It was a long time ago. The weather was rainy: autumn, slush. The old gypsy set out on the road: where to exchange, where to sell, to save money, otherwise winter is just around the corner, and we need to get to the house.
The gypsies loaded their belongings onto the cart, put the children in, and sat down to drive the reins. And my wife is sitting next to me. They drive, and then night comes. We need to look for a village somewhere to stay overnight. The gypsy looks: not far away a stream appears, a bridge over the stream. As soon as the gypsy sent the horse to the bridge, he felt that it began to stumble, as if someone was getting tangled up in its legs. And just before the bridge the horse stopped altogether. The gypsy got angry, gave the reins to his wife, jumped off the cart and said:
- Hold the horse, I see it’s gone crazy, so I’ll whip it now...
- Stop being angry at the horse, why bother touching it in vain? Or maybe there is something there, or maybe she can smell wolves?
The gypsy approached the horse and saw that a small ram was tangled in its legs. The gypsy marveled:
“Come on, get down, wife, look that I found Baranchik alive.” And what a good one too.
- It really is a little lamb. Apparently, I got lost.
“You know, wife, there’s probably a village nearby. Let’s take him, and tomorrow we’ll slaughter him - we’ll have meat, and we can bake pies with filling.” What if the village is still far away - at least we’ll be well-fed.
The gypsy just wanted to grab the lamb, but he jumped to the side! And run. He runs away a little, stops and looks at the gypsy. The gypsy is behind him, and the ram is behind him. The gypsy sat on the cart, whipped his horse and galloped off after the lamb. He was really impatient to catch it. And the little ram jumped into the very thick of the forest, jumped out of the forest and started running through the swamp. As soon as the horse drove into the swamp, it immediately got stuck up to its belly. The gypsy whips the horse with a whip, but to no avail. The gypsy cursed, read prayers, but nothing helped. And the little ram stood nearby and bleated quietly, as if laughing at the gypsy. The gypsy suffered until the morning, and in the morning, as soon as the roosters crowed, the little ram disappeared, as if it had never existed. The sun rose, the gypsy somehow got out of the swamp, and lo and behold, the road was nearby and the village was just a stone's throw away.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru