A Priceless Gift
Long ago, an honest merchant lived in ____, Italy.
His name was Antonio, and he went to ____ places to support his family by trading.
One ____, he filled his ship with goods and visited a faraway island.
There he traded ____ for spices and books for nuts.
Thanks to Antonio, the ____ could get what they needed.
One ____, Antonio had dinner with the island’s queen at her palace.
When dinner was ____, rats appeared, and some servants chased them away with sticks.
Antonio was ____ surprised that there were rats in the palace.
He asked, “Are there no ____ on this island?”
The ____ looked puzzled.
“What is a cat?” she asked.
The merchant said to himself, “What the islanders here need is not tools or ____, but cats.”
He brought two cats from his ship and let them run ____.
“What amazing animals!” cried the queen ____ she saw all the rats run away.
She gave ____ a chest that was filled with jewels.
Back in Italy, Antonio told his ____ about his good fortune.
____, the richest merchant in Genoa, heard the story and was jealous.
“Cats are worthless,” Luigi ____.
“I’ll ____ the queen what is really valuable.
I’m sure that the queen will ____ me more jewels.”
Luigi packed his ship with wonderful paintings and ____ works of art.
He took the gifts to the island.
To get a chance to meet the queen, he told the islanders a lie that he was a good ____ of Antonio’s.
When the queen heard about Luigi, she invited him to her palace for ____.
Before sitting down at the table, Luigi presented the queen with all his gifts, and the queen thanked him ____ and again.
“I’ll repay you with a priceless gift,” ____ the queen.
Luigi watched the queen ____ in a servant’s ear.
He became ____ and hopeful.
He was ____ that he would receive more jewels than Antonio.
After a while, the servant returned with a ____, and the queen presented it to Luigi.
____ Luigi opened the box, he was speechless.
There was a kitten in the box.
“Antonio gave us the priceless cats, and we now have some kittens,” ____ the queen.
“In ____ for the wonderful gifts you gave us, we want to give you what is most valuable to us.”
Luigi realized that, in the queen’s mind, the kitten was worth ____ more than all the jewels in the world.
He tried to look ____ with the gift.
He knew that was the right ____ to do.
Luigi did not return home a richer ____.
But he was surely a wiser ____.