old woman got up in anger.
The Sultan Mahmood, who had a great deal of wit and courage, but whose face was anything but handsome, had heard himself called so often, by his courtiers, Star of the World, Source of Consolation, Delight of the People, Image of the Sun, that when, in their audacity, they went so far as to eulogize his beauty, he finished by believing that he was really handsome.
But one day, when he was walking in a great gallery, he looked by chance upon a mirror, and saw with astonishment that he was everything else.
"Either my courtiers tell me falsehoods," he said, "or this mirror is bad. So many eyes, which find me handsome, cannot however he easily deceived. The fault, beyond a doubt, must be in this mirror."
There was a cook whose name was Gretel. She wore shoes with red heels, and whenever she went out wearing them she would turn this way and that way, and she was very cheerful, thinking, "You are a beautiful girl!"
Once there were three children, three brothers, who played together in the sunshine about their father's door. Now the youngest of them all was not as large and strong as his brothers; and for that reason they often teased him, saying : "You are not as tall as we. You cannot run as fast. See! we can jump farther and swing higher than you."
Accurately relating how a marked advance in material and political prosperity accrued to Abdul Karim, and the part played by a monarch whose philosophy included the immediate advancement of a worthy subject.
Long, long ago, in old Japan, the Kingdom of the Sea was governed by a wonderful King. He was called Rin Jin, or the Dragon King of the Sea. His power was immense, for he was the ruler of all sea creatures both great and small, and in his keeping were the Jewels of the Ebb and Flow of the Tide. The Jewel of the Ebbing Tide when thrown into the ocean caused the sea to recede from the land, and the Jewel of the Flowing Tide made the waves to rise mountains high and to flow in upon the shore like a tidal wave.
Once upon a time there was a handsome hen who lived like a great lady in the poultry-yard of a rich farmer, surrounded by a numerous family which clucked about her, and none of which clamored more loudly or picked up the corn faster with his beak than a poor little deformed and crippled chicken.
The Caliph HAROON-AL-RASCHID, being one day at the chase, met an old man who was planting a walnut-tree.
There was a king of the olden time who heard a prophecy that the child of his only daughter would destroy him. This daughter was the loveliest princess in the world, and her name was Danae.
Once upon a time there lived in Hindustan two kings whose countries bordered upon each other; but, as they were rivals in wealth and power, and one was a Hindu rajah and the other a Mohammedan badshah, they were not good friends at all.
I'd like to be a teacher, and have a clever brain,
Marie awoke to the sound of a sudden shatter. It was near sunrise and she was still dazed from her night’s dream.