You can just imagine what a shock this was to the fairies! You know,
of course, that fairies always keep their word. If they could not
persuade Subha Datta to choose something else, they would have to
give him their beloved, their precious pitcher and would have to
seek their food for themselves. They all tried all they could to
persuade the woodcutter to choose something else. They took him to
their own secret treasure-house, in an old, old tree with a hollow
trunk, even the entrance to which no mortal had ever been allowed
to see. They blindfolded him before they started, so that he could
never reveal the way, and one of them led him by the hand, telling
him where the steps going down from the tree began. When at last the
bandage was taken from his eyes, he found himself in a lofty hall
with an opening in the roof through which the light came. Piled up
on the floor were sparkling stones worth a great deal of gold and
silver money, and on the walls hung beautiful robes. Subha Datta was
quite dazed with all lie saw, but he was only an ignorant woodcutter
and did not realize the value of the jewels and clothes. So when the
fairies, said to him, "Choose anything you like here and let us keep
our pitcher," he shook his head and said: "No! no! no! The pitcher! I
will have the pitcher!" One fairy after another picked up the rubies
and diamonds and other precious stones and held them in the light,
that the woodcutter might see how lovely they were; and when he still
only shook his head, they got down the robes and tried to make him
put one of them on. "No! the pitcher! the pitcher!" he said, and at
last they had to give it up. They bound his eyes again and led him
back to the clearing and the pitcher.

17. Would you have been tempted to give up the pitcher when you saw
the jewels and the robes?