The Flying Dutchman and Other Folktales from the Netherlands

Copyright © 2008 by Theo Meder

A mother-goat went to the wild

And warned her only little child

To keep the door locked very tight

And keep the fearful wolf outside.

A wolf came by and tried to fake

The sounds a mother-goat would make.

The goat looked through a hole he knew

And said, "You scoundrel, I know you!

Why did you make the sound you made?

May God's dishonor be your fate!"

So never will you end up dead

If you obey your mom and dad.

This is a thirteenth-century verse version of ATU 123, The Wolf and the Kids, written down in the Middle Dutch manuscript of fables called Esopet. The translation is based on G. Stuiveling, ed., Esopet (Amsterdam, 1965), part 2, p. 39.