Travellers’ Tales
Folklore of journeys and adventure from around the world
Compiled & Edited by
Praveen Dabré
SMASHWORDS EDITION
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PUBLISHED BY:
Praveen Dabré on Smashwords
Travellers’ Tales
Copyright © 2010 by Praveen Dabré
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a compilation of traditional folklore from across the world. By definition these are in the public domain and free of copyright. However, the author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of those tales that are so copyrighted and have inadvertently been included in this collection.
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Travellers’ Tales
Folklore of journeys and adventure from around the world
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Ben Sikran’s Hunger
ONE EVENING on his travels Ben Sikran ran out of provisions far from any town or village. Spying a Bedouin tent in the distance, he hurried toward it goaded by hunger. “A guest stands at your door, may God bless you!” he called into the tent. The Bedouin came out and welcomed him most hospitably.
The Bedouin’s wife, however, was not so pleased. She had been on the point of spreading her risen dough on the clay griddle to bake it and did not have enough for three. Sighing, she dug among the embers of her fire and hid the dough in the hot ashes where it could bake out of sight. “All guests are welcome,” she said, “but to our shame we have no food to offer this night.”
Ben Sikran, who had watched her bury the dough, sat with his host and entertained him with tales of his travels. Soon he said, “I feel cold; let me sit near the fire.”
“Give him a blanket!” said the Bedouin’s wife suspiciously.
“Look; I can hardly close my fingers,” said Ben Sikran.
So the Bedouin invited him to draw near to the hot embers. Stretching his legs comfortably and warming his hands, Ben Sikran went on with his talk.
“We are three brothers,” he said, “and when our father died he left us a piece of land hardly bigger than a sheepskin. How were we to divide it? We began by pacing it, so many paces from here to here.” As he spoke he demonstrated by tracing three furrows with his stick through the middle of the ashes in the fire.
“But my younger brother did not think it was just. So we measured the land with ropes from there to there.” He poked his stick through the ashes in the other direction.
“This time my oldest brother was dissatisfied. So we mixed it all up between us.” Here he stirred the ashes thoroughly round and round.
“May God upset your stomach as you have upset my yeast dough!” wailed the Bedouin’s wife in anger.
– Algeria
The Two Travellers and the Farmer
A TRAVELLER came upon an old farmer hoeing in his field beside the road. Eager to rest his feet, the wanderer hailed the countryman, who seemed happy enough to straighten his back and talk for a moment.
“What sort of people live in the next town?” asked the stranger.
“What were the people like where you’ve come from?” replied the farmer, answering the question with another question.
“They were a bad lot. Troublemakers all, and lazy too. The most selfish people in the world, and not a one of them to be trusted. I’m happy to be leaving the scoundrels.”
“Is that so?” replied the old farmer. “Well, I’m afraid that you’ll find the same sort in the next town.”
Disappointed, the traveller trudged on his way, and the farmer returned to his work.
Some time later another stranger, coming from the same direction, hailed the farmer, and they stopped to talk. “What sort of people live in the next town?” he asked.
“What were the people like where you’ve come from?” replied the farmer once again.
“They were the best people in the world. Hard working, honest, and friendly. I’m sorry to be leaving them.”
“Fear not,” said the farmer. “You’ll find the same sort in the next town.”
– USA
The Bishop’s Visit
ONCE THERE was a parish in which the farmers complained that their parson wasn’t good enough, and they wanted another. So they sent for the bishop.
It so happened that the parson had a very beautiful wife, and the bishop went up to her and grabbed her breasts. “What do you call these?” he asked.
“The Bells of Bethlehem,” answered the wife.
Then he grabbed her a little farther down. “And what do you call this?” he said.
“Joshua’s grave.”
He wanted to put his staff into Joshua’s grave, and so he did. All the while the parson lay in the next room listening to everything.
Later, when the bishop was about to go to sleep, he checked to see if the parson was asleep, and accidentally singed his beard and hair with his candle. But the parson kept his eyes closed.
