“What does yourself mean, you old blather-skite?” says the old man, says he.
Says she, “Didn’t you come out to the byre and ask me for the jug of milk there, an’ didn’t I give it to you, and didn’t you drink it all?”
“Be this and be that,” says he, “but this is a nice how-do-ye-do. It’s that scoundrel,” says he, “in the kitchen that’s tricked ye again. An’ be this an’ be that,” says he, “I’m goin’ down now to have his life.”
And when she heard how she had been tricked, she was not a bit sorry to let him go and have Manis’s life.
But Manis had been listening with his ear to the keyhole to hear what was going on, and when he heard this, and while the man was preparing to go down and take his life, he hauled in a calf, and put it by the fireside where he had been lying, and threw the cover over it.
And when the man came down with the sledge-hammer, he went to the place where he knew Manis had been lying, and he struck with all his might, and he drove the hammer through the calfs skull, and the calf only just gave one moo! and died. And then the old fellow went back to his bed content, and the miller went out and off home again.
When the old fellow and his woman got up in the morning early to go and bury the miller, they found the trick he had played on them, and they were in a pretty rage. But when the breakfast was made this morning, and Donal and all of them sat down, I can tell you the old fellow was in no hurry saying grace, and Donal he got his hearty fill for once in his life anyhow, and so did he at night.
And when Donal was going back home on Monday morning, he leapt the mill-race, and Manis came out, and gave him a cheer. He took Manis’s both hands, and he shook them right hearty.
And every Monday morning after, for the three years that the old fellow lived, Manis always saw Donal leap the mill-race as easy as a sparrow might hop over a rod.