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Title: The Great Bear Author: Leo Tolstoy Date: 1916 Language: en Topics: fiction Source: Original text from http://www.revoltlib.com/?id=10367, 2021. Translated by Rochelle S. Townsend.
A long, long time ago there was a big drought on the earth. All the
rivers dried up and the streams and wells, and the trees withered and
the bushes and grass, and men and beasts died of thirst.
One night a little girl went out with a pitcher to find some water for
her sick mother. She wandered and wandered everywhere, but could find no
water, and she grew so tired that she lay down on the grass and fell
asleep. When she awoke and took up the pitcher she nearly upset the
water it contained. The pitcher was full of clear, fresh water. The
little girl was glad and was about to put it to her lips, but she
remembered her mother and ran home with the pitcher as fast as she
could. She hurried so much that she did not notice a little dog in her
path ; she stumbled over it and dropped the pitcher. The dog whined
pitifully ; the little girl seized the pitcher.
She thought the water would have been upset, but the pitcher stood
upright and the water was there as before. She poured a little into the
palm of her hand and the dog lapped it and was comforted. When the
little girl again took up the pitcher, it had turned from common wood to
silver. She took the pitcher home and gave it to her mother.
The mother said, " I shall die just the same ; you had better drink it,'
: and she handed the pitcher to the child. In that moment the pitcher
turned from silver to gold. The little girl could no longer contain
herself and was about to put the pitcher to her lips, when the door
opened and a stranger entered who begged for a drink. The little girl
swallowed her saliva and gave the pitcher to him. And suddenly seven
large diamonds sprang out of the pitcher and a stream of clear, fresh
water flowed from it. And the seven diamonds began to rise, and they
rose higher and higher till they reached the sky and became the Great
Bear.