Page:The Pentamerone, or The Story of Stories.djvu/70

46 on account of the Monaciello, a plaster statue; and being tired out, and wearied with going about and about, he sat himself down upon a bench. But not seeing any one astir in the house, which looked like a sacked village, he was lost in amazement, and said to the statue, "Tell me, comrade, does no one live in this house?" Vardiello waited awhile; but as the statue gave no answer, he thought this surely was a man of few words. So he said, "Friend, will you buy my cloth? I'll sell it you cheap." And seeing that the statue still remained dumb, he exclaimed, Faith then I've found my man at last! there, take the cloth, examine it, and give me what you will; tomorrow I'll return for the money."

So saying, Vardiello left the cloth on the spot where he had been sitting, and the first mother's son who passed that way found the prize and carried it off.

When Vardiello returned home without the cloth, and told his mother all that had happened, she well-nigh swooned away, and said to him, "When will you put that headpiece of yours in order? See now what tricks you have played me—only think! but I am myself to blame, for being too tender-hearted, instead of having given you a good beating at first; and now I perceive, that a pitiful doctor only makes the wound incurable. But you'll go on with your pranks, until at last we come to