The old man had forty sons and one daughter. The daughter was a blind girl, she was busy with housework. Every morning she made forty-two beds, prepared a large pot of soup for lunch, and placed forty-two bowls on the table.
Father and sons worked in the field. In their field they grew good wheat, each grain of which was the size of a grape. An apple tree grew in the middle of the field, and under it a spring with the freshest cold water came out of the ground.
Autumn has come. The leaves on the apple tree have turned yellow and the harvest has ripened. The old man and his sons threshed the sheaves, collected the grain and took it to the barn. Then the sons took the oxen out to the arable land and began to plow the land. The old man walked from boundary to boundary and scattered grains that fell into the ground like golden hailstones.
The old man overstrained himself at hard work, and three days later he fell ill and took ill. The medicinal decoctions that his daughter gave him did not help him. Feeling the approach of the last hour, the old man called his sons.
“My dear children,” he said, “my time has come.” Come up to me one by one so that I can say goodbye to each one.
When the father said goodbye to all his children, he said his testament:
- Live together as brothers should live. Cultivate our field, the kindest and sweetest bread will be born from it. Now take a jug and bring me water from the spring under the apple tree. I want to drink for the last time the water that my grandfathers drank.
All forty brothers grabbed a jug and ran to the source. However, thirty-nine brothers came running, threw the jugs under the apple tree, broke off a branch for themselves and began to measure the field.
- Brothers, what are you doing, why are you measuring the field? – asked the youngest brother.
- Now we’ll start dividing it! - Thirty-nine voices answered him.
The brothers measured and measured the land, then they began to divide it, and they quarreled. They began to shout loudly, argue, and then swing sticks at each other. A fight broke out between them, and all the jugs were broken.
- What are my sons doing there? - asked the old man, hearing the noise.
“They are fighting over a field,” his daughter answered him.
- Did they bring me water?
- No, father.
The father became angry and cursed his sons.
- If you are so greedy for the earth, then turn into moles and rummage in it forever! - he exclaimed.
At that very moment the forty sons turned into forty moles, dug holes in the ground and sank underground.
And the blind girl buried her father and went to the field to look for her brothers. She called them and called them, shouting all forty names loudly, but no one responded. She then sat down under the apple tree and wept bitterly.
The lizard heard her, which was fussing near the source, she felt sorry for the girl, she climbed out onto a pebble and said:
- Don’t cry, honey, your brothers are alive! They are in the underworld.
- How do you know this? – the girl asked.
“The source told me, it flows from the very depths of the earth.”
- How can I find them?
- There is a dry well at the edge of your field, sit in the tub and go down. There is no water in the source, and at the bottom there is a stone slab. There will be a staircase under it, you go down it and you will find yourself in the underworld.
The blind girl went into the house to get a basket, then returned to the apple tree and picked ripe apples from it. There were exactly forty apples in total. She put them in a basket and set off on a long journey. She found a dry well, sat down in the tub, went down to the bottom, picked up a stone slab and began to go down the stairs. She walked for twenty weeks, exhausted from fatigue and hunger, but did not touch the apples - she wanted each brother to get an apple from their father’s tree.
On Monday of the twenty-first week, the blind girl finally reached the underworld. Here she met an old woman.
- What are you looking for here? - asked the old lady.
“My brothers,” the girl answered.
“Here they are, locked in a cage,” the old woman pointed to the forty moles. “I feed them salty earth three times a day, and when I give them something to drink, as soon as they bring the cups to their mouths, the bottom of the cups falls off and all the water flows out.” They cannot quench their thirst in any way; apparently, a grave sin is upon them.
- Let me give them an apple! – the girl begged.
“Okay, give it,” answered the old woman.
The girl approached the cage, and the moles whined pitifully. She opened the cage, took out each mole and gave him an apple. They greedily pounced on the food. And as soon as the apples were eaten, the moles turned back into people. Their sister cried joyfully when she heard their voices again. Only the younger brother needed only half an apple to turn into a human again, and he handed the second to his blind sister.
As soon as she took the first bite, she immediately saw the light.
The joy of the brothers and sister knew no bounds, and they all couldn’t stop looking at each other. They set off on their way back, and their sister showed them the way. They walked for twenty weeks, and on the twenty-first week, on Monday, they all crawled out of the dry well into their field.
Meanwhile, the Niva was filled with strong grain. The forty brothers took forty sickles and began to harvest together. They collected grain, and their sister baked loaves. And she gave one half to the poor people so that they would remember her father, and the other half she baked for the brothers, who now lived together in peace and harmony, as brothers were supposed to.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru