Dansk / B1
Sypigen, som tabte sin nål
En ung kvinde, som arbejdede med at sy, tabte engang sin synål ude på en mark. Tabet gjorde hende meget ked af det.
”Jeg ville hellere have mistet ti andre nåle end netop den her,” sagde hun.
Hun gjorde sig stor umage for at finde den igen. Men lige meget hvor meget hun ledte, blev nålen ikke fundet.
Mens hun søgte efter den, fandt hun noget andet: en ægte perle. Den var så værdifuld, at hun kunne købe mere end en million synåle for den.
Et mindre tab kan altså være årsag til en stor gevinst.
English summary · includes the ending
A young woman who sews loses a needle in a field. She is deeply upset by the loss and says she would rather have lost ten other needles than this particular one. The story does not explain why she values it so highly.
She makes every effort to find the needle again, but her search fails. However hard she looks, the small object remains out of sight. While searching for it, she discovers something quite different: a genuine pearl.
The pearl is worth enough to buy more than a million sewing needles. Although she does not recover the needle she wanted, looking for it brings her a much greater gain. The ending changes the meaning of the loss that seemed so upsetting at first.
Holberg closes the fable with a simple lesson: a small loss can often be the cause of a large gain.
Adapted for Lejrbål from the credited source.
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