{"id":7864,"date":"2024-06-27T11:17:41","date_gmt":"2024-06-27T15:17:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lecturia.org\/?p=7864"},"modified":"2025-11-09T20:33:52","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T00:33:52","slug":"saki-the-story-teller","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/short-stories\/saki-the-story-teller\/7864\/","title":{"rendered":"Saki: The Story-Teller"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Synopsis: <\/strong>\u201cThe Story-Teller\u201d is a short story by Saki (H. H. Munro), published in 1914 in the book Beasts and Super-Beasts<\/em>. In a hot train carriage, a woman tries to keep her three restless nephews entertained. To do so, she tells them a moralistic story that fails miserably, causing boredom and disinterest in the children. Irritated by the commotion, a man also traveling in the car intervenes and tells them his own story: a witty and provocative tale that immediately captures the attention of his impromptu audience.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\n
\"Saki<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The Story-Teller<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Saki
(Full story)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a hot afternoon, and the railway carriage was correspondingly sultry, and the next stop was at Templecombe, nearly an hour ahead.  The occupants of the carriage were a small girl, and a smaller girl, and a small boy.  An aunt belonging to the children occupied one corner seat, and the further corner seat on the opposite side was occupied by a bachelor who was a stranger to their party, but the small girls and the small boy emphatically occupied the compartment.  Both the aunt and the children were conversational in a limited, persistent way, reminding one of the attentions of a housefly that refuses to be discouraged.  Most of the aunt\u2019s remarks seemed to begin with \u201cDon\u2019t,\u201d and nearly all of the children\u2019s remarks began with \u201cWhy?\u201d  The bachelor said nothing out loud.  \u201cDon\u2019t, Cyril, don\u2019t,\u201d exclaimed the aunt, as the small boy began smacking the cushions of the seat, producing a cloud of dust at each blow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCome and look out of the window,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The child moved reluctantly to the window.  \u201cWhy are those sheep being driven out of that field?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI expect they are being driven to another field where there is more grass,\u201d said the aunt weakly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut there is lots of grass in that field,\u201d protested the boy; \u201cthere\u2019s nothing else but grass there.  Aunt, there\u2019s lots of grass in that field.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPerhaps the grass in the other field is better,\u201d suggested the aunt fatuously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy is it better?\u201d came the swift, inevitable question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOh, look at those cows!\u201d exclaimed the aunt.  Nearly every field along the line had contained cows or bullocks, but she spoke as though she were drawing attention to a rarity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy is the grass in the other field better?\u201d persisted Cyril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The frown on the bachelor\u2019s face was deepening to a scowl.  He was a hard, unsympathetic man, the aunt decided in her mind.  She was utterly unable to come to any satisfactory decision about the grass in the other field.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The smaller girl created a diversion by beginning to recite \u201cOn the Road to Mandalay.\u201d  She only knew the first line, but she put her limited knowledge to the fullest possible use.  She repeated the line over and over again in a dreamy but resolute and very audible voice; it seemed to the bachelor as though some one had had a bet with her that she could not repeat the line aloud two thousand times without stopping.  Whoever it was who had made the wager was likely to lose his bet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCome over here and listen to a story,\u201d said the aunt, when the bachelor had looked twice at her and once at the communication cord.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The children moved listlessly towards the aunt\u2019s end of the carriage.  Evidently her reputation as a story-teller did not rank high in their estimation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a low, confidential voice, interrupted at frequent intervals by loud, petulant questionings from her listeners, she began an unenterprising and deplorably uninteresting story about a little girl who was good, and made friends with every one on account of her goodness, and was finally saved from a mad bull by a number of rescuers who admired her moral character.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWouldn\u2019t they have saved her if she hadn\u2019t been good?\u201d demanded the bigger of the small girls.  It was exactly the question that the bachelor had wanted to ask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, yes,\u201d admitted the aunt lamely, \u201cbut I don\u2019t think they would have run quite so fast to her help if they had not liked her so much.