The miser meets with defeat

There was a very, very rich man. As you might have guessed, he was the worst possible miser. He had many, many workers, but he would pay them next to nothing. Sometimes he would not give them any wages, but what could they do? It was so difficult to get jobs. Everyone hated this miserly boss. They all had complaints against him.

One morning a new worker arrived to apply for a job. The miser said, “Yes, I will give you a job, but I want to warn you in advance that I only pay my workers’ salary on a monthly basis. If you are expecting to receive money on a daily or weekly basis, this is not the place for you.”

Giving only monthly payments was the miser’s way of defrauding his workers of their salary. He would always find fault with them, and then he would not give them the full amount at the end of the month. If they were entitled to one hundred rupees a month, he would say, “You made such and such a mistake and for that I am deducting fifty rupees. I will give you only fifty rupees this month.” What could these poor workers do? They had to accept this injustice. But they used to curse the boss and they did not want to work for him.

The miser said to the new worker, “If you work well, I will give you the full amount plus a bonus. But if you do not do a good job, then your fate will be like these people. Your salary will be reduced.”

The new worker said, “No, I will do a very good job.”

He worked very, very hard for the whole month, better than anybody else. But the rich man was such a bad fellow. He deliberately tried to find something that this poor worker would not be able to do so that he would not have to pay him his full salary for that month.

Then the rich man had a brilliant idea. He said, “I have one last job for you this month. So far you have proved to be an excellent worker. If you can do this job, then I will give you a bonus of one hundred rupees or even more. Here are two bottles: one is small, the other is much larger. I want you to put the larger one inside the smaller one.”

The worker said, “Inside the smaller one? Oh, I can do that. It is very easy.”

The rich man said, “Very easy? Then do it in front of so many witnesses.”

The worker dashed the larger bottle against the ground and broke it into pieces. Then he collected the pieces and put them inside the smaller bottle.

The rich man was infuriated. “What are you doing?” he screamed.

The worker calmly said, “Did you not tell me to put the larger bottle inside the smaller one?”

The rich man said, “Yes, I did.”

“You did not tell me that I was not allowed to break it,” said the worker. “You asked me to put the larger one inside the smaller one, so I did it. I collected all the pieces and I put them inside.”

The rich man said, “At long last, I have met with my defeat.”

Then, in front of everyone, he gave the worker one hundred rupees plus another hundred rupees as a bonus.

Then the miser’s true nature came forward. He said, “You may take this money, but in the future I will not be able to keep you as my worker. You are fired. If I employ you, then every month I will have to give you the full amount or even more. These other workers are idiots. If I give them some difficult job, they will not be able to do it. Then I will not have to give them the full salary.”