Page:Lange - The Blue Fairy Book.djvu/344

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NE summer’s day a little tailor sat on his table by the window in the best of spirits, and sewed for dear life. As he was sitting thus a peasant woman came down the street, calling out: ‘Good jam to sell, good jam to sell.’ This sounded sweetly in the tailor’s ears; he put his frail little head out of the window, and shouted: ‘Up here, my good woman, and you’ll find a willing customer.’ The woman climbed up the three flights of stairs with her heavy basket to the tailor’s room, and he made her spread out all the pots in a row before him. He examined them all, lifted them up and smelt them, and said at last: ‘This jam seems good, weigh me four ounces of it, my good woman; and even if it’s a quarter of a pound I won’t stick at it. The woman, who had hoped to find a good market, gave him what he wanted, but went away grumbling wrathfully. ‘Now heaven shall bless this jam for my use,’ cried the little tailor, ‘and it shall sustain and strengthen me.’ He fetched some bread out of a cupboard, cut a round off the loaf, and spread the jam on it. ‘That won’t taste amiss,’ he said; ‘but I’ll finish that waistcoat first before I take a bite.’ He placed the bread beside him, went on sewing, and out of the lightness of his heart kept on making his stitches bigger and bigger. In the meantime the smell of the sweet jam rose to the ceiling, where heaps of flies were sitting, and attracted them to such an extent that they swarmed on to it in masses. ‘Ha! who invited you?’ said the tailor, and chased the unwelcome guests away. But the flies, who didn’t understand English, refused to let themselves be warned off, and returned again in even greater numbers. At last the little tailor, losing all patience, reached out of his chimney corner for a duster, and exclaiming: ‘Wait, and I’ll give it to you,’ he beat them mercilessly with it. When he left off he counted the slain, and no fewer than seven lay dead before him with outstretched legs. ‘What a desperate fellow I am!’ said he, and was filled with admiration at his