y after a long apprenticeship. Jacob
served there, rising from a scullion to be first pastry-cook, and
soon acquired such uncommon cleverness and experience in all arts of
the kitchen, that he often wondered at himself. The most difficult
dishes--such as pasties seasoned with two hundred different essences,
and vegetable soup consisting of all the vegetables on earth--all this
he was learned in, and could prepare any thing speedily. Thus had some
seven years passed in the service of the old woman, when one day she
took off her cocoanut shoes, grasped her crutch, and ordered Jacob to
pluck a chicken, stuff it with herbs, and have it all nicely roasted by
the time she came back. He did all this in accordance with the rules of
his art. He wrung the chicken's neck, scalded it in hot water, pulled
out the feathers, scraped the skin till it was nice and smooth, and,
having drawn it, began to collect some herbs for the dressing. In the
room where the vegetables were kept he discovered a closet which he had
never noticed before, the door of which stood ajar. He went nearer,
curious to see what was kept there; and beheld many baskets, from which
a powerful but pleasant odor arose. He opened one of these baskets and
found therein herbs of quite peculiar shape and color. The stems and
leaves were of a bluish-green, and bore a small flower of brilliant
red, bordered with gold. He examined this flower thoughtfully, smelt of
it, and discovered that it gave forth the same strong odor that he had
inhaled from the soup the old woman had cooked for him so long ago. But
so strong was the fragrance that he began to sneeze; he sneezed more
and more violently, and at last--woke up, sneezing.

[Illustration]

He lay on the divan and looked around him in astonishment. "Really, how
true one's dreams do seem!" said he to himself. "Just now I should have
been willing to swear that I was a mean little squirrel, the companion
of Guinea-pigs and other low creatures, and from them exalted to be a
great cook! How my mother will laugh when I tell her all this! But may
she not scold me for going to sleep in a strange house, instead of
hurrying back to help her at the market-place?"

So thinking, he got up to go away; but found his limbs cramped, and his
neck so stiff that he could not move it from side to side. He had to
laugh at himself for being so helplessly sleepy; for every moment,
before he knew it, he was striking his nose on a clothes-press, o