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La Laitière et le Pot au lait

The Milkmaid and the Milk Jug

1Châteaux en EspagneCastles in the airFree2m

Perrette walks to town with a jug of milk on her head, dressed light for speed. On the way she already spends the money in her mind: a hundred eggs, three broods of chicks raised round her house, enough (whatever the fox takes) for a pig; the fattened pig sold for good money; then a cow and her calf in the cowshed, the calf jumping among the herd. Carried away, Perrette jumps too: the milk falls, and goodbye calf, cow, pig and chicks. She leaves her spilt fortune with a sorry eye and goes home to make her excuses to her husband, much afraid. Who does not daydream? Who does not build castles in Spain?

Retold from Fables de La Fontaine (Bernardin-Béchet, Paris 1874), Livre septième, X: La Laitière et le Pot au lait by Jean de La Fontaine (public domain).

Stories retold from public-domain tales. Text, audio and pictures © Glowing Fables.

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