"So the lad said to the cat,—
"'My dear cat! do, cat, catch the mouse, for the mouse won't gnaw the rope, the rope won't hang the smith, the smith won't hammer the axe, the axe won't chop the yoke the yoke won't pinch the ox, the ox won't drink up the water, the water won't quench the fire, the fire won't burn the fir, the fir won't fall on the Finn, the Finn won't shoot the bear, the bear won't slay the wolf, the wolf won't tear the fox, the fox won't bite Hairlock, and Hairlock won't come home in good time to tea to-day.'
"'Well!' said the cat, 'just give me a drop of milk for my kittens and then——' that's what the cat said, and the lad said, 'yes, she should have it.'
"So the cat bit mouse, and mouse gnawed rope, and rope hanged smith, and smith hammered axe, and axe chopped yoke, and yoke pinched ox, and ox drank water, and water quenched fire, and fire burnt fir, and fir felled Finn, and Finn shot bear, and bear slew graylegs, and graylegs tore fox, and fox bit Hairlock, so that she sprang home and knocked off one of her hind legs against the barn wall.
"So there lay the nanny-goat, and if she's not dead she limps about on three legs.
"But as for Osborn Boots, he said it served her just right, because she would not come home in good time for tea that very day."
OSBORN BOOTS AND MR. GLIBTONGUE.
"Once on a time there was a king who had many hundred sheep, and many hundred goats and kine; and many hundred horses he had too, and silver and gold in great heaps. But for all that he was so given to grief, that he seldom or ever saw folk, and much less say a word to them. Such he had been ever since his youngest daughter was lost, and if he had never lost her it would still have been bad enough, for there was a troll who was for ever making such waste and worry there that folk could hardly pass to the king's grange in peace. Now the troll let all the horses loose, and they trampled down mead and corn-field, and ate up the crops; now he tore the heads off the king's ducks and geese; sometimes he killed the king's kine in the byre, sometimes he drove the king's sheep and goats down the rocks and broke their necks, and every time they went to fish in the mill-dam he had hunted all the fish to land and left them lying there dead.
"Well! there was a couple of old folk who had three sons, the first was called Peter, the second Paul, and the third Osborn Boots, for he always lay and grubbed about in the ashes.