Prevod

Once a farmer went out to plough with a pair of oxen. When he reached the field, the two beasts’ horns began to grow, and kept on growing, and by the time he wanted to go home they were so large that he could not get the oxen through the gate. Luckily, a butcher happened to come along, and the farmer let him have them. They struck a bargain: the farmer was to bring the butcher a measure of turnip seed, and the butcher would count out a Brabant thaler for every grain. Now that is what I call a good sale! The farmer went home and brought the measure of turnip seed on his back, but on the way a single grain fell out of the sack. The butcher paid him in full, just as they had agreed; if the farmer had not lost that grain, he would have had one Brabant thaler more. Meanwhile, when he came back along the same road, the grain had grown into a tree that reached all the way to heaven. Then the farmer thought, ‘Since I have the chance, I really must see what the angels are doing up there, and have a look at them face to face.’ So he climbed up and saw that the angels were threshing oats, and stood watching them. As he watched, he noticed that the tree he was standing on had begun to sway. He looked down and saw that someone was about to chop it down. ‘It would be a nasty business if you fell from here,’ he thought, and in his distress he could think of nothing better than to take the oat chaff that lay about in heaps and twist it into a rope. He also seized a hoe and a threshing flail that were lying about in heaven, and lowered himself down by the rope. But when he reached the earth below, he landed right in a very, very deep hole, and it was a stroke of luck that he had the hoe, for with it he cut himself a flight of steps and climbed out. He brought the threshing flail home as proof, so that no one could doubt his story any longer.