He was an ugly little beggar, especially now, when he was shaking all over his body, because he thought that his last hour had struck. But that was just how she liked to see him. She thought that quite the right attitude for a man. And, when he saw that she gave no sign of making for him, he recovered to such an extent that he was able to finish his speech:
“I quite understand that you can’t see anything at all good-looking in me,” he said. “I don’t want to make myself out better than I am; and I am only a miserable man. But, if I could become the father of a daughter who was like you, I should consider that I had attained the object of my life and give thanks most humbly for my good fortune.”
Then a wonderful thing came to pass. She took the leg of a fly and threw it to him, which among spiders means the same as “yes.”
Quivering with happiness and apprehension, he crept nearer to her.
“Very well,” she said. “I accept you. But mind you don’t irritate me. For then I’ll eat you.”
“She’s accepted him!” said the mouse and swooned away with delight.
“She’s accepted him!” said the goat’s-foot and the parsley.
“She’s accepted him!” said the twigs on the stubs and rustled for sheer astonishment.
“She’s accepted him!” cried the gentleman-spiders, who had come back, but now ran away again, partly to spread the news in the hedge and partly so as not to be eaten at the wedding.
And it was a wedding.