There was a cobbler who was happier than any of the Seven Sages, and mellifluously sang throughout the day.
His neighbor, on the other hand, a man of wealth, a financier, did not sing much—and slept still less. If sometimes he at dawn into a fitful slumber fell at last, it only was to be awakened by the cobbler’s unrepressible aubade. The financier deplored a world in which a multimillionaire like him could buy his food and drink, but not a wink of sleep!
He summoned now the cobbler to his mansion, and asked, “You earn, good sir, how much a year?”
That merry man in laughing tones replied, “I hardly know. It’s not my habit thus to add the days together. Walk the yards, they say; the miles will walk themselves. I get enough to buy my bread with.”
“Tell me, then, how much a day?”
“It varies. Sometimes more, and sometimes less. We’d be quite well-to-do, to tell the truth, if not for all these saints’ days when we’re not allowed to work. The priests keep adding new ones, too!”
The financier said, chuckling, “Well, I’d like to help you. Here’s three hundred francs to set aside for time of need.”
The cobbler thought it more than all the money spent by all the men since gold itself was born. He took it home and locked it in his cellar—and he locked away his joy as well.
He sang no more, and ceased to sleep; his former ease was troubled now by insubstantial worries, fears, suspicions; his guard was always up; and any sound at night—a padding cat, the house’s sigh—could rouse him to alarm.
The financier slept better now. (The filthy rich by song are bothered more than fear of robbery.)
The poor are better left in poverty.