Atondido Stories
The Story of Poor Lukas
There was once a wealthy farmer named Lukas who was so care-
less in the management of his affairs that there came a time
when all his property was gone and he had nothing left but one
old tumble-down cottage. Then when it was too late he realized
how foolish he had been.
He had always prayed for a child but during the years of his
prosperity God had never heard him. Now when he was so poor
that he had nothing to eat, his wife gave birth to a little daughter.
He looked at the poor unwelcome little stranger and sighed, for
he didn’t know how he was going to take care of it.
The first thing to be thought about was the christening. Lu-
kas went to the wife of a laborer who lived nearby and asked her
to be godmother. She refused because she didn’t see that it
would do her any good to be godmother to a child of a man as
poor as Lukas.
“You see, Lukas, what happens to a man who has wasted his
property,” his wife said. “While we were rich the burgomaster
himself was our friend, but now even that poverty-stricken
woman won’t raise a finger to help us.... See how the poor infant
shivers, for I haven’t even any old rags in which to wrap it! And
it has to lie on the bare straw! God have mercy on us, how poor
we are!” So she wept over the baby, covering it with tears and
kisses.
Suddenly a happy thought came to her. She wiped away her
tears and said to her husband:
“I beg you, Lukas, go to our old neighbor, the burgomaster’s
wife. She is wealthy. I’m sure she hasn’t forgotten that I was
godmother to her child. Go and ask her if she will be godmother
to mine.”
“I don’t think she will,” Lukas answered, “but I’ll ask her.”
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