Atondido Stories
The youth went home and told his father about the strange
inscription. They talked the matter over and at last decided that
it would be well for the young man to marry the poor man’s old-
est daughter provided he could get the golden bird as dowry.
The goldsmith went to see the girl’s father and after some dis-
cussion the marriage was arranged.
The wedding day arrived. The bridegroom ordered the bird
to be roasted and ready to be put on the table when the bridal
party came home from church. It was his intention to eat the
heart himself and have his bride eat the gizzard.
The children of the family cried bitterly at the thought of los-
ing their pretty bird, but the bridegroom, of course, had his way.
Now two of the boys stayed home from the wedding and they
decided that they would like very much to taste the roast bird if
only they could find a piece that nobody would miss. They did
not dare take a leg or a wing, but they thought it would be safe
to pick out a morsel from the inside. So one boy ate the heart, the
other the gizzard. Then they were so frightened at what they had
done that they ran away and never came back.
When the bride and groom returned from church, the bird
was carried to the table. The groom looked at once for the heart
and the gizzard and was greatly shocked at their disappearance.
The two boys who had gone out into the world found work with
a merchant. They slept together and every morning the mer-
chant’s wife found a heap of golden ducats under the feather
bed. She didn’t know to which boy they belonged. She took
them and saved them for a whole year until they filled a hogs-
head.
At the end of a year the boys decided to go out again into the
world. The merchant showed them all the ducats his wife had
found in their bed and he said to them:
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