In one village there lived an elder named Tokai, who was proud of his intelligence.
One day he called the inhabitants of the aul and said:
- Hey, people! Even though you are all stupid, I decided to ask you one task. Skin a rock on the river bank. The period is three days. If you don't do it, I'll skin you!
People have gathered on the shore in the morning and are sitting and grieving. How to be?! What kind of skin does the rock have?.. And at this time a beautiful woman, the daughter of the forester Peyma Khanum, came to the river with a jug.
“Why are you so sad?” the girl asks.
People shared their grief with her: so, they say, and so, the foreman is looking for a reason to deal with us...
“That’s all?” she asked. “Don’t worry!” Go and say: “Where has it been seen that they skin something that has not been slaughtered? You slaughter the rock first, and then we will skin it.”
The foreman, meanwhile, was impatient. He came to the shore himself and shouted:
- Where is the skin? Hey slackers!
“Have mercy, Tokai!” people answer. “Who skins something that hasn’t been slaughtered?” Slaughter the rock, if you please, and we’ll skin it in an instant.
- Hm! - Tokai realized that he had been left a fool. - Come on, tell me, who taught you to answer like that?
- We figured it out ourselves.
- No! - Tokay shouts. - You're lying! Who taught?
— The forester’s daughter, Peyma Khanum, taught me. Then Tokai ordered to bring three boards for threshing.
- Go to Peyma Khanum and convey my order. Let him dress these sheepskins, cut them and sew them into a fur coat for me.
Peyma Khanum saw the boards and asked:
- What did you bring, good people? And people are ashamed to carry out a stupid order. They looked at each other:
- Tokay said: “These are sheepskins.” He ordered you to make them, cut them and sew a fur coat for him. Peyma Khanum laughed:
- Okay! Take the sheepskins to my barn and don’t refuse, I ask you to taste my bread and salt.
While they were enjoying themselves, Peyma Khanum took a large bag, filled it with river pebbles, and tied it tightly.
“Here,” she said, “here are silkworm cocoons.” Let Tokai weave strong threads out of them. I’ve already cut out a fur coat, but I have nothing to sew with.
And Tokai was again left a fool.
Peyma Khanum soon went with her father to the forest to get firewood. Her father instructed her to cut down a dry oak tree near the road, and he himself went hunting.
And at this time, Sergeant Major Tokai was passing through the forest with his farmhand on a pair of dashing horses. He sees: a beautiful girl is cutting down a dry oak tree by the road.
Tokay ordered the horses to stop and asked:
- Who will you be?
“I am the daughter of the forester Peyma Khanum,” answered the girl.
- Finally I met you! - Tokai was delighted. “Come on, come on, if you’re so smart, answer: how many times did you hit this tree with an ax and how many chips flew off?”
“I’m a simple girl,” Peima Khanum answered modestly. “I may not know... But you are the foreman!” They say there is no one in the area smarter than you... Tell me, how many steps did your horses take, how did you leave the house, and how many times did the wheels turn?
- Drive! - Tokai shouted to the farmhand. “Let’s not waste time on empty talk!”
So the foreman was left in the cold three times.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru