There was once a poor man who had many children to feed. However, the poor man's children were all very hard-working. So all of the poor man’s children except one, went to work in other houses as servants. The poor man’s children worked very hard and were cheerful. So the poor man’s children were able to take care of themselves.
However, one of the sons of the poor man was Tiidu. Tiidu was very lazy and did not do any work. No matter what his parents told him or how much he was scolded, Tiidu did not change his ways.
However Tiidu played the flute beautifully well.
Once Tiidu was playing the flute, he sat under the shade of trees doing nothing else.
On hearing the notes from his flute once an old man came to see him. The old man looked surprised on seeing that the notes were played by a human because the old man thought that the nose came from a bird. “What work do you do?”
Tiidu was unhappy when he heard the old man’s question. “I want to be a rich man so that I do not have to work at all.”
The old man laughed when he heard Tiidu’s answer. “If you need to become rich you need to make money. You will not earn then by sitting around and doing nothing.” The old man waved at Tiidu and his flute. “You have a gift. You should go and play pipes. Then you will easily make money.
Tiidu frowned for a few seconds. “But I do not have money to get pipes.”
The old man smiled again. “Play on your flute for a few days then you will make money. Using the money buy some pipes and play it and you are likely to grow rich.”
Tiidu decided to follow the old man's advice. However he did not want to be laughed at if his plan did not work out. So he did not tell anyone and the next morning he left his home to find his fortune.
His parents were finally happy that Tiidu had decided to create something for himself.
Tiidu wandered from village to village and played his flute. The people whom Tiidu met were all very kind and they gave him food in return for his music and sometimes they also gave him money. Tiidu saved all the money that he got and soon bought a beautiful pair of pipes.
When Tiidu started playing his pipe everybody around him enjoyed it.
Soon it came such that whenever there was a marriage or any other function Tiidu was always called in.
A few years Tiidu had become such a good music player that people would travel far and wide to hear him play.
Adapted from Andrew Lang’s Fairy Tales
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