4. The Three Wishes

    One fine morning in early winter a woodman, who spent nearly all his time felling trees, went out from his little hut into the leafless forest that spread to his very door.  He carried his big axe with him, and pausing near a fine oak, began to make preparations for cutting it down.

    He was marking and measuring and examining the little twigs at the ends of the boughs, when suddenly a gentle sighing shook the tree, and a soft voice spoke to him sadly from the branches.

    "Oh, kind sir!" sighed the voice.  "Have pity on me!  I have made my winter home in this tree.  If you cut it down I shall have nowhere to sleep, and must die in the cold."

    The woodman was so surprised that he dropped his axe and nearly cut off his toes.

    "Who are you?" he exclaimed.  "I can't see you!"

    "No, because I am a woodland fairy, and you can only see the branches that rock me, the rough bark that clothes me, and the little twigs where, in the spring, I shall shake out my delicate green hair!  If you will spare me I will grant you and your wife three wishes."

    The woodman at once agreed to leave the tree standing, so that the fairy might sleep beneath its bank until the spring.

    Hurrying home, he told his wife what had happened.  Then he flung himself into his chair and asked for breakfast.

    "There is only porridge!" said the old lady.  "But with three wishes we can--"

    "Only porridge!" interrupted the woodman.  "I wish a good hot string of black-puddings would come tumbling down the chimney--"

    He broke off with a jump, and his wife gave a little shriek and dropped the porridge.  Down the chimney had popped the biggest, longest, hottest string of black-puddings you ever saw in your life!  The woodman's mouth watered as he looked at them.

    "Get a plate, wife!" he cried.  "Here's a breakfast for a hungry man!"

    "Plate!" sneered his wife angrily.  "Get a plate for yourself!  One of our three wishes gone, and nothing but a string of black-puddings to show for it!  I wish they were hanging to the tip of your silly nose!"

    "Ugh! ugh! ugh!" shouted the woodman, springing quite a yard across the kitchen.  "What's this?  What's this?"

    He was shaking his head like a terrier with a rat.  For, at his wife's words, the whole string of black-puddings had jumped off the hearth, and fastened themselves firmly to the tip of his nose.

    The woodman raged with anger and fright as he struggled vainly to shake the black-puddings from his nose.  His wife, terrified out of her wits, brought a big knife to try and chop them away-- but they were fairy black-puddings, and she could no more cut them off than she could cut off her husband's head.  She began to cry, and the more she cried, the more bad language the woodman used.  However, the black-puddings, still steaming hot, remained dangling from the tip of his nose.

    "Never mind!  Never mind!" said his wife, as soothingly as she could.  "We'll have a grand house, and keep hens and chickens, and have servants to wait on us as well.  We have only to decide how much money to wish for, so that we may be able to live comfortably for the rest of our lives."

    "Live comfortably!" screamed her husband.  "Who's going to live comfortably with a reeking dangling, streaming string of black-puddings swinging at the end of his nose?  I wish to goodness they were up the chimney, where they came from."

    Hey, presto!  He felt a sort of electric shock in his nose, and without a sound, the string of black-puddings took a flying leap into the fire and disappeared up the chimney.  The woodman and his wife were left staring at each other.  At last the old husband spoke, rubbing his nose at the same time.

    "What's the good of wishing for things?" he said philosophically.  "You never know where you are when you've got them.  make a fresh basin of porridge, wife, and we'll have our breakfast."

    And that was the end of the Three Wishes given to the woodman and his wife by the fairy who lived in the tree.