A Long Tale
A King kept a man to tell him fables and tales at night before going to sleep. And one night the King, troubled with anxious thoughts, could not sleep, and the man told him three tales more than on other nights. And the King bade him tell still more, but he was unwilling, having told many. And the King said, “Thou hast told many, but they were short; tell me a long one, and then thou canst hie thee to bed.” The man, agreeing, began thus: “A countryman had a thousand shillings, and went to the fair and bought two thousand sheep at sixpence each, and on his way back he found the water had risen in the river, and that he could not cross by either bridge or ford; but he found a little boat, and putting in two sheep, rowed across. And now, the river is wide, the boat very small, and the sheep many; when the rustic has ferried his flock across, I will go on with the tale.” And he got up and hied him to bed.
“Libro de los Exemplos” (Fifteenth Century).