Clever Manka, Part 1

Thank you, Captain.

Okay, today's story is a very old story.

It's a folktale from Slovakia, and it's the story of a very clever girl.

Her name is Manka, so this story is called Clever Manka.

Clever Manka, Part One.

Once upon a time, there was a rich farmer who was as greedy as he was rich.

He was always driving a hard bargain and always getting the better of his poor neighbors.

One of these neighbors was a humble shepherd who, in return for some work, was to receive from the farmer a heifer.

Now, a heifer is a young female cow.

When the time of payment came, the farmer refused to give the shepherd the heifer, and the shepherd was forced to bring the matter to the town judge.

Now, the judge, who was a young man and as yet not very experienced, listened to both sides, and when he had thought it over, he said, "Instead of deciding this case, I will put a riddle to you both, and the man who makes the best answer shall have the heifer.

Are you agreed?" The farmer and the shepherd accepted this proposal, and the judge said, "Well then, here is my riddle.

What is the swiftest thing in the world? What is the sweetest thing? And what is the richest? Think out your answers and bring them to me at this same hour tomorrow." The greedy farmer went home in a very bad temper.

"What kind of a judge is this young fellow?" he growled.

"If he had let me keep the heifer, I'd have sent him a bushel of pears.

But now I'm in a fair way of losing the heifer, for I can't think of any answer to his foolish riddle." "What is the matter, husband?" his wife asked.

"It's that new judge.

The old one would have just given me the heifer without any argument.

But this young man thinks to decide the case by asking us riddles." When he told his wife what the riddle was, she cheered him greatly by telling him that she knew the answers at once.

"Why, husband," said she, "our gray horse must be the swiftest thing in the world.

You know yourself nothing ever passes us on the road.

As for the sweetest, did you ever taste honey any sweeter than ours? And I'm sure there's nothing richer than our chest of golden coins that we've been gathering for forty years." The farmer was delighted.

"You're right, wife.

You're right.

That heifer remains ours." The shepherd, when he got home, was downcast and sad.