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“Why?”

“I went through the whole village, and there is nobody who will give me his daughter.”

“That looks bad!” said the husband. “It will soon be summer, and we shall not have anybody to help us at the harvest. Woman, go into the next village, as you may find somebody there.”

The old woman went to the next village, went from one end to the other, went through all the courtyards and houses of the peasants, but it was all in vain. Wherever she showed her nose, she was put off. And she came back home as she had left. “No one wants to be kin with such poor folk as us!”

“In that case it is no good running oneself off one’s legs. Go and sit behind the oven.”

But the son was indignant, and asked: “Father, bless me, and I will go and seek my own fate.”

“Where then will you go?”

“Wherever my eyes lead me!”

So they blessed him and they let him go wherever the four winds blow.

When the boy was on the road, he wept bitterly and spoke to himself: “Am I then the feeblest man in the world, and no maiden will really have me? If the Devil would only send me a bride I think I would rake her!”