So here we are, livin’ in a pig-stye, and my husband comes home and tells me he caught a fish. Well, it’s about time! Where is it?

“Oh, I let him go,” says he.

“You did what? You haven’t caught any fish for days! You mean to starve us?”

“It was a Flounder,” he says. “He told me he was an enchanted prince.”

“Well, if he was a prince, did you ask him for something before setting him free?”

“No,” says he.

Imbecile! I ordered him to go back and call that fish. “Tell him we live in a stinking, disgusting pig-stye and we want a better hut to live in. Go!”

The Fisherman’s Wife in The Fisherman and His Wife, Grimms. Illustration by Walter Crane.