“Why do you dance with no one?”
“It is better to dance alone. You need wait for no one, and your partner is always with you.”
“Have you had nothing yet from the marriage-supper?” he asked simpering.
“No!”
“Come in and eat,” said the proud farmer, and he placed her at the wedding-table, which continued the whole day to be served afresh. Amrie ate very little; but the farmer would have continued his amusement by making her drink wine.
“No,” she said; “if I drink, somebody must lead me home; I could no longer go alone. Mariann says, ‘One’s own feet is the best carriage—it is always harnessed.’”
They were all astonished at the wit of the child.
The young farmer came with his wife and asked her, jokingly, “if she had brought them a wedding-present? All who eat,” he said, “must bring a present.”
At this question the old farmer, with incredible generosity, secretly thrust a sixpence into the child’s hand. Amrie, nodding to the farmer, held the sixpence fast, and said to the young couple,—
“I have now the promise and the fee. Your departed mother promised that I, and no other, should be nursery-maid to her first grandchild.”