Once upon a time a little pig lived in a little wooden house in the middle of a forest in Hungary.
One very cold day, the little pig made a big fire and began cooking his dinner.
Suddenly there was a banging on his door, and a voice shouted:
“Dear little pig! Kind little pig! Do let me in. The north wind is blowing and I’m very, very cold.”
The little pig knew it was a wolf that was speaking.
“If you would open the door and let me put just one of my back legs into your house, that would save me from dying of cold,” the wolf continued.
The little pig knew from experience how miserable it was to be cold and since he had a kind heart, and thought that one back leg of the wolf could not do him any harm, he replied, “Very well. Only one back leg and no more.”
“Thank you! Thank you! Dear little pig, kind little pig,” said the wolf. So the little pig opened the door just wide enough for the wolf to put in one back leg, but as he did not really trust the wolf, he put a big pot of water on the fire to boil. A little while later the wolf sighed deeply and said, “Dear little pig! Kind little pig! Will you let me put my other back leg in your house? I’m so cold.” So the kind little pig let the wolf bring in his other back leg, and lie down with half of his body inside and half outside. The little pig put more wood on the fire, and the wolf seemed to go to sleep, but later he sighed again and said, “Dear little pig! Kind little pig! Do let me bring in my front legs. They are freezing. “All right,” said the little pig, “but you must promise not to harm me.” Before opening the door the little pig had a large sack and a thick piece of string ready. Then carefully holding the sack open behind the wolf the little pig said, “Very well. But come in backwards very carefully so that you don’t break my door down.” So the wolf moved carefully backwards until he was completely inside the house. But he did not realize until later that his whole body was now inside the sack. Quick as a flash, the little pig tied up the mouth of the sack with the string; then taking the pot of boiling water from the fire, he poured it over the sack.
The wolf howled with pain. Meanwhile the pig ran out of the door and climbed on to the roof of his house and hid behind the chimney.
Presently he heard several wolves coming, for the wolf in the sack had burst the sack open and called his friends over to help him.
The wolves looked for the pig in the house and up the roof. Finally one of them caught sight of the pig hiding behind the chimney.
“I’ll stand here,” said the first wolf who had been tied up in the sack, “and one of you must climb on to my back. Then the others must get up one by one, until we’ve made a wolf-ladder, and then we shall be able to reach the little pig.”
So the first wolf stood close to the wall of the house, while others began to climb up on each other’s backs.
But just as the tenth wolf was climbing up, the little pig shouted.
“Boiling water! Boiling water for the bad wolf! Watch out!”
The first wolf who still hurt from the boiling water, was terrified and without thinking, he dashed away as fast as he could go. The other nine wolves fell down to the ground in a struggling heap.
Some of them fell so heavily that they broke their necks and died, and others ran away as fast as they could into the forest.
When the little pig was sure he was safe, he climbed down the roof and went back to his house. Never was he troubled by the wolves again.
