e month went by without
anyone seeing his cup held towards them, people would say, "Where is
the old man?" and the usual answer was, "On the roads."

This said man had had for a father a Tryballot, who was in his
lifetime a skilled artisan, so economical and careful, that he left
considerable wealth to his son.

But the young lad soon frittered it away, for he was the very opposite
of the old fellow, who, returning from the fields to his house, picked
up, now here, now there, many a little stick of wood left right and
left, saying, conscientiously, that one should never come home empty
handed. Thus he warmed himself in the winter at the expense of the
careless; and he did well. Everyone recognised what a good example
this was for the country, since a year before his death no one left a
morsel of wood on the road; he had compelled the most dissipated to be
thrifty and orderly. But his son made ducks and drakes of everything,
and did not follow his wise example. The father had predicted the
thing. From the boy's earliest youth, when the good Tryballot set him
to watch the birds who came to eat the peas, beans, and the grain, and
to drive the thieves away, above all, the jays, who spoiled
everything, he would study their habits, and took delight in watching
with what grace they came and went, flew off loaded, and returned,
watching with a quick eye the snares and nets; and he would laugh
heartily at their cleverness in avoiding them. Tryballot senior went
into a passion when he found his grain considerably less in a measure.
But although he pulled his son's ears whenever he caught him idling
and trifling under a nut tree, the little rascal did not alter his
conduct, but continued to study the habits of the blackbirds,
sparrows, and other intelligent marauders. One day his father told him
that he would be wise to model himself after them, for that if he
continued this kind of life, he would be compelled in his old age like
them, to pilfer, and like them, would be pursued by justice. This came
true; for, as has before been stated, he dissipated in a few days the
crowns which his careful father had acquired in a life-time. He dealt
with men as he did with the sparrows, letting everyone put a hand in
his pocket, and contemplating the grace and polite demeanour of those
who assisted to empty it. The end of his wealth was thus soon reached.
When the devil had the empty money bag to himself, Tryballot did not
appear at all cut