The Goat and the Tailor
Collected by Afra Mohammed
Edited by Patty Paine
Once upon a time, there was a beautiful girl who had all her clothing made by the local tailor. The tailor admired the young beautiful girl, and he wanted to marry her even though he knew her family would not allow him to marry her.
The tailor thought and thought about how he could marry this girl. He became friends with the maid at the girl’s house, and he asked the maid to help him. After thinking about the tailor’s request, the maid said, “Alright tailor, I will help you, but you have to give me money.”
The tailor agreed immediately, and gave the maid all the money he had.
While the beautiful young girl was asleep in her room, the maid crept in and cut off a lock of the girl’s hair. Her plan was to give the tailor the lock of the girl’s hair so he could have a black magic spell made that would make the girl fall in love with him and want to marry him against her family’s wishes.
The girl’s younger brother was playing and his ball rolled into the maid's room. He chased his ball into the maid’s room and saw his sister’s hair on the maid’s table. He knew that the maid was up to no good. He went next door to talk to his wise neighbor about what he should do. The man said “I have a goat with the same color hair as your sister. Let’s cut a bit of the goat’s hair, and replace your sister’s hair with the hair of the goat. Then we will watch and see what happens.”
The boy did what the wise neighbor advised.
A few days later, the goat went to the tailor’s shop and stood there from sunrise to sunset. The tailor tried to make the goat leave, but the goat refused.
In the end, the beautiful girl was saved from the black magic spell, and the goat fell in love with the tailor.
