"Oh do not go!" said the wife, "I feel as if the house were on fire."
But the man went out and looked at the bird.
"Who all my bones in pieces found;
Them in a handkerchief she bound,
And laid them under the almond tree.
Kywitt, kywitt, kywitt, I cry,
Oh what a beautiful bird am I!"
With that the bird let fall the gold chain upon his father's neck, and it fitted him exactly. So he went indoors and said,
"Look what a beautiful chain the bird has given me."
Then his wife was so terrified that she fell all along on the floor, and her cap came off. Then the bird began again to sing,
"It was my mother who murdered me;"
"Oh," groaned the mother, "that I were a thousand fathoms under ground, so as not to be obliged to hear it."
"It was my father who ate of me;"
Then the woman lay as if she were dead.