dumps; for to church they must go, and yet it looked as if they
should never get there. So at last the Sheriff said, that yonder in
the gilded hut, in the copse, lived a maiden, and if they could only
get the loan of her calf:

'I know it can drag the coach, though it were as heavy as a
mountain.'

Well they all thought it would look silly to be drawn to church by a
calf, but there was no help for it, so they had to send a third time,
and ask so prettily in the King's name, if he couldn't get the loan
of the calf the Sheriff had spoken of, and the Mastermaid let them
have it on the spot, for she was not going to say 'no' this time
either. So they put the calf on before the horses, and waited to see
if it would do any good, and away went the coach over high and low,
and stock and stone, so that they could scarce draw their breath;
sometimes they were on the ground, and sometimes up in the air, and
when they reached the church, the calf began to run round and round
it like a spinning jenny, so that they had hard work to get out of
the coach, and into the church. When they went back, it was the same
story, only they went faster, and they reached the palace almost
before they knew they had set out.

Now when they sat down to dinner, the Prince who had served with the
Giant said he thought they ought to ask the maiden who had lent them
her shovel-handle and porch-door, and calf, to come up to the palace.

'For', said he, 'if we hadn't got these three things, we should have
been sticking here still.'