"Of course,"
answered one of the thieves, "my companion struck it with a switch on
the haunch." The old man asked: "But where did you strike it, on the
right or on the left haunch?" "On the left." "That is why the rabbit ran
away," said the old man. "You should have hit it on the right. If you
did not observe these conditions, what fault is it of mine?" "This is
true," said the thieves, "Uncle Capriano is right; so go and eat and we
will attend to the work." And so their friendship was not broken this
time.

After a time Uncle Capriano said to his wife: "We must get some more
money from the thieves." "In what way?" "To-morrow you must buy a new
pot, and then you must cook in an old pot somewhere in the house, and at
Ave Maria, just before I come home, you must empty the old pot into the
new one, and put it on the hearth without any fire. To-morrow I will
tell the thieves that I have a pot that cooks without any fire."

The next evening Uncle Capriano persuaded the thieves to go home with
him. When they saw the pot they looked at one another and said: "We must
ask him to give it to us." After some hesitation, he sold it to them for
four hundred ounces, and twenty over as before.

When the thieves arrived at their house in the country, they killed a
fine kid, put it into the pot, and set it on the hearth, without any
fire, and went away. In the evening they all ran and tried to see who
would arrive first, and find the meat cooked. The one who arrived first
took out a piece of meat, and saw that it was as they had left it. Then
he gave the pot a kick, and broke it in two. When the others came and
found the meat not cooked, they started for Uncle Capriano's, and
complained to him that he had sold them a pot that cooked everything,
and that they had put meat into it, and found it raw. "Did you break the
pot?" asked Uncle Capriano. "Of course we broke it." "What kind of a
hearth did you have, high or low?" One of the thieves answered: "Rather
high." "That was why the pot did not cook; it should have been low. You
did not observe the conditions and broke the pot; what fault is that of
mine?" The thieves said: "Uncle Capriano is right; go, Uncle Capriano,
and eat, for we will do your work."

Some time after, Uncle Capriano said again to his wife: "We must get
some more money out of them." "But how can we manage it?" "You know that
we have a whistle in the chest; have it put in order, and to-morrow go
to the butcher's, and g