Gretel began to cry, and said: "How are we to get out of the forest now?" But Hansel comforted her: "Just wait a little while until the moon has risen, and then we'll find our way, that's for sure." And when the full moon had risen Hansel took his little sister by the hand and followed the pebbles, which were shining like new-minted pennies and showed them the way. At last, when they woke, darkest night had fallen. And as they had been sitting for such a long time, their eyes closed with weariness and they fell fast asleep. But it wasn't the woodman's axe it was a bough he had tied to a dead tree, blowing to and fro in the wind. And because they heard the blows from the woodman's axe, they thought their father was nearby. Hansel and Gretel sat by the fire, and when midday came they each ate their piece of bread. When we're finished we'll come back and fetch you." The brushwood was lit, and when the flames rose high the woman said: "Now lie down by the fire, children, and have a rest. I'll light a fire so that you don't get frozen." Hansel and Gretel gathered up brushwood, a little mountain of it. When they had come to the middle of the forest their father said: "Now, go and gather some wood, children. His father said: "Hansel, what are you looking back at? Why are you dawdling all the time? Watch out, my boy, and mind where you're going." "Oh, father," said Hansel, "I'm looking back at my little white cat she's sitting up on the roof and wants to say goodbye." The woman said: "Little fool, that's not your cat that's the morning sun shining on the chimney." But Hansel hadn't been looking back at the cat instead, each time he had dropped one of the bright pebbles from his pocket. After they had been walking for a little while Hansel stopped and looked back towards the house, and he did so over and over again. Then they all made their way together towards the forest. But mind you don't eat it before then, because you're not getting any more." Gretel took the bread beneath her apron, because Hansel had the stones in his pocket. "Get up, you pair of lazybones, we want to go into the forest to fetch wood." Then she gave them each a little piece of bread, saying: "Here's something for midday. God won't forsake us," and lay down on his bed.Īt daybreak, even before the sun had risen, the woman came and woke the two children.
Then he went back and said to Gretel: "Don't worry, sister dear, go to sleep peacefully. Hansel stooped down and crammed his little pocket with as many as could fill them. The moon was shining clear, and the white pebbles in front of the house were glistening as bright as pennies. Gretel wept bitterly and said to Hansel: "Now it's all up with us." "Hush, Gretel," said Hansel, "don't fret, I'll get us out of this." And when the grown-ups had fallen asleep, he got up, put on his jacket, opened the door downstairs, and slipped out. The two children had not been able to sleep for hunger either, and they had heard what their stepmother had said to their father. "But I'm sorry for the children, all the same," the husband said. "No, wife," said the man, "that I won't do how could I have the heart to leave my children alone in the forest it wouldn't be long before the wild beasts came and tore them to shreds." "Oh, you fool," she said, "then we're bound to die of hunger, all four of us you can just plane the boards for the coffins." And she gave him no peace until he complied. They won't find their way back home, and we'll be rid of them.
There we'll light them a fire and give each of them an extra piece of bread, then we'll go off to our work and leave them on their own. "Tomorrow morning, very early, let us take the two children out into the forest where it is thickest. As he lay in bed one evening, brooding over this and tossing and turning with worry, he sighed and said to his wife: "What's to become of us? How can we feed our poor children when we've nothing left for ourselves?" "Do you know what, husband?" answered his wife. He had little enough to put in his belly, and once, when a great famine came upon the land, he could not even provide their daily bread. On the edge of a great forest there lived a poor woodcutter with wife and his two children the little boy was called Hansel and the girl Gretel.
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