Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 1 1883.djvu/346

 338 and do not you blame us. For it's an exceedingly bad thing to agree without thought; for those who go along with fishermen, they say, stink of fish; those who make friends with vagabonds are themselves vagrants; and those who make friends with workers are workers themselves. And so you see, my good fellow, the reason of our declining friendship with you is your changing in the end; and that is why we can't join together. For you see that we have not that changing, whatever may befall us. You see that we are damped to become rotten, and when we have become so we are soon put in the ground; but after a little time we are still rice all the same. And when we have become green on the earth again, then we are uprooted and stuck in the ground, where there is much water; yet we do not change, but still remain rice. And after growing again until we are ripe, we are then reaped with the knife; yet we do not change, but still remain rice. And after stopping a little while more, we are then beaten on the stone; yet we do not change, but still remain rice. And not only so, but we are buried in the rice-pit; we do not change, but still remain rice. And also, we are drawn out thence, and dried in the sun; and when dry we are pounded in the mortar and our skin stripped from us, yet we do not change, but still remain rice. And not only so, but we are put into the cooking-pot and covered with water, and heated with a fierce fire; and unless well boiled and thoroughly soft we are not removed from it. And when removed we are chewed, and when masticated are swallowed. And in all these calamities which overtake and befall us we do not change, but still remain rice. And the land where we are not found is called famine-stricken, and the country where we are not found is called desolate.

"But as for you sugar-canes, on the other hand, you are cut down and chopped up, and stuck about in the ground; and then you do not change at all, but are still sugar-cane. And after you have grown and become tall, you are cut down with the knife; and still you do not change, but are still sugar-cane. And afterwards you are chewed into fibres with the teeth and crushed in the mill, but yet that does not change you, for you are still sugar-cane.

"But that is not all, for you are steeped in a great pot; and after a little while you are put into a boiling pot and heated intensely by the fire a long time, and after you thicken they stop. And upon that you change, and take another name, that is, sugar.

"And when you have been sent back to the boiler again, then you