Aesop's Fables

#203 Mercury and the Workmen

A Workman, felling wood by the side of a river, let his axe drop by accident into a deep pool. Being thus deprived of the means of his livelihood, he sat down on the bank and lamented his hard fate.

Mercury appeared and demanded the cause of his tears.

After the Workman told of his misfortune, Mercury plunged into the stream and, bringing up a golden axe, inquired if that were the one he had lost.

On his saying that it was not his, Mercury disappeared beneath the water a second time and returned with a silver axe in his hand. Again, he asked the Workman if the axe was his.

When the Workman said it was not, Mercury dived into the pool for a third time and brought up the axe that had been lost.

The Workman claimed it and expressed his joy at its recovery. Mercury, pleased with his honesty, gave him the golden and silver axes in addition to his own.

The Workman, on his return to his house, related to his companions all that had happened. One of them at once resolved to try to secure the same good fortune for himself. He ran to the river and threw his axe on purpose into the pool at the same place, and sat down on the bank to weep. Mercury appeared to him just as he had hoped and, having learned the cause of his grief, plunged into the stream and brought up a golden axe and asked the Workman if he had lost it. The Workman seized it greedily, and declared that truly it was the very same axe that he had lost. Mercury, displeased at his knavery, not only took away the golden axe, but refused to recover for him the axe he had thrown into the pool.