Peter Christen Asbjørnsen

“ ONCE on a time there were two goodies who quarrelled, as women often will; and when they had nothing else to quarrel about, they fell to fighting about their husbands, as to which was the silliest of them. The longer they strove the worse they got, and at last they had almost come to pulling caps about it; for, as every one knows, it is easier to begin than to end, and it is a bad look-out when wit is wanting. At last one of them said there was nothing she could not get her husband to believe, if she only said it, for he was as easy as a Troll. ”

“ You look just like a corpse in face; you must go to bed! Dear! dear! this never can last long! And so she went on till she got her husband to believe he was hard at death's door, and she put him to bed; and then she made him fold his hands on his breast, and shut his eyes; and so she stretched his limbs, and laid him out, and put him into a coffin ”

“ The other goody, she took a pair of carding combs and began to card wool; but she had no wool on them. In came the man, and saw this tomfoolery.
"There's no use," he said, "in a wheel without wool; but carding combs without wool is work for a fool." ”