In the valley of Aherlow, at the foot of the gloomy Galtic Mountains, lived a crippled poor man with a large hump on his back. He was short, weak, and did not have the strength to work in the field. Therefore, he made a living by weaving willow baskets and selling them to local residents.
Despite his disability, he was a cheerful, cheerful person and loved to sing songs while working.
He also liked to pin a bunch of foxgloves, flowers often called “fairy caps,” to his cap. No wonder people nicknamed the little hunchback Cap.
One evening Cap returned from the market, where he had been selling his baskets. Night came, it was necessary to hurry, but the poor man could not walk quickly.
Finally, he was exhausted and sat down to rest on a hummock near some half-overgrown ruins.
And suddenly, in the silence and darkness, the sound of a pipe was heard. The cap listened and discerned a motive - simple, but so joyful and wonderful, which he had never heard in his life. A song began to sound, a choir of thin voices carried out the melody with extraordinary perfection, and the words were as follows:
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday...
At this point the singing somehow stopped hesitantly, and then it was repeated all over again:
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday...
The cap enjoyed extraordinary music. He realized that he had accidentally overheard the singing of the Fairy People from Under the Hill. The little ones must have been composing a new song, but something wasn’t going well with them. The cap wanted to help them. He got ready and - when it sounded for the third time:
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday - he entered and finished singing in a beautiful, ringing voice, completing the melody: And Wednesday!
For a few seconds there was amazing silence. And suddenly there was a cheerful noise, the chirping of thin voices, laughter, joyful exclamations, and Cap saw that he was surrounded by a crowd of little musicians. These were the magical inhabitants of the hills, whom the Irish call the Seeds, and the English call fairies or elves. The kids rejoiced that they had finally succeeded in the song, and sang tirelessly, dancing around the Cap:
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday
And Wednesday!
Finally, one of the Seeds, apparently the eldest, demanded silence and, stepping forward, addressed Cap with the following speech:
- O singer, most skillful among mortals! We are saddened to see you burdened with this heavy hump. Fortunately, one wave of the magic wand is enough to rid you of ugliness forever. This is our gratitude to you for this wonderful song. Goodbye, Cap!
With these words, he waved his wand... and everything flashed in the Cap’s eyes, spun in a rapid round dance and disappeared. He fell unconscious on the dewy grass and fell asleep, and when he woke up, morning had already come.
The cap jumped to his feet and straightened up for the first time in his life - he no longer had a hump behind his shoulders, he became a stately and handsome guy. Many did not recognize him. He had to tell everyone the story about the Seeds again and again before people believed him and recognized him as the old Cap.
It so happened that another hunchback, named Johnny Tainted, heard about this incident and also decided to try his luck.
In the evening he came to the very place that Cap had talked about, and sat down there on a hummock, waiting for darkness.
He sat for such a long, long time and was already beginning to doze off, when suddenly thin voices were heard, the singing of a pipe, and Johnny heard a cheerful choir singing a song:
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday,
Monday, Tuesday
And Wednesday!
“Aha!” thought Johnny. “The cap only told them one day—Wednesday, but I’ll tell them two. I’ll probably be rewarded more generously for this: not only will they get rid of the hump, but they’ll also give me gold. After all, they say, they have a lot of gold—those wonderful People from Under the Hill.”
Reasoning in this way, Johnny opened his mouth wider and, as soon as the choir had time to sing “Monday...”, he hastily shouted out of tune and out of tune:
Thursday and Friday!
Thursday and Friday!
Everything fell silent - but only for a moment. Then there was noise, exclamations, angry voices:
- What ignoramus shouted that? Who ruined our song?
Johnny saw himself surrounded by an indignant crowd of little kids, they were shouting and showing him their fists. Suddenly one of them, with a magic wand in his hand, stepped forward and said:
- O fool, the most intolerable among mortals! You will receive a reward worthy of you. May you, until the end of time, be as awkward as your song!
He waved his wand... Everything began to spin in Johnny's eyes, and he collapsed to the ground as if knocked down. He slept on the dewy grass until the morning, and when he woke up and felt his back - oh misfortune! - not one, but two humps were behind his shoulders. The greedy Johnny somehow wandered away, angering the Seeds.
And the cheerful Cap lived happily ever after, delighting people with his songs and good disposition.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru