“But I can,” says she. “Go you, and bring the best of ‘em.”
“Best or worst,” says the girl, “I’ve ate ‘em all, and you can’t have one till that’s come again.”
Well, the woman she was done, and she took her spinning to the door to spin, and as she span she sang:
“My darter ha’ ate five, five pies to-day.
My darter ha’ ate five, five pies to-day.”
The king was coming down the street, and he heard her sing, but what she sang he couldn’t make out, so he stopped and said:
“What was that you were singing, my good woman?”
The woman was ashamed to let him hear what her daughter had been doing, so she sang, instead of that:
“My darter ha’ spun five, five skeins to-day.
My darter ha’ spun five, five skeins to-day.”