Two thieves joined together and they decided to steal money from others by their cleverness.
The two of them went to a far away kingdom and pretended to be strangers and that they had never seen each other.
The first man managed to get an audience with the king of the kingdom and asked the king for the finest beer of the place.
The king sadly shook his head on hearing the other man's request. “This year there has been a major failure in all the crops. The vines have also not survived. So we do not have any wine or beer in the whole kingdom.”
The other man pretended to be surprised. “That is just impossible. I have come from a country where the crops are so fine that they made twelve barrels of beer from one branch alone.”
The king was annoyed when he heard this. “I bet you three hundred florins that this cannot be true.” Still looking annoyed, the king summoned his servant. “Go to this country and ask them how their crops fared this year. At once we will know that this man is lying.”
The servant prepared himself for a long journey and started on horseback.
The servant had not even crossed his kingdom when he met a stranger. The servant stopped and waved to the stranger to come towards him. “I have never seen you here before. From which country have you come?”
The servant was shocked when the stranger gave the name of the country that the servant was supposed to go to under the orders of the king.
The servant thought that this was lucky because now he did not have to travel all the way to another country. The servant nodded at the stranger. “In that case can you tell me how big the vine in your country grows and how many barrels of beer can you make from one branch?”
The stranger shrugged. “I cannot tell you for sure but I know that it took three men about three days to cut one branch.”
The servant paid the stranger ten florins and asked him to repeat this to the king of his kingdom.
Adapted from Andrew Lang’s Fairy Tales
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