A Story from the Sand Dunes

A shipwreck was an exciting event. The visit to the church was a festive event. Twice a year the fisherman's hut had a visitor, and a very welcome one. This was the eel seller from Fjaltring, up near Bovbjerg, who was the brother of Jörgen's foster mother. He came with a red wagon full of eels; it was shut up like a box, and had blue and white tulips painted on it. It was drawn by two black oxen, and Jörgen was permitted to drive them.

The eel man had a good head on him. He was a jolly guest; he always brought a little keg of schnapps, and everyone had a drink of it, sometimes from a coffee cup, if there were not enough glasses. Even Jörgen, little as he was, had a thimbleful; that was so he could digest the fat eels, said the eel man. Then he would tell them his old story, and whenever he heard people laugh at it, he always repeated it at once, to the very same people, as all talkative folks do. And as Jörgen used phrases from this story throughout his youth and later in life, we had better listen to it.

"The eels played out in the river, and Mother Eel said to her daughters, when they had begged for permission to explore a little way up the stream, 'Don't go too far! The wicked man with his spear will come and catch you all!' But they did go too far, and of the eight of them only three returned to their mother and wailed out their story, 'We had only gone a little distance beyond the door when the ugly man with the spear came and stabbed our five sisters to death!'

" 'They'll come back,' said the eel mother.

" 'No,' said the daughters. 'For he skinned them and cut them into bits and fried them.'

" 'They'll surely come back,' said the eel mother.

" 'Yes, but he ate them!'

" 'Still they'll come back,' said the eel mother.

" 'But he drank schnapps afterwards!' said the daughters.

" 'Oh, my! Oh my!' howled the eel mother. 'Then they'll never return! For schnapps drowns eels!'

"And for that very reason people should always take a little schnapps after eating them," finished the eel spearer.