one had to think twice before crossing him. And so the old witch had
no help for it but to turn round and go home again.

So when the man's daughter got home, her step-mother and her step-
sister were more spiteful against her than ever; for now she was much
neater, and so smart, it was a joy to look at her. Still she couldn't
get leave to live with them, but they drove her out into a pigsty.
That was to be her house. So she scrubbed it out so neat and clean,
and then she opened her casket, just to see what she had got for her
wages. But as soon as ever she unlocked it, she saw inside so much
gold and silver, and lovely things, which came streaming out till all
the walls were hung with them, and at last the pigsty was far grander
than the grandest king's palace. And when the step-mother and her
daughter came to see this, they almost jumped out of their skin, and
began to ask what kind of a place she had down there?

'Oh', said the lassie, 'can't you see, when I have got such good
wages. 'Twas such a family, and such a mistress to serve, you
couldn't find their like anywhere.'

Yes! the woman's daughter made up her mind to go out to serve too,
that she might get just such another gold casket. So they sat down to
spin again, and now the woman's daughter was to spin bristles, and
the man's daughter flax, and she whose thread first snapped, was to
go down the well. It wasn't long, as you may fancy, before the
woman's daughter's thread snapped, and so they threw her down the
well.

So the same thing happened. She fell to the bottom, but met with no
harm, and found herself on a lovely green meadow. When she had walked