The whole of this little valley belonged to three brothers, called
Schwartz, Hans, and Gluck. Schwartz and Hans, the two elder brothers,
were very ugly men, with overwhelming eyebrows and small, dull eyes,
which were always half shut, so that you couldn't see into them, and
always fancied they saw very far into _you_. They lived by farming the
Treasure Valley, and very good farmers they were. They killed
everything that did not pay for its eating. They shot the blackbirds,
because they pecked the fruit; and killed the hedge-hogs, lest they
should suck the cows; they poisoned the crickets for eating the crumbs
in the kitchen; and smothered the cicadas, which used to sing all summer
in the lime-trees. They worked their servants without any wages, till
they could not work any more, and then quarrelled with them and turned
them out of doors without paying them. It would have been very odd,
if, with such a farm, and such a system of farming, they hadn't got very
rich; and very rich they did get.
They generally contrived to keep their corn by them till it was very
dear, and then sell it for twice its value; they had heaps of gold lying
about on their floors, yet it was never known that they had given so
much as a penny or a crust in charity; they never went to mass; grumbled
perpetually at paying tithes; and were, in a word, of so cruel and
grinding a temper, as to receive from all those with whom they had any
dealings, the nickname of the "Black Brothers.
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