German children's story in the vein of the
Brothers Grimm. Written by
Wilhelm Busch in the
19th Century.
Max and Moritz are two young boys who go about town causing trouble to the townspeople. They conduct seven Streichs...tricks, each with its own story.
- Max and Moritz tie two strings together in a + sign, then attach food to the four ends. A woman's chickens eat the food and get "connected" to each other...eventually panicking and ending up hanging themselves from a tree.
- The poor woman cooks the dead chickens. M&M smell this and climb on the roof, hooking each chicken through the chimney with a fishing line. The woman sees the missing chickens and suspects her dog Spitz, whacking him with a frying pan.
- The town tailor lives across a small stream, bridged by a long board. M&M take a saw and cut the board partially, then call for the tailor. He runs out and across his bridge and falls into the cold water, catching the flu.
- M&M sneak into the home of the church organ player while he is at church. They replace the tobacco in his pipe with gunpowder. The organ player returns home, lights his pipe, and gets an explosion in the face!
- M&M collect biting insects from a tree and place them in the bed of their Uncle Fritz. He goes to bed and wakes up shortly, covered with bugs!
- M&M sneak into the bakery through the chimney. They get filthy and jump into the flour to "clean up". While climing on a chair to get some treats up high, they fall into a vat of dough. The baker catches them and puts them in the oven! The baker thinks he's taken care of them for good, but they come out of the oven alive and eat their way out of the bread covering, escaping for more mischief.
- Finally, they cut open the grain bags of a farmer, and he catches them. He puts them in sacks and has them ground into feed, which are consumed by his ducks.
A nice strict lesson to keep your
whippersnappers in line!
You can read the story in German or English, with the illustrations, at:
http://www.vcu.edu/hasweb/for/mm/mmmenu.html