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the stupidest story I\u2019ve ever heard,\u201d said the bigger of the small girls, with immense conviction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t listen after the first bit, it was so stupid,\u201d said Cyril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The smaller girl made no actual comment on the story, but she had long ago recommenced a murmured repetition of her favourite line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t seem to be a success as a story-teller,\u201d said the bachelor suddenly from his corner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The aunt bristled in instant defence at this unexpected attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very difficult thing to tell stories that children can both understand and appreciate,\u201d she said stiffly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t agree with you,\u201d said the bachelor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPerhaps you would like to tell them a story,\u201d was the aunt\u2019s retort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTell us a story,\u201d demanded the bigger of the small girls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOnce upon a time,\u201d began the bachelor, \u201cthere was a little girl called Bertha, who was extraordinarily good.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The children\u2019s momentarily-aroused interest began at once to flicker; all stories seemed dreadfully alike, no matter who told them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe did all that she was told, she was always truthful, she kept her clothes clean, ate milk puddings as though they were jam tarts, learned her lessons perfectly, and was polite in her manners.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWas she pretty?\u201d asked the bigger of the small girls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNot as pretty as any of you,\u201d said the bachelor, \u201cbut she was horribly good.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was a wave of reaction in favour of the story; the word horrible in connection with goodness was a novelty that commended itself.  It seemed to introduce a ring of truth that was absent from the aunt\u2019s tales of infant life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe was so good,\u201d continued the bachelor, \u201cthat she won several medals for goodness, which she always wore, pinned on to her dress.  There was a medal for obedience, another medal for punctuality, and a third for good behaviour.  They were large metal medals and they clicked against one another as she walked.  No other child in the town where she lived had as many as three medals, so everybody knew that she must be an extra good child.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHorribly good,\u201d quoted Cyril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEverybody talked about her goodness, and the Prince of the country got to hear about it, and he said that as she was so very good she might be allowed once a week to walk in his park, which was just outside the town.  It was a beautiful park, and no children were ever allowed in it, so it was a great honour for Bertha to be allowed to go there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWere there any sheep in the park?\u201d demanded Cyril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo;\u201d said the bachelor, \u201cthere were no sheep.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy weren\u2019t there any sheep?\u201d came the inevitable question arising out of that answer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The aunt permitted herself a smile, which might almost have been described as a grin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere were no sheep in the park,\u201d said the bachelor, \u201cbecause the Prince\u2019s mother had once had a dream that her son would either be killed by a sheep or else by a clock falling on him.  For that reason the Prince never kept a sheep in his park or a clock in his palace.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The aunt suppressed a gasp of admiration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWas the Prince killed by a sheep or by a clock?\u201d asked Cyril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe is still alive, so we can\u2019t tell whether the dream will come true,\u201d said the bachelor unconcernedly; \u201canyway, there were no sheep in the park, but there were lots of little pigs running all over the place.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat colour were they?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBlack with white faces, white with black spots, black all over, grey with white patches, and some were white all over.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The story-teller paused to let a full idea of the park\u2019s treasures sink into the children\u2019s imaginations; then he resumed:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBertha was rather sorry to find that there were no flowers in the park.  She had promised her aunts, with tears in her eyes, that she would not pick any of the kind Prince\u2019s flowers, and she had meant to keep her promise, so of course it made her feel silly to find that there were no flowers to pick.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhy weren\u2019t there any flowers?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBecause the pigs had eaten them all,\u201d said the bachelor promptly.  \u201cThe gardeners had told the Prince that you couldn\u2019t have pigs and flowers, so he decided to have pigs and no flowers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was a murmur of approval at the excellence of the Prince\u2019s decision; so many people would have decided the other way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere were lots of other delightful things in the park.  There were ponds with gold and blue and green fish in them, and trees with beautiful parrots that said clever things at a moment\u2019s notice, and humming birds that hummed all the popular tunes of the day.  Bertha walked up and down and enjoyed herself immensely, and thought to herself: \u2018If I were not so extraordinarily good I should not have been allowed to come into this beautiful park and enjoy all that there is to be seen in it,\u2019 and her three medals clinked against one another as she walked and helped to remind her how very good she really was.  Just then an enormous wolf came prowling into the park to see if it could catch a fat little pig for its supper.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat colour was it?