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Little Master Misery
by
The merchant thought and thought, and puzzled his brain to find a way to get rid of him. And at last one night, when Misery had groaned himself to sleep, the merchant went out into the yard and took a big cart wheel and made two stout wedges of wood, just big enough to fit into the hub of the wheel. He drove one wedge firmly in at one end of the hub, and left the wheel in the yard with the other wedge, and a big hammer lying handy close to it.
In the morning Misery wakes as usual, and cries out to be taken to the tavern.
“We’ve sold everything I’ve got,” says the merchant.
“Well, what are you going to do to amuse me?” says Misery.
“Let’s play hide-and-seek in the yard,” says the merchant.
“Right,” says Misery; “but you’ll never find me, for I can make myself so small I can hide in a mouse-hole in the floor.”
“We’ll see,” says the merchant.
The merchant hid first, and Misery found him at once.
“Now it’s my turn,” says Misery; “but what’s the good? You’ll never find me. Why, I could get inside the hub of that wheel if I had a mind to.”
“What a liar you are!” says the merchant; “you never could get into that little hole.”
“Look,” says Misery, and he made himself little, little, little, and sat on the hub of the wheel.
“Look,” says he, making himself smaller again; and then, pouf! in he pops into the hole of the hub.
Instantly the merchant took the other wedge and the hammer, and drove the wedge into the hole. The first wedge had closed up the other end, and so there was Misery shut up inside the hub of the cart wheel.
The merchant set the wheel on his shoulders, and took it to the river and threw it out as far as he could, and it went floating away down to the sea.
Then he went home and set to work to make money again, and earn his daily bread; for Misery had made him so poor that he had nothing left, and had to hire himself out to make a living, just as his peasant brother used to do.
But what happened to Misery when he went floating away?
He floated away down the river, shut up in the hub of the wheel. He ought to have starved there. But I am afraid some silly, greedy fellow thought to get a new wheel for nothing, and pulled the wedges out and let him go; for, by all I hear, Misery is still wandering about the world and making people wretched–bad luck to him!