The Red Nightcaps

The Red Nightcaps

There was once a man who had fifty red nightcaps to sell at a fair.

His wife put them in a sack and he set off on his journey.

He travelled along the hot, dusty road until he came to a shady wood. The cool trees looked so inviting that the man threw his sack on the ground and sat down to rest. Then, feeling very sleepy, he took one of the red nightcaps out of the sack, put it on his head, leaned back against a tree and fell fast asleep.

Unknown to the man, a troop of monkeys lived in the wood. After a while a big old monkey crept down a tree and towards the sleeping man.

Very gently he pulled one of the nightcaps out of the sack and popped it on his head. Then he ran back up to the top of the tree and sat there grinning.

How monkeys love to copy people! Seeing what the old monkey had done, a young one came swinging down through the trees. He sneaked up to the man, took a nightcap, then ran up to the top of a tree. Then another monkey took a nightcap, then another, and another. Soon there were forty-nine monkeys all sitting high in the trees chattering and grinning at each other. And on every head was a new, bright red nightcap! The monkeys

made such a noise that Be the man woke up…

and saw the empty sack in front of him. He was in despair.

“Oh, what shall I do?” he cried. “What shall I do? What can I say to my wife when I get home without any money-and not even the nightcaps?”

He was so angry with himself for falling asleep that he pulled his red nightcap off and threw it on the ground in a rage.

The forty-nine monkeys sitting high in the trees all saw what the man had done. So, all at once, they pulled off their red nightcaps and threw them down on to the ground too.

The man just could not believe his good luck. But he was very, very pleased. He picked up the fifty red nightcaps, put them back into his sack, swung it over his shoulder and set off through the woods to sell them at the fair.