The Three Sillies

A gentleman was courting a farmer’s daughter and often came for dinner with her family. One evening, the farmer sent his daughter to the cellar to draw some beer and bring it. She saw a mallet stuck on the roof of the cellar and wondered what would happen if she had a son and the mallet fell on his head and he died! She sat down and wept, while the beer flowed all over the floor. Her mother came to look for her and, hearing her thoughts, she too began to weep. The farmer, too, joined them, crying! The guest came looking for them. He turned off the tap and when he learnt why they all were crying, he laughed. “I am going away for a while,” he said, “If I find three persons as silly as you three, I will return and marry your daughter!” And away went the gentleman to look for three sillies.

The First Silly

The gentleman set off and came to a village where a cottage had grass growing on its roof. A woman had put a ladder against the roof and was trying to coax her cow to climb it! When he asked her what she was doing, she replied, “Getting the cow up to graze! I’ll tie a rope around her neck and drop it through the chimney. That way, I can tie it to my wrist and prevent her from falling off the roof!” “Wouldn’t it be wiser to cut the grass and give it to the cow here?” asked the gentleman, smiling. But the stubborn woman was sure that she was doing things correctly. The cow slipped and fell, dragging on the rope around her neck and the poor creature died! The woman was dragged up into the chimney by the cow’s weight and got stuck there with the soot suffocating her. ‘That’s one silly,’ thought the gentleman.

The Second Silly

One night, the gentleman stopped to rest at an inn where he had to share a room with another man. The fellow was good-natured and friendly, so the two of them had dinner together. The gentleman, however, heard strange noises and awoke in the morning to a peculiar sight. The man had tied his trousers to the knobs of the dresser and was taking running jumps at it! “What are you doing?” asked the gentleman, for the man was perspiring and looked exhausted. “I am trying to get into my trousers!” he explained. “They give me so much trouble every morning. I’m tired of trying to leap into them! How do you wear yours?” Never in his life had the gentleman imagined someone trying to leap into trousers! He laughed and showed him how he wore his own trousers. Then, grinning broadly, he went for his breakfast, muttering, “That’s the second one!”

The Third Silly

The gentleman was searching for the third silly when he came to a pond on the outskirts of a village, one moonlit night. A large group of villagers had gathered around it with rakes and sticks and brooms. The curious gentleman joined them to find out what had fallen into the water. “What has fallen in?” he asked one of the men. “Can’t you see?” said the villager, “The moon’s fallen into the water! We’re trying to get it out!” The gentleman laughed aloud and showed them the moon in the sky. “This is only a reflection!” he said. But they were very annoyed at the foolish stranger and chased him away. The gentleman thought, ‘There’s whole lot of sillies in the world, not just three!’ He thought it wise to return to his village and marry the farmer’s daughter. After all, for she was no sillier than the others he had met on his travels!

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