English Fairy Tales / Английские сказки. Elementary

Then he said, “What are you three doing? Why are you sitting and crying?”

“Oh!” says the father, “look at that horrid mallet! Just think: if you and our daughter marry, and you have a son, and he grows up and comes down into the cellar to bring the beer, the mallet will fall on his head and kill him. How awful! How awful!” And then they all started to cry worse than before.

But the gentleman smiled and took the mallet, and then he said, “I travelled many miles, and I never met such big sillies as you three before.

Now I shall start my travels again, and when I can find three bigger sillies than you three, then I’ll come back and marry your daughter.” So he wished them good-bye and went away. The three sillies were all crying because the girl lost her sweetheart.

Well, he travelled a long way, and at last[55 - at last – наконец] he came to a woman’s cottage. It had some grass on the roof. And the woman was trying to get her cow to go up a ladder[56 - was trying to get her cow to go up a ladder – пыталась заставить свою корову взобраться наверх по лестнице] to the grass.

So the gentleman asked the woman what she was doing. “Look at all that beautiful grass,” she said, “I’m going to feed my cow with it.” “Oh, you poor silly!” said the gentleman, “you must cut the grass and throw it down[57 - throw it down – сбросить её вниз] to the cow!”

Well, that was one big silly.

Then the gentleman came to an inn. In the morning he saw a strange man. He hang his trousers on the knobs of the chest of drawers[58 - chest of drawers – комод] and ran across the room and tried to jump into them. At last, he stopped and wiped his face with his handkerchief. “Trousers,” he says, “are the most terrible kind of clothes in the world. Who could invent such things?! I usually spend an hour to get into my trousers every morning!” So the gentleman laughed, and showed him how to put the trousers on[59 - how to put the trousers on – как надеть брюки].

So that was another big silly.

Then the gentleman came to a village. Outside the village there was a pond, and round the pond was a crowd of people. And they had rakes, and brooms, and pitchforks, and they were piercing the water of the pond. The gentleman asked what was the matter.