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a hut at the farther end of a village, close to the forest, there once lived a man with his wife. Although they were very poor—the man was a daily labourer and the woman spun for sale—yet they were continually wishing for children, and saying, "Would we had a child."

"Be thankful that heaven has not granted you one," said the neighbours: "you yourselves have not enough to eat."

But the man and the woman said,—

"When we eat and are satisfied there would be always something left for our child. Would we had one."

One morning, as the man was digging out stumps of trees in the forest, he came across a small root which looked exactly like a little child—it had a head, body,