The Grimm brothers were from Germany and were well known for collecting German folktales from all over the country. In 1812, they published their collection of stories in a book called Children’s Tales. This title, unfortunately, is extremely misleading since most of the stories are far too frightening for children. In fact, many of the stories end with one, some, or all of the characters dying terrible deaths. The endings of some of the stories are so horrifying (and ridiculous), they’re almost funny—who thought up such dreadful endings?

You’ve probably heard of many of the more popular Grimms’ fairy tales, such as “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Cinderella,” and “Snow White.” Here’s one with a truly terrible ending that very few people have ever read—read it and see what you think.

A mouse, a bird, and a sausage all lived happily together in a little house. Each had a job. The bird flew to the forest every day to fetch wood for the fire. The mouse fetched the water from the well, started the fire, and set the table. The sausage cooked all the meals.

The sausage was a great cook. He would chop the vegetables, drop in the meat, and stir the stew. He even flavored the stew himself by climbing into the great pot over the fire and stirring the stew around himself. This gave the stew that great sausage flavor and didn’t harm him at all.

One day, the bird met another bird on his trip to fetch wood from the forest.

“Fetching firewood is the hardest work of all,” mocked the other bird. “Your friends are making a fool out of you by making you do the hardest job!”

The bird was very embarrassed by this, so he returned home without any wood and announced to his friends that he was no longer willing to gather the wood for the house. To make it fair, the friends drew lots for new jobs. The sausage got the job of fetching the wood, the mouse was now the cook, and the bird’s job was to fetch the water from the well.

Early the next morning, the sausage went out to the forest to collect wood. When he didn’t return after a few hours, the others got worried and went out looking for him. The bird flew out to the forest and when he saw a dog walking in the place where the sausage should have been, he understood what happened to his friend.

Can you guess what happened to the sausage? Yup, that’s right: the dog ate him. Do you know any dog that can resist a sausage?

The bird brought home the wood for the fire himself and told the mouse what happened. They were both very sad, but they decided to look on the bright side and go on with life as usual. The bird set the table and the mouse stirred the stew, and then he climbed up into the stew just like the sausage used to do.

Can you guess what happened to the mouse? Yup, the mouse became part of the stew and that was the end of the mouse.

The bird hadn’t seen his friend’s demise. When he went looking for the mouse around the stew pot, he bumped some burning wood out of the fireplace setting the whole house on fire. The bird took his bucket and went to get water to put out the fire, but he fell down the well with the bucket. Can you guess what happened to the bird? Yup, he drowned in the well.

Great story (just kidding)!

The end.