Little Brownie lived in a big house called Hilton Hall.
- Wait, who is this - Brownie? - you ask.
Brownies are what brownies are called in England. They most likely look like tiny funny people and can be quite cute, but terribly capricious. If they want, they will do all your homework for you, but if they don’t, they’ll just play pranks on you.
They say that there was one Brownie in Cornwall who could grind more grain in a night than the owner himself could do in a whole week. But this Brownie only got to work if they remembered to leave him a large bowl of fresh cream overnight.
And another Brownie - a very famous one, named Robin Hood - was a desperate mischief-maker and a great lover of all sorts of tricks. For example, he loved to sneak up on some respectable lady at the table and quietly throw out all the ale that she was just about to drink. And he did even worse: he unlocked the stable and released all the horses.
But the Brownie of Hilton Hall was not as desperate a prankster as this Robin Hood, nor was he as virtuous as the Cornish Brownie. Everything depended on his mood.
When he was out of sorts, before everyone in the house had time to fall asleep, he was right there and didn’t waste time: he would pour pepper into the sugar bowls, salt into the beer, throw ash on the fire in the hearth, which was deliberately left to burn all night, and also splash the clean water prepared for the morning.
Well, if he was in a good mood - fortunately, this happened more often - then while the maids were sleeping, he swept all the rooms for them, cleaned the hearth, built a bright fire, tidied up everything in the kitchen: scraped the pots, washed the plates, washed, scrubbed until everything in the kitchen sparkled and shone.
Brownie did this most willingly when the maids left him a bowl of cream or a loaf of bread with honey at night.
And then one day it happened that the maids stayed up late, telling each other scary stories. And when the two youngest of them - the cook's assistant and the maid - finally went to bed, while climbing the stairs with a candle, they suddenly heard a slight noise in the kitchen.
"What if it's Brownie?" - the girls thought.
But I must tell you that no one had ever seen Brownies before - they don’t really like to show themselves to people - and the girls really wanted to look at him. So they slowly went down the stairs, crept up to the kitchen door and, plucking up courage, opened it.
This is true! Little Brownie was in the kitchen. And what do you think this imp was doing? He sat astride a hook from a long chain screwed into the ceiling, on which pots are hung over the fireplace, and swung as if on a swing.
He swayed and sang:
Oh woe is me, woe!
The acorn has not yet fallen into the ground,
What will rise into the sky like an oak tree,
What will go on the unsteady cradle,
What will rock the child,
What will become a man later?
That will set me free.
Oh woe is me, woe!
The maidservants were kind girls. And while they were undressing to go to bed, they managed to talk about everything and agreed that it was a shame and disgrace to keep poor Brownie in the house against his wishes. After all, he was such a cutie! And if sometimes he played pranks, he helped much more often. And they decided to set him free.
The next day they asked everyone they met how they could release little Brownie. But no one knew. Finally they asked the old henkeeper.
- Oh my God! - exclaimed the birdwoman. - There’s nothing simpler!
And she told them what and how to do.
There was a fair in the neighboring town at that time, and the girls asked to go there. Each took part of the money that they had been saving for their wedding, and with this money they bought the best green Lincoln cloth at the fair.
They spent the next day cutting and sewing and made a very cute green cape with a hood for Brownie. And when evening came, they put it in the kitchen near the fire, and they themselves hid and peeked through the crack.
Soon Brownie appeared, frowning and sullen. It was clear that he came in a bad mood.
But as soon as he noticed a green cape with a hood near the fireplace - my God, what happened here! He smiled, grinned, picked up the cape to take a good look at it, then put it on himself and began to look into the polished copper frying pan. And then, well, dance and jump around the kitchen, chanting:
The cape is mine, the hood is now mine,
And the brownie no longer serves you!
And so, singing and dancing, he disappeared from the kitchen, and no one ever saw him again.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru