Ages ago a water nix would bring fish to the so-called Oil Mill located at Frauendorf Manor on a channel of the River Spree near Cottbus. The nix would ask the miller to cook the fish, after which the nix would eat them right at the mill. With time these uncanny visits came to annoy the miller, but he never dared to turn down his uninvited visitor's requests.
However, the time came when fate freed him from the nix.
One evening a bear trainer came to Frauendorf with his tamed bear and asked the miller for a night's lodging. The latter, a good-hearted man, did not refuse him. To keep it from harming anyone, the bear was chained up behind the table in the main room.
Not long afterward the nix entered the mill with a catch of fish. With the miller's permission he cooked them, and then sat down next to the bear behind the table and began to eat them. The hungry bear could not resist the tempting smell of the tasty meal, and wasted no time in helping himself from the nix's plate. This angered the nix, who struck at the bear's paws with his spoon. The bear let this happen a few times, but when the blows became more painful, he became furious. He grabbed the nix and crushed him terribly, until the bear trainer jumped up and rescued the nearly dead nix from the beast's claws.
The nix ran quickly out the door, jumped into the water, and was not seen again for a whole year. At the end of this time, the miller was one day working near his waterway, when the nix, wearing his red cap, suddenly emerged from the water, greeted the miller, then asked with a whining voice, "Master miller, do you still have that large cat?"
The miller, fearing that the nix wanted to take up his regular visits again, quickly answered, "Yes, she is lying behind the stove, and she has ninety-nine young ones!"
To this the nix replied, "I'll never again come to your place!" Then he disappeared beneath the water and was never seen there again.