\u201d asked the children, amid an immediate quickening of interest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMud-colour all over, with a black tongue and pale grey eyes that gleamed with unspeakable ferocity.  The first thing that it saw in the park was Bertha; her pinafore was so spotlessly white and clean that it could be seen from a great distance.  Bertha saw the wolf and saw that it was stealing towards her, and she began to wish that she had never been allowed to come into the park.  She ran as hard as she could, and the wolf came after her with huge leaps and bounds.  She managed to reach a shrubbery of myrtle bushes and she hid herself in one of the thickest of the bushes.  The wolf came sniffing among the branches, its black tongue lolling out of its mouth and its pale grey eyes glaring with rage.  Bertha was terribly frightened, and thought to herself: \u2018If I had not been so extraordinarily good I should have been safe in the town at this moment.\u2019  However, the scent of the myrtle was so strong that the wolf could not sniff out where Bertha was hiding, and the bushes were so thick that he might have hunted about in them for a long time without catching sight of her, so he thought he might as well go off and catch a little pig instead.  Bertha was trembling very much at having the wolf prowling and sniffing so near her, and as she trembled the medal for obedience clinked against the medals for good conduct and punctuality.  The wolf was just moving away when he heard the sound of the medals clinking and stopped to listen; they clinked again in a bush quite near him.  He dashed into the bush, his pale grey eyes gleaming with ferocity and triumph, and dragged Bertha out and devoured her to the last morsel.  All that was left of her were her shoes, bits of clothing, and the three medals for goodness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWere any of the little pigs killed?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo, they all escaped.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe story began badly,\u201d said the smaller of the small girls, \u201cbut it had a beautiful ending.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is the most beautiful story that I ever heard,\u201d said the bigger of the small girls, with immense decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is the only<\/em> beautiful story I have ever heard,\u201d said Cyril.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A dissentient opinion came from the aunt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA most improper story to tell to young children!  You have undermined the effect of years of careful teaching.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt any rate,\u201d said the bachelor, collecting his belongings preparatory to leaving the carriage, \u201cI kept them quiet for ten minutes, which was more than you were able to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUnhappy woman!\u201d he observed to himself as he walked down the platform of Templecombe station; \u201cfor the next six months or so those children will assail her in public with demands for an improper story!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE END<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Story-Teller\u201d is a short story by Saki (H. H. Munro), published in 1914 in the book Beasts and Super-Beasts. In a hot train carriage, a woman tries to keep her three restless nephews entertained. To do so, she tells them a moralistic story that fails miserably, causing boredom and disinterest in the children. Irritated by the commotion, a man also traveling in the car intervenes and tells them his own story: a witty and provocative tale that immediately captures the attention of his impromptu audience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13020,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[584,596,597,772],"class_list":["post-7864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-short-stories","tag-great-britain","tag-humor-en","tag-saki-hector-hugh-munro-en","tag-united-kingdom","generate-columns","tablet-grid-50","mobile-grid-100","grid-parent","grid-33"],"acf":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":559,"label":"Short stories"}],"post_tag":[{"value":584,"label":"Great Britain"},{"value":596,"label":"Humor"},{"value":597,"label":"Saki (Hector Hugh Munro)"},{"value":772,"label":"United Kingdom"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/lecturia.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/Saki-El-cuentista.jpg",1024,1024,false],"author_info":{"display_name":"Juan Pablo Guevara","author_link":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/author\/spartakku\/"},"comment_info":"","category_info":[{"term_id":559,"name":"Short stories","slug":"short-stories","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":559,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":418,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":559,"category_count":418,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Short stories","category_nicename":"short-stories","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":584,"name":"Great Britain","slug":"great-britain","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":584,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":49,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":596,"name":"Humor","slug":"humor-en","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":596,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":5,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":597,"name":"Saki (Hector Hugh Munro)","slug":"saki-hector-hugh-munro-en","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":597,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":11,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":772,"name":"United Kingdom","slug":"united-kingdom","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":772,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":92,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7864"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7864\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lecturia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}