The next day was Sunday and the parson took his revenge. He started his sermon saying, “A strange man came to me last night. He singed my hair, he fried my beard, he rang the Bells of Bethlehem, he put his staff into Joshua’s grave. And this will be the subject for today’s sermon.”
The bishop stood up and said to the congregation, “This man is so learned that you’ll never be able to understand what he’s saying. But I understand him very well!”
And after that the parson was allowed to stay and continue his ministry.
– Sweden
A Cat in Khelm
PEOPLE IN Khelm didn’t know about cats, and they lived with mice crawling in and out of every nook and cranny. At mealtimes each householder had a rod at his table to drive the mice away.
Then one day a stranger came to Khelm and described a creature he had seen, an animal called a ‘cat’ which, if it was introduced into a house, drove the mice into their holes. The town of Khelm asked him to find such a creature, and then bought the cat from him for the enormous sum of eighteen zlotys.
But the Khelmites didn’t know that a cat could run away. Well, the cat was put on watch in a house, and the townspeople were delighted to see that it scared off the mice. But one day someone left a window open, and the cat took it into its head to leap out onto a roof.
So the Khelmites called a meeting to figure out how to catch the cat. They decided to set the house on fire to make the cat jump to the ground. So they burned the house down, but the cat sprang to the roof of the next house. So they burned the second house down. But the cat sprang to the roof of a third house.
So they burned the third house down. And so on, until they destroyed half their town.
– Jewish, Poland
The Treasure at Home
THE RABBI of Aleksander used to say, “Many people think that when they come to the rabbi, they will be helped.” And he liked to tell this tale to young people who came to see him the first time.
One night, Ayzik, the son of Reb Yekl, dreamed that there was a treasure hidden under the Praga side of the Warsaw bridge. So he travelled to Warsaw. At the bridge he tried to reach the spot, but a soldier was standing guard there. So he paced back and forth as he waited for the soldier to go away.
The soldier meanwhile became aware of someone on the bridge, so he went up to Ayzik and asked what he wanted. Ayzik told him the truth: that he had dreamed about a treasure buried under the bridge. The soldier said, “Aw, go on. Just because I dreamed about a treasure in the oven at the home of Ayzik, Reb Yekl’s son in Krakow, doesn’t mean I have to go there.”
Ayzik turned around and went home, where he took his oven apart and found a treasure that made him a very rich man.
– Poland
The Lazy and the Industrious–A Traveller’s Tale
I WAS sitting on a bench in a park in Vänersborg in the beginnning of the 1880s. Soon after I arrived, a couple of the town’s artisans came and sat down on the bench. They discussed social questions for a while, and finally one of them told this story.
In the Beginning it was decided that one person must labour for another. When Jesus walked on earth with His disciples, they came to a field where the grain was being cut. The servant boy cut the grain, but always rested when he got to one end of the field. The servant girl, on the other hand, worked so hard that the sweat poured off her without a minute's pause.
Then the disciples said to the Master, “You ought to give that girl a reward for all her hard work.”
“Yes,” said the Master, “she’ll get the lazy boy for a husband.”
“But isn’t that being unjust toward the girl?” the disciples asked.
“No,” said the Master. “You see, it’s the lot of one human to carry another through life.”
– Sweden
The Demon Sheep
A JEW was travelling from his village to town. On the way he noticed a bound sheep lying in the road, bleating. The villager jumped down to load the sheep into his wagon.
Though the animal was very heavy, the man was not willing to untie it, so he heaved and hauled and laboured until at last he got it stowed away. Then he had to crack the whip because the horses could not pull the wagon unless they stretched and strained.
As they drew near town, the man felt the wagon moving more easily. Looking back, he saw the sheep standing on its hind legs, exposing its rear end to him. “Ha, ha, ha!” it bleated. “I sure made you heave and haul and sweat, didn’t I?”
Then it leaped from the wagon and disappeared.
– Poland
A Tall Tale