One widow had two daughters; one of them was pretty and diligent, the other was ugly and lazy. But she loved the bad one more, because she was her own daughter, than the beautiful stepdaughter, who did all the dirty work in the house. This poor girl had to sit down every day on the high road by the stream and spin so much that blood came out from under her nails.
It happened one day that the entire spindle was in her blood; She bent down to the water to wash it, and it jumped out of her hands and fell to the bottom of a deep stream. The poor thing began to cry, ran to her stepmother and told her about her misfortune.
She scolded her and shouted:
“You dropped it yourself, get it yourself, and until then don’t show your face to me!”
The girl went back to the stream with tears, and out of despair she rushed into it to get her spindle. Then she fell into oblivion, and when she woke up and came to her senses again, she saw that she was lying on a beautiful lawn, dotted with many wonderful flowers and brightly lit by the sun.
She walked along this lawn and came to the stove, in which there were many, many loaves of bread planted. The loaves shouted to her:
“Take us out, girl, take us out quickly, otherwise we’ll burn: we’ve been baked for a long time.”
She came up and took all the bread out of the oven. Then she went further and came to an apple tree, on which there were many, many apples. The apple tree told her:
“Shake me, girl, shake me quickly: the apples on me have long been ripe.”
It went to the tree, shook all the apples and put them in a pile.
Finally, she came to the hut and in its window she saw an old woman with such large and long teeth that she was frightened and was about to run away from her when she turned to her and said tenderly:
-What are you afraid of, my dear? Stay with me: after all, if you work well in my house, you will be happy here. But most importantly, you must thoroughly fluff up my feather bed when you make the bed, so that the feathers fly in all directions, because this causes snow on the ground. My name is old woman Holle.
The girl agreed to stay with her and entered her service. She faithfully served her mistress, pleased her in everything, and yet she never heard a bad word from her, and received plenty of all kinds of food, drink and delicacies from her.
No matter how good it was for her to live with the old woman, she soon wanted to return home and see her family. She said to the old woman:
“I am overcome by longing for my family, and although I feel good with you, I still feel that I am unable to live away from my loved ones.” The old woman praised her for her affection and added:
“You served me faithfully, and that’s why I want to reward you justly.”
Then she took her by the hand and led her under the large gate: as soon as she approached under its arch, a heavy golden rain poured down on her, and all the gold stuck to her and covered her from head to toe.
“This is a souvenir from me for your diligence, but by the way, grab your spindle that fell into the stream.”
After that, the gate slammed, and the girl found herself on the ground, not far from the house of her stepmother, who this time received her kindly, because she saw what wealth she carried with her.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru