Stories to Read or Tell from Fairy Tales and Folklore
that there was neither food nor money in the house, and now he had lost one of her good cows also. "We must do something to live," says she. "Over to the fair you must go to-morrow morning, and take the black cow with you and sell her."And off in the morning at an early hour brave Jack started, and never halted until he was in the fair. When he came into the fair, he saw a big crowd gathered in a ring in the street. Said Jack to himself, "I wonder what are they looking at."Into the crowd he pushed, and saw the wee man this day again with a Mouse and a Bum-clock, and he put them down in the street and whistled. The Mouse and the Bum-clock stood up on their hind legs and got hold of each other and began to dance there and jig, and as they did there was not a man or woman in the street who didn't begin to jig also, and Jack and the black cow, and the wheels and the reels, and the pots and pans, all of them were jigging and dancing all over the town, and the houses themselves were jumping and hopping about, and such a place Jack or any one else never saw before.When the man lifted the Mouse and the Bum-clock into his pocket, they all stopped dancing and settled down, and everybody laughed right hearty. The man turned to Jack. "Jack," said he, "I am glad to see you; how would you like to have these animals?""I should like well to have them," says Jack, says he, "only I cannot.""Why cannot you?" says the man."O," says Jack, says he, "I have no money, and my poor mother is very down-hearted. She sent me to the fair to sell this cow and bring some money to lift her heart.""O," says the man, says he, "if you want to lift your mother's heart I will sell you the Mouse, and when you set the Bee to play the Harp and the Mouse to dance to it, your mother will laugh if she never laughed in her life before.""But I have no money," says Jack, says he, "to buy your Mouse.""I don't mind," says the man, says he, "I will take your cow for it."Poor Jack was so taken with the Mouse and had his mind so set on it, that he thought it was a grand bargain entirely, and he gave the man his cow, and took the Mouse and started off for home, and when he got home his mother welcomed him."Jack," says she, "I see you have sold the cow.""I did that," says Jack."Did you sell her well?" says she."Very well indeed," says Jack, says he."How much did you get for her?""I didn't get money," says he, "but I got value.""O, Jack! Jack!" says she, "what do you mean?""I will soon show you that, mother," says he, taking the Mouse out of his pocket and the Harp and the Bee and setting all on the floor; and when he began to whistle the Bee began to play, and the Mouse go up on its hind legs and began to dance and jig, and the mother gave such a hearty laugh as she never laughed in her life before. To 
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