J. F. Campbell Collection > Household stories

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GRIMM'S HOUSEHOLD STORIES.
" Will you be quiet?" cried the Cat. " Not a word, or I'll eat you."
But the poor Mouse had "All-out" at her tongue's end, and had scarcely
uttered it when the Cat made a spring, seized her in his mouth, and
swallowed her.
This happens every day in the world.
THE THREE SPINSTERS.
There was once a lazy girl who would not spin, and let her mother say
what she would she could not get her to work. At last the mother,
getting both angry and impatient, gave her a blow, which made the girl
cry very loud. Just then the Queen passing by, heard the noise, and,
stopping the carriage, she stepped into the house and asked the mother
why she beat her daughter in such a way that the passers-by in the
street heard her shrieks. The mother, however, was ashamed that
her daughter's laziness should be known, and said, " I cannot make
her leave off spinning ; she will spin for ever and ever, and I am so poor
that I cannot procure the flax." The Queen replied, " I never heard
anything I like better than spinning, and I am never more pleased than
when the wheels are whirring. Let your daughter go with me to the
castle ; I have flax enough, and she may spin as much as she pleases."
The mother was very glad at heart, and the Queen took the girl home
with her. As soon as they entered the castle she led her up into three
rooms, which were all full of the finest flax from top to bottom. " Now,
.spin this flax for me," said the Queen ; " and, when you have prepared
it all, you shall have my eldest son for a husband. Although you are
poor, I do not despise you on that account ; your unwearied industry is
dowry enough." The girl, however, was inwardly frightened, for she
could not have spun the flax had she sat there fram morning to night
until she was three hundred years old. When she was left alone she
began to cry, and thus she sat three days without stirring a hand. On