“Oh, darling, pretty, good, nice, clever mother,” said the sixth.
“Oh, darling, pretty, good, nice, clever, sweet mother,” said the seventh.
So they begged for the Pancake all round, the one more prettily than the other; for they were so hungry and so good.
“Yes, yes, bairns, only bide a bit till it turns itself”—she ought to have said, “till I can get it turned”—“and then you shall all have some—a lovely sweet-milk Pancake; only look how fat and happy it lies there.”
When the Pancake heard that it got afraid, and in a trice it turned itself all of itself, and tried to jump out of the pan; but it fell back into it again t’other side up, and so when it had been fried a little on the other side, too, till it got firmer in its flesh, it sprang out on the floor, and rolled off like a wheel through the door and down the hill.
“Holloa! Stop, Pancake!” and away went the goody after it, with the frying-pan in one hand and the ladle in the other, as fast as she could, and her bairns behind her, while the goodman limped after them last of all.
“Hi! won’t you stop? Seize it. Stop, Pancake,” they all screamed out, one after the other, and tried to catch it on the run and hold it; but the Pancake rolled on and on, and in the twinkling of an eye it was so far ahead that they couldn’t see it, for the Pancake was faster on its feet than any of them.
So when it had rolled a while it met a man.
“Good day, Pancake,” said the man.
“God bless you, Manny-panny!” said the Pancake.