Week 3 Story: The Gold Fishing Rod

     Jonah was a fisherman in his little village. He had a caring wife who stayed at home and cooked, cleaned, and looked after their four children.  He woke up every morning at the break of dawn to go down to the largest and deepest pond in their village. The pond was at the edge of the forest which he had to trek through every day to get to the pond. 

     One day when Jonah was fishing in this deep pond, he was concerned about his financial situation at home because they were getting ready to have a new addition to the family. He decided to stay and fish a little longer today to earn more money for his family. As the sun started to set, he grew fatigued and started to drift off. He was woken up by a large splash as he realized that he had dropped his fishing pole in the pond. He looked deep into the pond to see if there were any signs of his fishing pole but there was no trace of it. The pond was much too deep for him to jump in and look for his fishing rod so he sat by the river and wept bitterly while thinking to himself “What will I do without my fishing rod, I can’t make money for my family and I can’t afford to buy a new one”. 

     Mercury heard his cries and came up to the surface of the pond to ask what was wrong. Jonah told him the problem with tears in his eyes and Mercury immediately went down into the pond to look for the fishing rod. Mercury returned to the surface with a gold rod and offered it to Jonah but Jonah insisted that it wasn’t his. Mercury then went back in and returned with a silver rod but Jonah once again said it wasn’t his. Finally, Mercury came back with the original rod that Jonah had dropped and Jonah leaped with joy at the sight of his rod and graciously accepted. Mercury was moved by Jonah’s honesty and let him keep all 3 of the fishing rods. 

     The next day, word had spread to the whole village that Jonah received luxurious rods from Mercury down by the pond. Other people in the village immediately grabbed their fishing gear and ran into the forest to throw their fishing rods into the water. They would then cry and pretend as if they had lost their most prized possession. Mercury would receive their cries and start out by bringing a gold rod out of the water. They tried to immediately take the gold rod but Mercury wouldn’t allow it. He hit them with the gold rod and returned to the water with the rod. The greedy men realized that they had lost their original rods too because the pond was too deep to go down into.    

A fisherman at a pond: Clipartool

Bibliography. "Mercury and the Woodman" from Aesop's Fables by Milo Winter; Web Source.

Author's Note: A woodman was in the forest trying to chop down a tree when he accidentally dropped the axe in the water after a long tiring day of chopping. He cried bitterly without his axe because it was his source of income and his life line. He didn't have enough money to buy a new one. Mercury heard his cries and dove deep in the water to retrieve his axe but instead pulled out a gold axe. The woodman denied that it was his and Mercury then pulled out a silver which the woodman also turned down and then finally, Mercury pulled out the one that the woodman lost originally and he happily accepted. Mercury gladly gave him all 3 to keep for his honesty. Other people in town had heard about his fortune and started hiding their axes in the bushes and forest and pretending like they had lost their axes and called out to Mercury to help them find their axes and once again, Mercury offered them the gold one first and they tried to take it but Mercury instead hit them with the axe and they ended up losing their original axes too because they were gone when they tried to look for them. When retelling the story, I changed the main object from an axe to a fishing rod and added more background to the main character.