The Shroud

There was a mother who had a little girl of seven years old who was so beautiful and lovely that no one could look at her without being good to her, and she loved her more than anything in the world. Now it happened that he suddenly became ill, and the good God took him to himself. The mother could not console herself and cried day and night. Soon after it was buried, however, the child appeared at night in the places where it had otherwise sat and played in life. When the mother cried, he also cried, and when morning came, he was gone. But when the mother did not want to stop crying, he came one night with his white shroud, in which he had been laid in the coffin, and with the wreath on his head, and sat down at her feet on the bed and said, "Oh, mother, stop crying, or I will not be able to fall asleep in my coffin, for my shroud will not dry from your tears, which all fall on it." Then the mother was frightened when she heard this and cried no more. And the next night the little child came again, holding a little light in her hand, and said, "You see, now my little shirt will soon be dry, and I will have rest in my grave." Then the mother commanded her sorrow to the good Lord and bore it quietly and patiently, and the child did not come again, but slept in his little bed underground.