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Peronnik was a poor idiot who belonged to nobody, and he would
have died of starvation if it had not been for the kindness of
the village people, who gave him food whenever he chose to ask
for it. And as for a bed, when night came, and he grew sleepy, he
looked about for a heap of straw, and making a hole in it, crept
in, like a lizard. Idiot though he was, he was never unhappy, but
always thanked gratefully those who fed him, and sometimes would
stop for a little and sing to them. For he could imitate a lark
so well, that no one knew which was Peronnik and which was the
bird.
He had been wandering in a forest one day for several hours, and
when evening approached, he suddenly felt very hungry. Luckily,
just at that place the trees grew thinner, and he could see a
small farmhouse a little way off. Peronnik went straight towards
it, and found the farmer's wife standing at the door holding in
her hands the large bowl out of which her children had eaten
their supper.
'I am hungry, will you give me something to eat?' asked the boy.
'If you can find anything here, you are welcome to it,' answered
she, and, indeed, there was not much left, as everybody's spoon
had dipped in. But Peronnik ate what was there with a hearty
appetite, and thought that he had never tasted better food.
'It is made of the finest flour and mixed with the richest milk
and stirred by the best cook in all the countryside,' and though
he said it to himself, the woman heard him.
'Poor innocent,' she murmured, 'he does not know what he is
saying, but I will cut him a slice of that new wheaten loaf,' and
so she did, and Peronnik ate up every crumb, and declared that
nobody less than the bishop's baker could have baked it. This
flattered the farmer's wife so much that she gave him some butter
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Fairytales 
