Nasreddin was a poor man, so he tried to grow
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he could in his own garden, so that he would not have to buy so many in the market.
One evening he heard a noise in his garden and looked out of the window. A white ox had got into the garden and
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his vegetables. Nasreddin at once took his stick, ran out and chased the ox, but he was too old to catch it. When he got back to his garden, he found that the ox had ruined most of his precious vegetables.
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, while he
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in the street near his house, he saw a cart with two white oxen which looked very much like the one that
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his vegetables. He was carrying his stick with him,
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he at once began to beat the two oxen with it. As neither of them looked more like the ox that had eaten his vegetables than the other, he beat both of them equally hard.
The owner of the ox and cart was drinking coffee in a
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coffee-house. When he saw
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Nasreddin was doing
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his animals, he ran out and shouted, "What are you doing What have those poor animals done to you for you to beat them like that"
"You keep out this!" Nasreddin shouted back, "This is a matter between me and one of these two oxen. He knows very well
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I am beating him!"